A Quote by Toomas Hendrik Ilves

I realised that if we were not in the E.U., there were people in the E.U. who were also members of NATO that would veto our joining NATO.

Toomas Hendrik Ilves

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Also Joining Members NATO Our People Realised Veto Were Would

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Toomas Hendrik Ilves
Estonian - Politician
Born: December 26, 1953

NATO is in our national security interests. And, yes, we pay a lot for it, but, when we had Afghanistan, NATO troops were by our side from almost all of the NATO members. And they put their life and treasure on the line for us.

James Franklin Jeffrey

You have to listen to Trump in a nonpolitical way. When Trump starts talking on the campaign trail, "NATO's pointless, it's worthless. We're paying the lion's share and these people aren't contributing, and that's gonna end. This make America great, put America first." People think, "Wow! We're gonna get out of NATO, finally. He's gonna close up NATO!" No. If you listen very carefully, he was complaining that the other members were not doing their part.

Rush Limbaugh

Following the end of the Cold War, there was much discussion concerning the point of NATO. In the event, it was reinvented as a means of reducing Russia's reach on its western frontiers and seeking to isolate it. Its former East European client states were admitted to NATO, as were the Baltic states.

Martin Jacques

I'm deeply satisfied with the decisions that were taken by Warsaw NATO Summit in 2016, where the presence of the military forces of NATO in Poland was guaranteed.

Andrzej Duda

In Ukraine, there has never been a consensus behind NATO membership. Even Yulia Tymoshenko was noncommittal when she was still prime minister. Georgia under President Mikhail Saakashvili pursued a rather aggressive stance, which stood in the way of its NATO membership. Given both states' unique relationships with Russia, concerns were justified that NATO membership would trigger Russia's reasonable fears of encirclement.

Heinrich August Winkler

I welcome the fact that Trump has clearly stated that NATO is not obsolete.And I think, also, that reflects that NATO is adapting. NATO is the most successful alliance in history because we have been able to change, to adapt when the world is changing. And now NATO is stepping up its effort in the global fight against terrorism, and we are responding to a more assertive Russia with an increase of our collective defense, with more presence in the eastern part of the alliance.

Jens Stoltenberg

Let's allow Poland and the Czech Republic to have that missile shield that they were entitled to by joining NATO. I think that's the right strategic response to Russian aggression.

Mike Pence

NATO was a wonderful idea. It was formed in 1949. We are as far away from NATO as NATO was when it was done in time from the presidency of Grover Cleveland.

Barney Frank

I think NATO is obsolete. NATO was done at a time you had the Soviet Union, which was obviously larger - much larger than Russia is today. I'm not saying Russia is not a threat. But we have other threats. We have the threat of terrorism. And NATO doesn't discuss terrorism. NATO's not meant for terrorism. NATO doesn't have the right countries in it for terrorism.

Donald Trump

In 2003, at the time I made my "Old Europe" comment, the center of gravity in NATO and Europe had long since shifted to the East. With the former Warsaw Pact countries joining NATO, the alliance has a different mix today. Some people were sensitive about my comment because they thought it was a pejorative way of highlighting demographic realities. Apparently they felt it pointed a white light at a weakness in Europe - an aging population. Europe has come some distance since World War II in becoming Europe.

Donald Rumsfeld

Americans know that a strong alliance of free, sovereign and independent nations is the best defense for our freedoms and for our interests. That is why my administration has demanded that all members of NATO finally meet their full and fair financial obligation. As a result of this insistence, billions of dollars more have begun to pour into NATO. In fact, people are shocked. But billions and billions of dollars more coming in from countries that, in my opinion, would not have been paying so quickly.

Donald Trump

I got recruited to join a research team at SCL group which, at the time, was a British military contractor based in London. Most of its clients were various ministries of defense in NATO countries. And what we were looking at is how to use data online to identify people who would be likely targets of different extremist groups.

Christopher Wylie

Okay, NATO expanded to East Berlin and East Germany. Under [Bill] Clinton NATO expanded further, to the former Russian satellites. In 2008 NATO formally made an offer to Ukraine to join NATO. That's unbelievable. I mean, Ukraine is the geopolitical heartland of Russian concern, quite aside from historical connections, population and so on.

Noam Chomsky

NATO has a special relationship with countries far away from Europe: Australia, Japan, South Korea. They have joint projects and programmes which are being implemented without these countries becoming members of NATO.

Sergei Lavrov

[Mikhail] Gorbachev said that he would agree to the unification of Germany, and even adherence of Germany to NATO, which was quite a concession, if NATO didn't move to East Germany. And [George] Bush and [James] Baker promised verbally, that's critical, verbally that NATO would not expand "one inch to the east," which meant East Germany. Nobody was talking about anything farther at the time. They would not expand one inch to the east. Now that was a verbal promise. It was never written. NATO immediately expanded to East Germany.

Noam Chomsky

I think if NATO haven't expanded, we would have a no-man's zone between the E.U. and NATO and Russia, and that would be very dangerous.