THE FUTURE of NATO has been a subject of intense debate, including in the two most recent issues of The National Interest. In the Winter 2003/04 issue, E. Wayne Merry unveiled a picture of an Atlantic Alliance that is casting about in search of a mission, having outlived its usefulness with the demise of its original adversary. Indeed, he argued that NATO continues to keep Europe in a state of dependence, frustrating the rise of a European Union that can act as an equal partner to the United States. Yet even some of NATO's defenders--such as John Hulsman, writing in the Spring 2004 issue--view NATO primarily as a useful toolbox from which the United States can draw as it undertakes military adventures far from Europe's shores, cherry-picking allies on a case-by-case basis.¹

Yet these visions of the alliance are at odds with the view of those who work on transatlantic security policy on a daily basis. The reality is that NATO is not a Cold War institution in search of a mission to keep itself alive, but remains an indispensable tool for the democracies of the Euro-Atlantic region to ensure their security against common threats.

For a few heady years after the collapse of the Soviet Union, it appeared that the long-held dream of a Europe at peace had become a reality. The newly freed nations of central and eastern Europe aligned themselves definitively with the West, and even Russia developed a peaceful, non-adversarial relationship with its former rivals. Today, there is no risk of an invasion of western Europe, and it is tempting to conclude that a united Europe is now secure. However, the terrorist bombings in Madrid on March 11 horribly demonstrated the error of that belief. Europe still faces threats to its territory and to its citizens from international terrorism, weapons of mass destruction, states that sponsor terrorism and proliferate WMD, and the conjunction of these challenges: the horrifying prospect of these states providing WMD to terrorist groups. These are the same threats confronting North America, and the defense of our two continents remains indivisible.

NATO's Three Ongoing Missions

WHEN THINKING about NATO's primary purpose, many commentators fall into a geographic trap. Because NATO was founded to defend against the Soviet threat that was directed at Western Europe, it follows for some that NATO exists for the defense of this specific geographic area.

Instead, it is more useful to view NATO in functional terms, with three main and currently ongoing missions. First and foremost, the Alliance enables its members to provide collectively for the defense of their states against external threats, a role it has played for 55 years. Its second mission consists of peace-enforcement operations. The Alliance assumed this function nine years ago, when it became clear that only NATO (and not the United Nations, the OSCE or any other international organization) could actually enforce the peace agreement ending the war in Bosnia-Hercegovina. The third mission is political: maintaining and enhancing the partnerships that NATO has developed since the end of the Cold War with non-members in Europe and Eurasia. These partnerships have promoted cooperation and permitted the Alliance to enlarge the Euro-Atlantic zone of stability beyond the core of its member-states.

No one would ever have predicted that NATO's first collective-defense mission--more than five decades after the Alliance was created and ten years after the collapse of the Soviet Union--would be in response to an attack on the United States. But it is important to remember that collective defense applies not only to the European allies, but to the United States and Canada as well. After the September 11 attacks, the North Atlantic Council, comprised of representatives of the then-19 member countries, proclaimed that if those attacks were "directed from abroad", they would be covered by Article 5 of the Washington Treaty, NATO's collective defense guarantee. The Council declared:

The commitment to collective self-defense embodied in the Washington Treaty was first entered into in circumstances very different from those that exist now, but it remains no less valid and no less essential today, in a world subject to the scourge of international terrorism.

The Alliance itself sent AWACS aircraft to patrol the skies over the United States, and several countries sent special operations forces to Afghanistan to fight alongside U.S. troops in Operation Enduring Freedom. Since September 11, AI-Qaeda and its affiliates have again struck against NATO members in Istanbul and Madrid, as well as targeting the citizens of NATO states elsewhere in the world. The Soviet threat may have vanished, but not NATO's reason for existence. Recognizing this fact, NATO's Strategic Concept notes that

Alliance security interests can be affected by other risks of a wider nature, including acts of terrorism, sabotage and organized crime, and by the disruption of the flow of vital resources.

