>> you can't fight a country like Russia, they have 7000 nukes
That's why people join NATO: Access to nuclear firepower. NATO serves as a list of countries that cannot be invaded, because they have bent at the knee to US hegemony, and thus the US is (at least convincingly postured as) willing to use its world-ending nuclear arsenal to defend them.
That's the post-WWII world order: sovereignty belongs to those with the power to wipe out any other country on Earth. You can either be a nuclear power, join in on one's protection scheme, or pray you stay irrelevant enough to not get conquered.
What you're misconstruing as "NATO's aggressive expansion" is countries scrambling to get the US's protection, because the alternative is Russian occupation. NATO was founded specifically to counter Russia's aggressive expansionism.
That's why people join NATO: Access to nuclear firepower. NATO serves as a list of countries that cannot be invaded, because they have bent at the knee to US hegemony, and thus the US is (at least convincingly postured as) willing to use its world-ending nuclear arsenal to defend them.
That's the post-WWII world order: sovereignty belongs to those with the power to wipe out any other country on Earth. You can either be a nuclear power, join in on one's protection scheme, or pray you stay irrelevant enough to not get conquered.
What you're misconstruing as "NATO's aggressive expansion" is countries scrambling to get the US's protection, because the alternative is Russian occupation. NATO was founded specifically to counter Russia's aggressive expansionism.