Former Communist States Have Earned Their Entry : NATO: Poland, Hungary and the Czechs overcame tyranny; how can the West not encourage them in democracy?

At the urging of the United States, NATO has taken up the question of admitting Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic. Making allies of these former communist states is the most far-reaching foreign-policy idea our country faces. An ugly wound still separates Europe’s new democracies from the safe and wealthy West. It was made by Stalin’s army and accepted at Yalta, 50 years ago this month, by Western leaders anxious to avoid World War III. With the Soviet Union gone, responsibility for the old wound has shifted to those who could heal it but hesitate.

At heart, this is a moral issue. Since liberating themselves five years ago, the Poles, Hungarians and Czechs have pleaded to join the West, only to be dodged by double-talking diplomats. So Germany may be unified, but Europe is not. Yet why should East Germans--and for that matter, West Germans, Dutch, Greeks--have more right to belong to the West than those who suffered without respite from Nazi and then Soviet oppression? The cruel irony is that West Europeans and North Americans have chosen to hoard the benefits of security and prosperity provided by the very institutions from which East Europeans were excluded during their Soviet captivity.

We have seen enough of the post-Soviet world--Bosnia, Chechnya, the return to power of former communists--to know that democracy’s roots must be strengthened in Eastern Europe. There will be no excuses, and no forgiveness, if we let this hopeful region slide into the feuding and fascism that spawned two world wars. But by withholding the security and trade that we in the West enjoy, we place the privileges of those who never knew Soviet domination above the needs of those who endured and overthrew it. So much for “Europe whole and free”; a more apt motto might be “the West rich and comfortable.”

Opponents of NATO’s expansion argue that the new democracies face no threat of invasion. True. But if this standard was applied to NATO’s current members, they should all be expelled and NATO liquidated. In fact, the value of NATO goes far beyond protection from attack, which is precisely why its members are so keen to preserve it. Along with the European Union--from which the Eastern democracies are also excluded, at great cost to their struggling economies--NATO ended centuries of conflict in Western Europe. In much the same way, joining NATO would require Eastern European states to live by Western standards in how they treat their own citizens, reduce the danger that they will settle their disputes by violence and reform their armed forces through cooperation with ours. How can we doubt that NATO could help Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic, while insisting that it still helps Denmark, Turkey and Canada.

The same opponents of NATO’s enlargement who claim that East Europeans are not threatened also argue that the American people would refuse to help defend them if they were. In fact, Russia lacks the means to menace the vastly superior Atlantic Alliance, and any hard-line future Russian leadership inclined to do so would only worsen the country’s economic decline. But in the improbable event of a new threat to European democracies, Americans would surely make the same (correct) choice to stop aggression that they made in World War II and again in the Cold War.

The Russians say that NATO’s enlargement would be a provocation. But NATO guarantees are purely defensive. To call them provocative is to dignify the bogus old Soviet claim that NATO was a threat--the very claim used to justify Soviet occupation of Eastern Europe. This falsehood is no reason to exclude from NATO the new democracies that badly need its benefits. The concern that NATO enlargement would isolate Russia is no less fishy, since it is an admission that NATO now isolates Eastern Europe. Should we exclude Poland so it can keep Russia company? In light of the 50 years since Yalta, this is hardly a respectable reason to tell East Europeans to stay on their side of the tracks.

Some in the West warn that expanding NATO would expose Russia’s immediate neighbors, notably Ukraine, to new threats. But if we reject the voluntary inclusion of Poland and others in NATO for fear of causing the involuntary absorption of Ukraine by Russia, we are declaring that we will pay a price--in Poland’s security, no less--to purchase Russian restraint.

If we fail to do what is right lest Russia do what is wrong, are we not contradicting the important message that Russia must finally take responsibility to respect international law? Indeed, fear that Russia might still bully its neighbors for any reason argues for, not against, bringing Eastern Europe into NATO.

NATO’s enlargement would pose no threat to Russia or to Russian reform. Russia deserves our support as long as it walks the straight and narrow road toward democracy. But we cannot save reform in Russia by putting reform at risk in Eastern Europe. While the transformation of Russia is important to us, it is vital to the Russians. We should not buy the argument that they will jettison their own reform, at the cost of their nation’s future, if we act to heal Europe’s wound.

What makes the case for NATO expansion especially strong is that “doing the right thing” also serves American interests. A stable Europe is important for our own security and economic future, and the success of Eastern Europe is crucial for European stability. Any costs of NATO expansion will pale by comparison to the costs, to us, of letting these new democracies drift and fail.

We can no longer blame Europe’s division on Russia, for it is we who maintain it. Gone are the Soviet border guards policing the frontier. In their place are Western governments that, so far, would rather protect their winnings than follow their principles. We should bring the new democracies into both NATO and the European Union by 1999, 10 years after the fall of the Berlin Wall. Let’s hope the American people and America’s allies understand what is really at issue and follow President Clinton’s lead.