Bill Clinton: I Tried to Put Russia on Another Path - The Atlantic - 0 views
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When I first became president, I said that I would support Russian President Boris Yeltsin in his efforts to build a good economy and a functioning democracy after the dissolution of the Soviet Union—but I would also support an expansion of NATO to include former Warsaw Pact members and post-Soviet states. My policy was to work for the best while preparing for the worst.
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Lately, NATO expansion has been criticized in some quarters for provoking Russia and even laying the groundwork for Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. The expansion certainly was a consequential decision, one that I continue to believe was correct.
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As United Nations ambassador and later secretary of state, my friend Madeleine Albright, who recently passed away, was an outspoken supporter of NATO expansion. So were Secretary of State Warren Christopher; National Security Adviser Tony Lake; his successor, Sandy Berger; and two others with firsthand experience in the area:
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