A popular argument from Russian trolls is that NATO promised not to expand, and then expanded anyway, and therefore Russia has the right to invade Ukraine.
It is claimed that Gorbachev was promised this verbally in a meeting.
Since Gorbachev only had an international role until the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991 such a promise must have been made up until 1991.
The arguments against are:
In short, Russia accepted in writing the expansion of NATO here:
https://www.nato.int/cps/su/natohq/official_texts_25468.htm
with the critical part being:
”
respect for sovereignty, independence and territorial integrity of all states and their inherent right to choose the means to ensure their own security”
Former Warsaw Pact countries wanted to join NATO to avoid being invaded by Russia applied and the first invitation came in July 1997, that is after the Founding Act was signed.
The only deal on enlargement is the 1990
Treaty on the Final Settlement with Respect to Germany. where NATO troops are not to be based in former East Germany - until a new German government decides otherwise.
en.wikisource.org
Before signing the Founding Act, Yeltsin wanted to have a promise of no-expansion from Bill Clinton, but this was denied. This is shown in the notes taken from the meeting, available in the Clinton Library.
Washington, D.C., October 2, 2018 – President Bill Clinton saw Russian leader Boris Yeltsin as indispensable for promoting American interests following the collapse of the Soviet Union, often prompting him to take controversial steps to ensure Yeltsin’s political survival, according to top-level...
nsarchive.gwu.edu
Instead it was agreed to postpone discussions until after critical elections.
Putin and Russian Trolls are lying their teeth out, when they claim that NATO promised - no expansion.
The West is for lack of a better description, led by a bunch of deranged people who have been caught lying, checked on every front wherever they have tried to move against Russia. Now they wanna argue that NATO expansion is legit?
Those who have a history of brutal colonization, enslavement and occupation of other people and their lands, cannot lecture others on what is legitimate and what is not.
The West has no moral backbone to begin with. Whether the slaughter of 10 million Congolese by the Belgian colonialists, or the world's first Concentration Camps set up by the wretched british in Bloemfontein, South Africa during the Boer Wars 1899-1902. Or whether it be the Rawagede Massacre of Indonesians by the dutch in 1947.
What's worse, is that to this day, the West still practices its colonialism by more refined and sophisticated means. Where France to date, prints the currencies of West African countries such as Burkina Faso, Mali, Niger, Cote de Ivore and etc, on its own soil.
One thing has become transparently obvious and that the West has finally met an adversary which is vastly more powerful, unimaginably abundant in resources and a miraculously just and honorable as a Superpower, which is the Russian Federation. And guess what, the harder the West tries to exert its evil oppression on Russia, the weaker and more exposed it becomes before the world.
There is absolutely nothing the West has in its arsenal that can defeat Russia militarily or economically. Anyone who doesn't read the writing on the wall, is hopelessly illiterate and devoid of even an iota of genuine intellect. That is because the West and its idiot supporters are prisoners of their hubris, their vanity and their arrogance.
Today the West weakening as I speak and the world is witnessing the true evil face of the West. Even some upright individuals of the West, are raising their voices and pointing out the duplicity and deceit of the West's leadership. Whether it be from its military, or be it from the Political Science arena, or be it from the financial sector. Voices are emerging and exposing the truly weakened West before the world.
So as we witness the West weaken, we see how increasingly desperate the West is becoming. More importantly, the West's economic clout has not just waned, but is also vanishing at very steady pace.
It won't be long before the world witnesses the West's desperation turn into outright thuggery and NATO try to attack Russia. What will unfold, is the West comprehensively beaten in conventional war and in its last gasp, the West will resort to nukes. And that would the final straw, where the West as you and know it to be, will exist no more.
Those who laugh this post, are but depraved and mindless buffoons, drunk the bull$h!t the Western MSM feeds them. So go ahead, laugh your head off, for it only shows how utterly deluded and spinless they really are.
Russia will remain dominant over its rivals until Judgement Day, as promised by Allah Subhanahu Wata'aalah.