One cannot predict where NATO will need to act in the future, which is all the more reason to ensure that it is able to operate wherever needed. The War on Terror is a multi-faceted struggle, but ongoing operations in Afghanistan show that there is an important military component.

The decision by NATO to take command of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), which is helping to stabilize the region around Kabul, is an example of NATO's growing second mission: peace enforcement operations. NATO first assumed this role in 1995, when the first military action in NATO history was carried out, not to defend a member state but to guarantee the Dayton Peace Accords that halted the civil war in Bosnia. Since then, NATO has also undertaken peace enforcement missions in Kosovo and in Macedonia. These missions demonstrated that NATO is the only international organization with the experience, organization, military capabilities and robust rules of engagement needed to compel adversaries to accept, or at least conform to, a peace agreement.

NATO's third mission--its partnerships with non-member nations in Europe and the former Soviet Union-has enabled the Alliance to bring ten new members into the fold. The decade-old Partnership for Peace (PfP) program facilitated political and military cooperation with the nations of central and eastern Europe and Eurasia and helped former Soviet-bloc countries begin needed political and military reforms. By holding out the promise of eventual membership, PfP kept NATO's door open and assisted aspirant nations in meeting the criteria for membership. Now, with most central and eastern European candidate countries having joined NATO, the geographic focus of PfP must move to Ukraine, the Caucasus and Central Asia. At the same time, its functional emphasis will shift in part from preparing countries for NATO membership to engaging with countries that may never join the Alliance but which may become key security partners. The success of PfP in extending a zone of security to the east also needs to be replicated to the south, as recent events have underscored the importance of the non-European countries of the Mediterranean as well as those of the Persian Gulf to the security of NATO members. Therefore, the Alliance should enhance and expand its Mediterranean Dialogue. It currently brings seven nations--Algeria, Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Mauritania, Morocco and Tunisia--together with the NATO nations to discuss regional security issues such as civil emergency planning, crisis management, proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and terrorism.

Capabilities, Capabilities, Capabilities

WHILE NATO remains committed to collective defense, many of its members have been slow to develop the forces needed to carry out the pledges that they have made to defend one another. Former NATO Secretary General Lord Robertson often said: "When I took up my post as Secretary General, I said that I had three priorities: capabilities, capabilities, capabilities." Soon afterward, he noted that this became a mantra "which all of you will have heard--and some of you, in government, may have politely ignored."

In order to fulfill their responsibility for carrying out collective defense, NATO members must continue to transform their forces to address today's threats. No longer does NATO need heavy armored units with large numbers of conscripts arrayed in fixed sectors along the inter-German border. What is required today is a number of highly mobile professional units that can deploy quickly where they are needed in order to apply effective force to accomplish their mission. Allied countries have no shortage of military personnel, but NATO does lack units that can actually be used for the missions the Alliance now needs to conduct.

In November 2003 Robertson used his final address to the NATO Parliamentary Assembly to cite the need "to increase substantially the usability of European armed forces." Robertson noted that the 18 allies outside of the United States have 1.4 million active duty troops, plus another 1 million reserves. He said,

Yet with only 55,000 soldiers currently deployed on multinational missions, most of your countries plead that they are overstretched and can do no more. That is quite simply unacceptable.

The first step toward increasing the usability of European forces has been the creation of the NATO Response Force (NRF). This force has two tasks. First, the NRF is a vehicle to enable European and Canadian allies to join with the United States in developing forces that can rapidly deploy wherever they are needed and apply decisive power in combat or in less demanding missions. Second, the NRF can be an effective means to drive force transformation throughout the Alliance. Before national units are chosen to take part in the NRF, they will have to meet the tough standards of this elite NATO force. Then, when they train with other NRF units, they will be exposed to cutting-edge capabilities and procedures that they will take home and share with their nation's armed forces, serving as a catalyst for change.

The NRF was set up in October 2003 as a small "prototype" intended to define requirements and to test procedures, doctrines and concepts. By October 2004 the NRF will have an "initial operational capability" that will allow it to carry out smaller-scale missions. It is to reach "full operational capability" by October 2006. At that time, it will consist of one enhanced combat brigade, roughly 5,000 ground troops. Maritime, air, command and support elements will bring the total strength to around 20,000 personnel. Some of those units will be kept at "very high readiness", able to deploy within five days, with the rest of the force deployed within thirty days.

