By Hua Zhang

The NATO Summit released a joint declaration on July 10, local time, accusing China of posing "systemic challenges", condemning it for providing support to Russia, and calling it a so-called "decisive enabler" of the Ukraine crisis. This was the first time that NATO issued a "direct warning" to China through a joint declaration and the implicit threat to "make China pay", which marked a significant change in the organization's attitude towards China.

As a Cold War vestige, NATO, instead of being dissolved along with the Warsaw Treaty Organization, has kept expanding its geographical boundary and sphere of activities during the decades after Cold War. As a military bloc, the organization has never brought peace or tranquility to the world but has acted as the agitator of one geopolitical conflict after another.

Bombing the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, attacking Afghanistan, launching air raids against Libya, invading Iraq, and meddling in the Syrian civil war… NATO's shadow is in almost every regional conflict. The protracted Ukraine crisis is exactly the result of NATO's constant eastward expansion. Incomplete statistics show that the wars either initiated or joined by NATO members after 2001 have cost hundreds of thousands of lives and displaced tens of millions.

Now the "trouble maker", who has never stopped exporting conflict and war, feels no shame to call another country a "challenge" and a "threat"! Since its very birth, NATO has always been a handy tool to help achieve America's hegemony. By placing itself firmly at the helm of the organization, America has set up military bases in Western European countries and stationed troops there. It seems that the host countries have become more "secure" with the "protection" by US troops stationed therein. However, the sovereign integrity of those countries has been damaged from the moment they host US troops, and they have become subordinates to the "protector" in a certain sense.

George Kennan, former US ambassador to the Soviet Union, was right to the point when saying that NATO's instigation of regional conflicts, especially the decades-long "eastward movement", reflects America's will. The military bloc's constant encroachment upon the sphere of influence of the former Soviet Union has reinforced America's control over the European continent and squeezed Moscow's security space. Additionally, the admission of new members has swelled the pro-US ranks within NATO and curbed certain European countries that advocate European strategic independence.

Recent years have seen Washington shifting its strategic gravity to the Asia Pacific with a view to containing China in economic, sci-tech, security, and other aspects. It has also pushed NATO to hasten the steps of cooperating with its Asian Pacific allies. The NATO Summit in 2022 invited Japan, ROK, Australia, and New Zealand, at which the organization also signed the Individually Tailored Partnership Programmes (ITPPs) with Japan and ROK to further elevate their institutional cooperation. However, German newspaper Berliner Zeitung analyzed on July 9 that America's seeing China as a chief rival and shifting its military focus to the Indo-Pacific doesn't serve the interests of some European members of NATO. French President Macron last year publicly opposed the idea of setting up a NATO liaison office in Tokyo and maintained that the organization should continue to focus on the North Atlantic.

Considering the disagreements from allies, the US has been fabricating lies about how "China helps Russia rebuild its military capabilities" in recent years, slandering the two countries' normal economic and trade interactions as "China's assistance to Russia". In fact, only some Western countries have followed the US in sanctioning Russia, while the developing countries, including America's regional allies like India, haven't severed their normal trade ties with Russia. Now NATO is specifically targeting China and portraying it as a so-called accomplice in destroying Europe's security just to coax and coerce its European members to board the war chariot to the Asia Pacific.

The US is still bent on maintaining its hegemony, and NATO has never stopped creating chaos and war. After it instigates bloc confrontation and triggers an avoidable war in Europe, will it cause another conflict in the Asia Pacific by doing what it is doing now? From this perspective, the "warning" from the latest NATO summit to China is a timely alert for the peace-loving countries and peoples in the Asia Pacific, reminding them of staying vigilant against this "war maker" from across the Atlantic and saying no to its incitation and lies.

Editor's note: Originally published on china.com.cn, this article is translated from Chinese into English and edited by the China Military Online. The information and opinions in this article do not necessarily reflect the views of eng.chinamil.com.cn.