NATO's missed opportunity: Stoltenberg on arming Ukraine

Jens Stoltenberg admitted that if Ukraine had received more weapons before the war, it might have prevented the conflict. "I take my part of the responsibility," stated the former NATO Secretary General in an interview with the "Financial Times."

"I’m proud of what we have done, but it would have been a great advantage if it started earlier," Stoltenberg emphasized in his conversation with the British newspaper.

""If there’s anything I in a way regret and see much more clearly now is that we should have provided Ukraine with much more military support much earlier," the Norwegian declared.

"I think we all have to admit, we should have given them [Ukrainian side] more weapons pre-invasion. And we should have given them more advanced weapons, faster, after the invasion. I take my part of the responsibility," he said.

He added that before the Russian aggression against Ukraine, the issue of delivering lethal weapons to Kyiv was the subject of "big discussion." At the time, "Most allies were against that, pre-invasion . . . they were very afraid of the consequences," Stoltenberg said.

"I’m proud of what we have done, but it would have been a great advantage if it started earlier," he confessed. "It maybe could even have prevented the invasion, or at least made it much harder for [Russia] to do what they’ve done," he suggested.

At the beginning of October, Jens Stoltenberg ceased his role as NATO Secretary General and handed it over to former Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte.

The Dutchman was chosen as the new NATO Secretary General by the ambassadors of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization member states at a meeting in Brussels.