Unfortunately, the NRF has been plagued by the typical initial misunderstandings over what it is and what it is not, particularly by Europeans who fear that it is an American-led vehicle to undermine the European Union's Rapid Reaction Force (RRF). It is important to put to rest this fallacy, which led one leading European defense analyst to conclude that "the creation of an NRF potentially holds devastating consequences for the further development of European capabilities" and "could effectively undermine the EU's RRF...."²

In reality, the NRF is not designed to compete with, but rather to promote the further development of European capabilities. The NRF is designed for the full spectrum of missions, including combat operations; the RRF, to undertake the EU's Petersberg tasks, which focus on crisis management and humanitarian operations. Nor is there any danger that the NRF would supplant the much larger RRF. The RRF is to facilitate the large-scale deployment of European forces to deal with crises and is expected to have a sixty-day deployment capability and to be comprised of roughly 15 small brigades, or 60,000 ground troops, with additional air and maritime components.

IF THE NRF is to succeed, the NATO allies must develop the capabilities that are necessary for effective combat operations. Unfortunately, NATO's ability to compel its members' actions has always been limited. While NATO does work with each member to set force goals, it is the responsibility of each state to fulfill those pledges. Often, a defense ministry's good-faith promise to the Alliance is not fulfilled because that country's defense budget request is later cut by the finance ministry in order to fund other government programs. A further difficulty arises because the NATO force goals are classified and not open to public scrutiny. In most countries, members of parliament-even those serving in the NATO Parliamentary Assembly--do not have either the required clearances or access through oversight; thus, they are often unaware of their government's pledges to NATO, and they are unable to question whether defense budgets adequately fund their force goals and whether progress toward these goals is sufficient. While NATO force goals do contain some sensitive information and cannot be completely declassified, member states should strive to increase the transparency of the force planning process to the extent possible and to extend the required clearances to members of the parliaments responsible for defense oversight.

To ensure that NATO has the critical capabilities that it needs, its national leaders agreed in 2002 to the Prague Capabilities Commitment (PCC). This initiative assigned lead nations for multinational working groups to rectify shortfalls in key areas like air-to-air refueling, strategic lift and precision-guided munitions. Despite some progress over the past year, the report card on this initiative continues to be mixed. Governments must fully fund the pledges that they have made under the PCC because a failure on this point will ensure that the PCC ends up on the trash heap with previous NATO capabilities initiatives.

More fundamentally, European forces must be streamlined to generate more deployable units. While several states, notably Britain and France, have an expeditionary capability, large numbers of European soldiers cannot be deployed on actual military missions. Given the absence of a massive land-invasion threat, this leaves them with little to contribute in the field to the Alliance. Reducing personnel levels in European militaries can free up money to develop more agile, more capable forces. For example, Germany has announced plans to reduce the size of the Bundeswehr from 285,000 to 250,000 personnel; Defense Minister Peter Struck said in mid-January 2004 that these cuts "will enable us to markedly reduce the amount of personnel costs in favour of new investments." While the Bundeswehr today is strained by deploying 10,000 troops abroad, plans call for 105,000 troops to be available for intervention or stabilization operations.

WHILE EUROPEAN armed forces must become more efficient, the two North American allies can also take steps to increase their defense cooperation. Since 1958 the air defense of North America has been a joint effort through the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD), but maritime and land defenses have remained separate. The inauguration of U.S. Northern Command in 2002 provided an opportunity for closer defense integration between the United States and Canada. However, Canada declined an offer to include maritime and land defense in NORAD at that time. Instead, the two countries agreed to establish a Binational Planning Group (BPG), headed by the Canadian deputy commander of NORAD, to improve bilateral cooperation to defend against common maritime threats and to respond to land-based attacks or natural disasters.

