More ballast for an already bloated and and sclerotic NATO. From Michael Tracey at newsweek.com:
As NATO members gather in Lithuania this week with traditional Eastern European fanfare, the chief focus of their deliberations is whether to extend formal membership to Ukraine amid the ongoing war. But the question of whether Ukraine officially joins NATO may have turned into something of a red herring. The truth is Ukraine has already been unofficially incorporated into NATO. As University of Chicago international relations professor Paul Poast, a passionate advocate for NATO’s swift admittance of Ukraine, aptly put it, “NATO has already expanded into the war zone. The allies should just acknowledge that reality.”
A year and a half into the war, it can hardly be denied that NATO forces have gained substantially more than the mere “foothold” in Ukraine that Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed to have launched his invasion of Ukraine to preempt. With the U.S. effectively assuming financial, material, political, strategic, and operational dominion over Ukrainian state warfare, the “foothold” has turned into a heavily-fortified bridgehead. Rockets lobbed at Russian troop positions are ultimately the product of U.S. commanders “controlling every shot,” as Ukrainian officials have occasionally acknowledged. A great deal of American engineering ingenuity is currently being harnessed to pulverize Russians.
