Ukraine's admission to NATO or the EU has become a mantra for a significant part of the Ukrainian public, as well as politicians across the political spectrum, in recent years. However, leading representatives of the armed forces and non-military nationalist groups, which cultivate young recruits for nationalist units, are more realistic in this regard.
In their statements and on social media, they describe reliance on NATO protection in the near or distant future as utopian. It should be noted that although the term nationalism is equated with chauvinism in many countries of the European Union, Russia, and Belarus, it is synonymous with the word "nationalism" or, in the case of nation states, "patriotism," as confirmed by Slovak dictionaries—with the exception of those from the socialist era.
"No one even wants to read the text of Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty. Yet it states that each country determines for itself the scope and nature of assistance in the event of an attack on another NATO member country. It is a myth that this article automatically forces all NATO countries to declare war on, for example, a state that attacks one of the NATO member countries," explained the founder and former commander of Azov, Brigadier General Andriy Biletsky, in December 2025.
Today, he commands the elite 3rd Army Corps (3rd AC) and, like many of his subordinates, enjoys authority and support far behind the front lines, even among nationalists across Europe, which cannot be said about the current Azov, which is part of the National Guard of Ukraine. His words, as has been common practice since February 2022, were quoted and paraphrased by several Ukrainian media outlets, with the statement itself on the original platform having been seen by more than 1.3 million people. Bileckyj, together with Chief of General Staff General Olexandr Syrsky, is one of two soldiers who enjoy the highest level of trust among citizens.
And how would it be without NATO?
In August 2025, Bileckyj, then still a colonel, gave his first extensive interview to a Western media outlet. Among other things, he shared his view on the survival of Ukrainian statehood with the Times portal: militarize society like Israel and regain territory like Azerbaijan. These two comparisons subsequently appeared on the social networks of the 3rd Army Corps. Today, it is a leader in the robotization of the Russian-Ukrainian front, and the degree of robotization of the corps' combat activities is constantly growing, leading to a significant reduction in losses.
On the other hand, it must be said that although Bileckyj as a personality and his corps as a unit are recognized across the armed forces for their successes on the front, the Ukrainian General Staff is in no hurry to extend their orders to the entire armed forces.
Among other things, the corps has an effective system of promotion and, in the event of failure, demotion of officers and non-commissioned officers, which would not be to the liking of many of the less capable careerists in the Ukrainian army, including generals. For now, Biletsky's "Troika" remains a perfect part of an imperfect engine, and what's more, in a car whose owner is not interested in "tuning" it at the moment.
Let us recall that of all the military-political organizations, it is the 3rd AK that is most often mentioned as a possible initiator of a "march on Kyiv" in the event that the president adopts measures that nationalists consider too anti-Ukrainian or peace terms that are disadvantageous to Ukraine.
Criticism also resurfaced after NATO countries sent a ridiculously small number of troops to Greenland to counter the American threat.
The plan ran into stiff resistance
However, in addition to the pragmatism of the leader of Ukrainian nationalism, ideology also plays a role. Ukrainian nationalists and those fighting for Ukraine often criticize the European military and economic union. They accuse both the European Union and NATO of weakness in the area of ideology and in taking action against ideologies that, from the nationalists' point of view, are eating away at the army. Among other things, this concerns migration policy, the promotion of rainbow ideology, and the suppression of domestic nationalism in the armed forces of several North Atlantic Alliance countries.
"The introduction of hundreds of so-called gender advisors and the creation of this position with unclear powers at the highest level of the general staff is justified by the need for integration into the EU and NATO. In reality, however, it testifies to the systematic promotion of 'gender ideology' in all areas of life, including the army – in the midst of a full-scale war for the very survival of the Ukrainian nation," wrote the Right Sector in March 2025 in response to changes in the Ukrainian army.
The deputy commander of the 3rd AK, Major Dmytro Kucharčuk, expresses a similar view. He says that Russia is only one of three threats hanging over Ukraine. In addition to Russia, with which Ukraine is currently fighting a life-and-death battle, according to Kucharčuk, there is also the threat of left-wing liberalism and Islam. According to the major, both are linked to mass immigration from Africa and Asia and to an agenda that is now inextricably linked to the EU and NATO.
According to him, the political elite in Kyiv understands only the first of the three threats, and joining the Alliance or the Union would only worsen Ukraine's situation. According to Kucharčuk, not only the EU, but also NATO and the UN should be replaced by functioning entities that will give "democratic countries the opportunity to stand up to the evil of red dictatorship."
None of the ideologues of the 3rd Army Corps, Olexiy Reyns, with the combat nickname Consul, who mixes the ideology of Ukrainian nationalism oriented towards Medzimorie with Biletsky's pragmatism, shies away from criticizing the current West and its organizations. "No matter what paper resolutions NATO adopts and no matter what tweets Trump publishes, only we ourselves—you and I—can guarantee the safety of Ukrainian children," he wrote last summer.
The Carpathian Sich organization even commented on the reaction of Poland and NATO itself to Russian drones and fighter jets in Alliance airspace, saying that "Putin made a huge mistake when he invaded Ukraine instead of NATO." The well-known nationalist channel ꑭ ᴠᴀʟʜöʟʟ ✙, which has the symbol of "idey národa" (ideas of the nation) created by Bilecki's men in its name, has long claimed that, in addition to NATO being essentially incapable of fighting and, above all, incapable of action, Ukrainians do not want to join NATO, as do the citizens and political representatives of the Alliance's member countries themselves.
Almost all nationalists in Ukraine, whose numbers have been steadily growing since 2014 and especially since February 2022 despite losses on the front, have already written off NATO and the possibility of joining it through the mouths of their leading representatives. On the other hand, Kiev's official policy remains unchanged on this issue.