The new Canadian government of Prime Minister Paul Martin has demonstrated greater receptivity to closer defense cooperation with the United States. Already, Canada is negotiating terms for participation in the U.S. missile defense program, which could be headquartered at NORAD. Other options for closer cooperation include a "naval NORAD" that would integrate the maritime defense of North America; in this area, the BPG already has developed a binational maritime awareness and warning capability. Some Canadian opponents of greater integration argue that naval and land defense are different from air defense because the response times are greater, which allows Canada to maintain exclusive control of its naval and land forces. Proponents of including naval and land cooperation in NORAD argue that weapons like sea-launched missiles mean that naval defense is subject to the same time pressures as air defense. Similarly, they argue that a terrorist attack on land could come without warning.

The conventional wisdom is that the Martin government is unlikely to move forward in this area before federal elections, which could come as late as autumn 2004. If the victorious party appears amenable, then American officials should again offer closer defense ties to Canada in order to better protect both North American allies on land, sea and air.

An Organizational Division of Labor

THERE ARE too many folks in the corridors of the EU institutions who view defense as just another area for demonstrating, as one European commissioner put it, "a deeper commitment to our common political project." Further reflecting this attitude, he added,

 I sincerely believe that defense issues ... are crucial for the Union's future. The future and credibility of the European body politic will hinge on the decisions which we will take on them. ³

However, defense is different from many other political issues. As we saw a decade ago in Bosnia, when mistakes are made or when there is a failure to act, people die. When mistakes are made in defending your own territory, it is your own people who die. For those EU "true believers", however, defense policy is no different from agricultural policy or trade policy. Their main concern is, as they would say, "building Europe"--not the vital responsibility to protect European citizens.

In line with this thinking, Finnish General Gustav Hagglund, then-chairman of the EU Military Committee, proposed in January of this year a European security arrangement in which "The American and European pillars would be responsible for their respective territorial defenses...." This ill-conceived idea would undermine the fundamental commitment that lies at the heart of the North Atlantic Alliance and would render the citizens of all the Alliance's member states less secure. Shocking as it seems, the proposal was not inconsistent with a provision in the proposed EU Constitution to have the European Union take on a mutual defense role that duplicates the very reason for NATO's creation and its primary mission. If Europe creates a competitor to NATO, it will risk undermining the rationale for the Alliance, and it will risk undermining the support of the governments and people of the United States and Canada for participating in NATO.

Rather than trying to create a mutual defense commitment, the EU should assume primary responsibility for what could be characterized as intra-European crisis management; that is, for undertaking military operations in Europe when the security of the continent is threatened by domestic instability or civil war. In other words, there should be an organizational division of labor: While NATO deals with external threats to Europe's security, the EU should take the lead in keeping the peace within Europe.

THE BALKAN conflicts, of course, are the best example of such crises that need to be addressed in a timely and forceful fashion. Such an effective peacekeeping capability will complement other EU competencies, such as its work to build civil institutions, its economic and infrastructure assistance, and its deployable pool of civilian police officers. Included in this responsibility would be a commitment among the EU nations to assist one another in responding to terrorist attacks and natural or man-made disasters, as outlined in the "solidarity clause" of the draft constitution.⁴

Furthermore, the EU should assume command of the peacekeeping missions in Bosnia--perhaps at the beginning of 2005--and later in Kosovo. In fact, NATO leaders are expected to agree at Istanbul to end the Stabilization Force mission in Bosnia at the end of this year and turn over responsibility to the EU. The combination of improving EU capabilities and an improving security situation in Bosnia has created a situation in which NATO can withdraw without a large risk of an immediate return to violence. NATO should retain a small office in Sarajevo to work with the newly unified Bosnian military and to help track down indicted war criminals. In addition, the Alliance will maintain an "over the horizon" reinforcement capability in case the security environment should deteriorate.

