This story has been updated.
A day after President Barack Obama said that the United States has no
plan for countering the Islamic State, that it would not confront the
Islamist militant group in Syria alone, and that it doesn't intend
anything stronger than fiscal sanctions to punish Russia for invading
Ukraine, sources within NATO said that the alliance is also unlikely to
act directly.
Instead, European Union leaders, who are
meeting
in Brussels on Saturday, Aug. 30, are likely to issue a new round of
sanctions in retaliation for Russia's most recent incursion into
Ukraine. A NATO source familiar with discussions on the EU's response to
Russia told
Foreign Policy that the new sanctions could be levied as early as Saturday.
"It's obvious at this point that there are going to be new sanctions,"
the source said. "All of this was decided before what happened
yesterday."
According to a British report obtained by
Bloomberg,
the United Kingdom will recommend banning Russia's access to the
Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication, or SWIFT, a
key avenue through which Russia acccesses the international financial
system.
The source was referring to comments Obama made Thursday, which included
his plan to build a coalition of countries willing to take the fight to
the Islamic State, also known as ISIS and ISIL, in Syria.
Obama -- who will also attend the NATO summit in Wales next week --
tapped
Secretary of State John Kerry to lead the diplomatic effort to get
allies on board against the Sunni militant group that has seized wide
swaths of territory in Iraq and Syria.
"The violence that's been taking place in Syria has obviously given ISIL
a safe haven there in ungoverned spaces, and in order for us to degrade
ISIL over the long term, we're going to have to build a regional
strategy," Obama said during Thursday's White House
news conference.
"As I've said, rooting out a cancer like ISIL will not be quick or easy,
but I'm confident that we can and we will, working closely with our
allies and our partners," the president added.
The source also reaffirmed Obama's assertion that there would be no
immediate military response to Russia's opening of a third front in its
incurious into
eastern Ukraine, which came about six months after it first drew Western ire for annexing Crimea in March.
"We don't expect to have a major resolution coming from NATO. This is
going to be the work of individual allies, very likely this weekend,"
the source said. "Where we're going to be a week from now is anyone's
guess. We're going to be bound by the limitations built in the [NATO]
treaty. We're not going to intervene militarily."
This source also said that NATO is not likely to act as an umbrella for
any coordinated action against the Islamic State in Syria or Iraq.
"There's going to be a lot of discussion about what allies can do," the
source said. "What NATO can do is more of a question. There is no
intention of having a NATO multinational operation in Iraq or Syria."
The source indicated that NATO could be involved in training or
supplying Iraqi troops. However, "for anything large scale, you would
need to have boots on the ground, which we're not going to have."
In an interview with
Foreign Policy, NATO
Deputy Secretary-General Alexander Vershbow confirmed that the alliance
wouldn't undertake coordinated action in Ukraine. He said that the
alliance would continue "capacity building, but it's not direct security
assistance. NATO simply doesn't do that. This is a question for each of
the nations to decide what they can do."
On the threat posed by the Islamic State, Vershbow said that NATO could assist Iraqi forces through a
training program that
has been shelved since the end of the Iraq war. But he added, "There's
reluctance to make a commitment [to the program] before [
Iraqi politicians] get their
act together."
"We have been paying more and more attention and stepping up
intelligence sharing on the threat," he added. "But at this point, no
one is proposing any direct military action by NATO."
These comments reinforce what Obama said Thursday. Throughout the week,
multiple reports of imminent airstrikes in Syria ratcheted up
expectations of impending action. However, Obama said that any action in
Syria would be done only in consultation with allies. He said that he
and Kerry would meet with NATO allies next week and that then Kerry
would meet with cooperative leaders in the Middle East to develop a
strategy to confront the group.
All this comes as Ukraine is making a new push to join NATO. Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk
announced
Friday that he would introduce a bill canceling his country's status as
a nonaligned country and restoring "its aspirations to become a NATO
member."
"This law will prohibit the Ukrainian state to become part of any other
economic, political or military alliances that would hinder the main
goal of accession to the EU," Yatsenyuk later
wrote on Facebook.
Vershbow noted that Ukraine began the formal process of gaining NATO
membership in 2008. He said it is up to Kiev to meet the standards
needed to join the alliance.
"It's their choice. It's sort of the principle that every nation has the
right to secure its security arrangements," he said. "Clearly, this is a
very sensitive issue with the Russians."
"Ukraine's potential membership in NATO, in light of [Russia's]
aggression -- many people in NATO wouldn't be surprised that they
started to talk up the … option again."
New
sanctions
against Russia by the European Union would be a significant escalation.
Since the Ukraine crisis began, Europe, led by Germany, had been
reluctant to punish Russia severely, fearing collateral damage to
European economies. But after pro-Russian separatists shot down Malaysia
Airlines Flight 17, the severity of European sanctions were increased,
and countersanctions targeting European and American agricultural
products were issued by Moscow.
Now, with Russian troops fighting along three fronts in Ukraine, it
appears as if harsher sanctions are on the way. Speaking ahead of the
summit, and without specifying what the new punishments would be,
European foreign ministers said that they have no choice but to levy new
penalties.
"The European Union should be ready to move forward with possible new
measures against Russia because the situation is still getting worse,"
the
Associated Press quoted Estonian Foreign Minister Urmas Paet as saying.
Meanwhile, Russian President Vladimir Putin remained defiant, comparing Ukraine to Nazi Germany.
"Sad as it might seem, this reminds me of the events of World War II,
when the German Nazi occupants surrounded our cities, like Leningrad,
and directly shelled those cities and their inhabitants," Putin said,
according to state-controlled
RT.
He also
called
on Russian-backed separatists to create a "humanitarian corridor for
Ukrainian service members who have been surrounded, so as to avoid any
needless loss of life, giving them the opportunity to leave the combat
area unimpeded and reunite with their families, to return them to their
mothers, wives, and children, and to quickly provide medical assistance
to those who were injured in the course of the military operation."
Any new sanctions would have to be approved by the entire European
Union. When the crisis began, the German public and business community,
as well as some in the German political establishment, were reluctant to
punish Putin. However, according to Ulrich Speck, visiting scholar at
the Carnegie Europe think tank in Brussels, Putin's latest incursion
gives German Chancellor Angela Merkel no choice but to impose harsher
penalties.
"There is no other game; there is no plan B," Speck told
Foreign Policy.
"Neither the EU nor the U.S. is going to go to war. The only hope now
is to really increase the pressure so that Putin at least will limit his
recent incursion.
"This is the failure of more than half a year of really tough efforts,
especially on the German side," Ulrich added. "All these meetings, all
this diplomacy has really been exhausted and it failed. There is no
other way to stop Putin."
Photo by Chip Somodevilla / Getty Images News
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