Ukraine’s failure to secure an invitation to join NATO during the alliance’s annual summit in Vilnius, Lithuania, disappointed many, including Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
But although the summit’s concluding statement did not offer a definitive timetable for Ukrainian accession, it did demonstrate a degree of unity and strategic foresight that would have been impossible had Donald Trump still been president of the United States.
To be sure, NATO leaders’ promise to extend an official invitation to Ukraine “when Allies agree and conditions are met” was somewhat nebulous and Zelenskyy, angered by the ambiguity, criticized the Western position as “unprecedented and absurd.” But U.S. President Joe Biden was right to suggest that the war must end before Ukraine is allowed to join.