To the south, Kosovo is a much more difficult case because it remains an integral part of Serbia, despite the desire of its ethnic Albanian majority for independence. The deplorable outbreak of ethnic violence in March 2004, much of it apparently orchestrated by ethnic-Albanian elements, underscored the instability in Kosovo. Therefore, NATO should retain command of the Kosovo Force (KFOR), at least until the final status of the entity is resolved. The acceptance of the decision on final status and its implementation could be a difficult and volatile process. Once that danger passes, the EU should succeed KFOR. Even before that happens, the EU should actively guide the development of the entity's institutions in keeping with European standards, with an eye toward the possibility of Kosovo's eventual membership in the EU.

The EU also aspires to play a role in operations outside of Europe, as demonstrated by the operation in 2003 in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The EU should be encouraged to undertake crisis management and humanitarian tasks outside of Europe, provided that it has the necessary capabilities. Having the EU avoid duplicating NATO's collective defense function in no way limits the geographic scope of EU operation. In fact, there are regions like Africa where European interests and historical relationships may lead to an EU operation. Given that 19 of the 26 NATO members are also EU members, the Berlin Plus agreements that are meant to facilitate NATO-EU military relations should be scrupulously followed. These seven agreements make NATO assets and capabilities, including operational planning, available to the EU, and they facilitate smooth coordination between NATO and EU missions. This allows two organizations to avoid conflicting calls on the same national assets.

That overlap in membership between the two organizations also means that the EU can take advantage of the interoperability that NATO has engendered among its member countries. By standardizing communication and doctrine among its 26 member states and by integrating officers from those nations in headquarters with a single operational language, NATO facilitates multinational operations. That cooperation has been extended to partner nations through the PfP and through on-the-ground collaboration in Bosnia and Kosovo.

Retooling NATO Partnerships

WHEN NATO invited the seven newest members to join at the 2002 Prague Summit, it recognized that the emphasis of its PfP program would have to shift from helping candidate countries become members to cooperation between the Alliance and states that may never formally join the Alliance but may become close partners. The Alliance already has offered enhancements to PfP that range from improvements in interoperability and greater consultations with the twenty partner nations to individualized assistance with defense reforms. Russia is a special case, and the Alliance has already developed the NATO-Russia Council as a unique institution for a closer relationship.

At a minimum, NATO should engage in technical military cooperation with all nations of Europe and Eurasia which are at present members of the OSCE. Afghanistan should be included in the existing PfP programs, given its geographic proximity and cultural ties to the Central Asian members of PfP.

Several PfP nations are authoritarian dictatorships that are no closer to democracy than they were under Soviet rule. NATO must not lend such countries political legitimacy, but the realities of the international security environment mean that defense cooperation may advance the security of both Alliance members and a given partner nation. The most obvious example is Uzbekistan, a detestable dictatorship that nonetheless has offered invaluable assistance with military operations in Afghanistan. America and its allies should do nothing to sustain the oppressive rule of President Islam Karimov, but they should continue cooperation with Uzbekistan in counter-terrorism and at the Karshi-Khanabad Air Base. To the extent that NATO can enhance its ability to work with such countries through PfP, it should do so. It could also create benefits in the longer term, by exposing local officials to concepts like democratic control of the armed forces.

Beyond that, PfP assists nations that are moving toward democracy to reach Western norms, particularly in transforming their militaries from instruments of internal repression to guarantors of external security. Most notably, the Planning and Review Process enables the Alliance to help partners develop armed forces that can work alongside NATO forces. Some partners might never apply for NATO membership, but the Alliance nevertheless can assist them in developing the structures that are needed to ensure democratic civilian control over armed forces that are efficient, effective, and able to contribute to regional security alongside NATO forces.

Three aspirant countries--Albania, Croatia and Macedonia--currently remain in NATO's Membership Action Plan, the process through which the Alliance helps countries prepare for full membership. At the Istanbul Summit this June, NATO leaders should act on the recommendation of the House of Representatives (H.Res. 558) and agree to hold a summit no later than 2007 to consider their applications and decide at that time whether they and perhaps others should be invited to begin accession negotiations. Already, these nations are acting as allies, with all three contributing to NATO's ISAF operation, and Albania and Macedonia contributing troops to coalition forces in Iraq. Admitting these countries into NATO should cement their transformation from crisis zones to full membership in the Alliance's zone of stability.

