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NATO’s buildup in Eastern Europe, reckless policy: Commentator

Thursday, 11 February 2016 6:37 AM [ Last Update: Thursday, 11 February 2016 7:28 AM ]

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg (AFP photo)

Press TV has conducted an interview with Mark Dankof, a broadcaster and commentator in San Antonio, Texas, and Peter Sinnott, an independent scholar in New York, to discuss NATO’s plan to boost the alliance’s presence in Eastern Europe.

Dankof says the policies of the United States and NATO to increase their military presence in Eastern Europe are absolutely “reckless,” adding that they have basically driven Russia into a very “understandable defensive posture.”

He also stresses that NATO is pursuing a policy of “encirclement” of Russia which is absolutely “needless.”

“This is aggressive, it is reckless and it is moving the United States and NATO away from the old policy of deterrence and the old policy of peace through strength. This [NATO] is in fact an entity that is increasingly being used to facilitate aggression and regime change and the economic exploitation of governments and countries it does not like,” he states.

Elsewhere in his remarks, Dankof argues that tensions over Syria and Ukraine could boil over into a military confrontation between NATO and Russia.

“NATO encirclement of Russia, economic sanctions and so forth, this is clearly a reckless policy that just in Syria alone and Ukraine could well lead to a tragedy that could escalate into a global war,” he says.

Sinnott, for his part, believes that NATO’s buildup in Eastern Europe is mainly a “response” to Russian activity in the airspace of Lithuania, Estonia and Latvia. He also argues that the military buildup will help lower tensions because “cooler heads will prevail” when there is a stronger NATO presence.

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www.presstv.co.uk