Alabama's Morning News with JT
Jonathan Savage says plenty of leaders are meeting during the NATO Summit in DC
The Decono Music and Spirits Festival returns to Centennial Park Saturday, August 3rd from 2 to 10 p.m. And it's free! Live music from the Warren Treaty! Chris Daniels and the Kings is Callie and More. Enjoy a spirits competition. Kidzone and fireworks presented by Oxy and the City of Decono. Admission and parking are free. The Decono Music and Spirits Festival brought to you by Breckenridge Brewery and City of Decono. Go to thecityofdecono.com for more information. So, does it look like Ukraine is going to get what they're asking for? We're joined now by Jonathan Savage, who's live in London. Jonathan, what other things happened yesterday at the meeting? Yes, the speech by President Biden, probably the keynote moment of that first day, promising to provide Ukraine with five new strategic air defense systems. Not just the US doing that, but NATO countries as a whole. No, not every NATO country is entirely on site, Turkey and Hungary. I've said that they're not going to get involved, but President Biden said that this is a pivotal moment for NATO, and a pivotal moment in the war between Russia and Ukraine. How much of the responsibility to pay for all of this is going to fall on bigger countries like the United States? I would assume the bulk seems where the bigger countries. Yeah, the United States contributes more in absolute terms than any other of Ukraine's supporters. And it's also worth mentioning that NATO itself, as an organization, that it's not involved in the war, but it is supporting Ukraine. It's kind of striking a balance. There's no NATO mission in Ukraine, but the individual countries are working together within the structure of NATO to do this. So, lots of countries have contributed to Ukraine. Many of them are in NATO, Germany, the United Kingdom, France, smaller countries as well. But yeah, you're right, state that the US is likely to face the biggest bill. And Ukraine, the war continues on. There doesn't seem to be any sort of a chance that Russia is going to let up. Ukraine doesn't have the ability to hold out forever, so they're going to need the support of these other countries in order to stay in the battle. Was Zelensky, he was there yesterday, wasn't he? Yeah, President Zelensky has been invited to this NATO summit as he has to others. You may be spent months and months asking NATO leaders, please give us more air defenses because Russia has this enormous aerial arsenal that they're firing at us. President Zelensky said at an event in Washington, D.C., he gave a speech, he said the world is waiting for November when the US General Election takes place, and he's urging American voters to stand by Ukraine, whoever that means they vote for. And President Zelensky, he's also, is he asking once again for a membership to NATO? Yes. Ukraine wants membership to NATO. They're not very happy that they don't have a detailed calendar, a clear timescale. But what he is going to get this week is a statement from NATO, providing what I think is going to be pretty strong language, suggesting that NATO, the Ukraine's path to NATO membership is irreversible. And NATO will not accept Ukraine as a member while the war is going on, because that would automatically trigger our response from NATO, and they have to fight Russia face-to-face and that's not going to happen. I was going to say I'm pretty sure that the last thing that many countries, America included is interested in is going to war with Russia. Correct. They don't want World War III. They are being striking a balance for two and a half years between giving Ukraine the means to defend itself and not getting drawn into World War III. And also this has led to Ukraine making greater and greater demands of its allies in the West. And often these demands have been rebuffed, but then give it a few months and those demands get accepted from tanks to fighter projects to patriot air defense and missile supplies. President Zelensky's been pretty good at getting his allies to give him what he wants. Jonathan Savage, live from London, thank you so much for joining us this morning on Alabama's Morning News. Thank you. The Dakota Music and Spirits Festival returns to Centennial Park Saturday, August 3rd from 2 to 10 p.m., and it's free live music from the Warren Treaty. Chris Daniels and the Kings is Callie and Moore. Enjoy a spirits competition, Kidzone and fireworks presented by Oxy and the City of Dakota, admission and parking are free. The Dakota Music and Spirits Festival brought to you by Breckenridge Brewery and City of Dakota. Go to the city of Dakota.com for more information.