IN ADDITION, NATO's Mediterranean Dialogue should be both enhanced and enlarged. Given today's security threats, deeper cooperation with the region is imperative. A new partnership that incorporates elements of PfP would enable cooperation in counter-terrorism operations and could allow the Alliance to work with regional actors to increase their ability to work alongside NATO. It could assist them in defense planning and reforms, along the lines outlined above, and facilitate their transition to more representative forms of government. Moreover, it could help promote understanding and perhaps build confidence between Israel and some of the more moderate countries in the region with regard to security concerns.

Likewise, the NATO Parliamentary Assembly's Mediterranean Special Group should intensify its activities, particularly in assisting the parliaments of the region develop effective defense oversight. The Assembly should also consider extending associate status, heretofore reserved for PfP nations, to the members of this new partnership. This would allow their parliaments to gain a deeper understanding of the role of an independent legislature in a democracy and to build ties to their counterparts across the Mediterranean.

At the same time, this new partnership should be broadened, for example, to the states of the Gulf Cooperation Council (Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates). These six U.S. allies have experience working cooperatively on defense matters. A broader partnership with the Mediterranean Dialogue countries could facilitate this defense cooperation under a NATO umbrella. A democratic, sovereign Iraq should also be offered membership in this partnership, which would enable the NATO nations to work directly with nations of the Middle East on security issues of mutual interest.

The Future of Cooperation

SECRETARY of State Colin Powell recently wrote, "NATO is transforming itself from an Alliance whose main task was the defense of common territory to an Alliance whose main task is the defense of common principles."⁵ No longer are NATO troops stationed along the Fulda Gap, prepared to halt a Soviet invasion of Western Europe. The values that set the West apart have been embraced by former adversaries. Many of those states have become a part of NATO, and they have pledged their willingness to fight for our collective freedom. They recognize that there are those who seek to destroy democracies not because of what they may do, but because of what they are.

Collective defense has taken on a different manifestation, but at its heart, the principle remains the same: 26 democracies, standing together to defend one another against those who seek to do us harm. This mission requires new capabilities and new doctrines, but the same depth of commitment. Defending freedom requires more than military hardware; it requires keeping NATO's door open to help bring freedom's blessings to lands that have not known them. We must ensure security beyond our borders, and we must work alongside partners, some of whom may someday embrace our principles and become our allies.

Those who declare that NATO should be euthanized either misunderstand how the Alliance has transformed itself to confront today's security threats or value institutional development above the safety of their citizens. Maintaining NATO's primacy in transatlantic security is not a barrier to European integration. Rather, it is essential for the security of Europe and North America. No one nation alone can defend against today's primary security threats: global terrorism, proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, and the states that support them. The United States needs allies in this effort, and NATO must remain the cornerstone of our common defense.

1 See Merry "Therapy's End" (Winter 2003/04) and Hulsman's contribution to "Can NATO Survive Europe", (Spring 2004).

2 Rob de Wijk, "European Military Reform for a Global Partnership", The Washington Quarterly (Winter 2003/04), p. 207.

3 Michel Barnier, Presentation of the Final Report of the Working Group "Defense", European Convention, Brussels, December 20, 2002. Barnier, who chaired the group while serving as commissioner for regional policy and institutional reform, is now foreign minister of France. See also the speech by Romano Prodi, President of the European Commission, to the European Parliament, March 26, 2003.

4 The solidarity cause (Article 42) should not be confused with the mutual defense clause (Article 40(7)) of the draft constitution.

5 Colin L. Powell, "Flexible and Unbreakable", Frankfurter Allgemaine Zeitung, March 31, 2004.

Rep. Doug Bereuter (R-NE) is chairman of the Subcommittee on Europe of the House International Relations Committee and president of the NATO Parliamentary Assembly. John Lis is senior policy adviser for transatlantic relations for the committee and former director of the Assembly's Defense and Security Committee in Brussels.

Essay Types: Essay