[andrewnicolalde]

> Russia themselves asked to join but were rejected.

https://euobserver.com/news/27890

“‘Great powers don't join coalitions, they create coalitions. Russia considers itself a great power’, the Russian ambassador stressed."

[wackro]

That was their position once NATO had expanded eastward.

Here's an extract from a NATO report[0] in 2000. The whole chapter is genuinely worth a read:

> Nevertheless, in August 1994, Boris Yeltsin again said to the reporters, that Russia could join NATO in due course. Then, during 6-7 years, this question was not raised by the Russian political elite and the mass media. The main reason for that was NATO’s expansion to the East...

Russia actually has a long history of wanting to join [1]

[0] https://www.nato.int/acad/fellow/98-00/davydov.pdf

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2001/jun/17/russia.iantray...