April 2, 2024 (EIRNS)—In Berlin, the Bundestag has been advised that Paris’s direct military presence on the battlefield in Ukraine would be unilateral, not a decision of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), and would, therefore, not invoke Article 5 of its Charter. The EurAsian Times cites Zeit Online reporting that the Bundestag’s “scientific services” said the deployment of ground troops “from a NATO country in Ukraine would not automatically make all other allies parties to the conflict.” The state in question “would itself become a party to the conflict,” the report said, quoting an unidentified official. “If the NATO member state acts unilaterally—i.e., not within the framework of a previously decided NATO operation and outside NATO military command structures—neither NATO as a whole nor the other NATO partner states become parties to the conflict.”
The “scientific services” developed their analysis and conclusion in response to a parliamentary inquiry from Beatrix von Storch, a Bundestag member from Alternative für Deutschland (AfD). She had reportedly asked about the ramifications when a NATO member country deploys its own ground troops.
