this post was submitted on 22 Jul 2023
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I'm not up to snuff on NATO regulations. As I understand it, if a NATO nation gets attacked, the rest of them are obliged to defend, correct? What happens if that nation is "the aggressor". Like in this situation if Poland were to do a first strike against Belarus or Russia and they respond attacking Poland, is the rest of NATO obliged to help defend Poland?
No, NATO doesn't interfere if a member starts a war. It's a defensive treaty. That said, Poland alone wouldn't be able to do much, and democracies rarely openly declare war.
However what if a NATO country starts a war with Belarus, and then Russia attacks the NATO country?
The NATO country would never have initiated a war with Russia, they would have initiated it with Belarus.
Does a NATO country automatically become vulnerable if they have any wars currently ongoing? Because that would mean Russia could have attacked America during the war in Afghanistan and NATO would not have been able to get involved.
The way it works is that the attacked country invokes article 5. If the country does it then other members are obligated to help. If they don't, they are undermining NATO.
Having said that, NATO doesn't specify how countries supposed to respond. It could be something to this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoney_War
I think putin sending Wagner to Belarus is indeed thinking to force Belarus to attack Poland or a Baltic states and see what happens. Of course that would be simple, it would be Belarus vs NATO, and would end up quickly.
So he is tipping the scale and saying that attacking Belarus will be also attacking Russia, hoping that it will be ignored like two Russian missiles hitting Poland. If it won't be ignored, then he is just sacrificing Belarus.