The Next NATO
At the same time, the United States seeks to influence the economic
and diplomatic policies of European states and to balance the weight
of the European Union within the wider European continent. The
countries of central and eastern Europe are generally less critical
and more accepting of America than those of western Europe, and U.S.
objectives can best be met by advancing the fortunes and status of
the former as a balance to the latter. This would be furthered by the
enlargement of the European Union; but it would be furthered with
even more assurance by the enlargement of NATO. The result of NATO
enlargement would be the consolidation of Europe under American
leadership and its rendering into an embodiment and an expression of
the American way of globalization. The inclusion of the Baltic states
would consolidate this American-led European core up to the frontier
where the American project of globalization meets one of its
principal opponents--Russia. The inclusion of the Balkan states would
consolidate this core up to the frontier where the American project
meets another set of opponents--the rogue states of the Middle East.
NATO Enlargement: A Default Position
What might be the ideal form of organization for this American-led
Europe, which will be characterized by all the goals of
American-style globalization--free markets, open borders, liberal
democracy and the rule of law--all within a security community or
zone of peace? It would actually be some sort of American
Commonwealth of Nations, rather like the British Commonwealth of
Nations of the first half of the 20th century (composed of Britain
and the "dominions" of Canada, Australia, New Zealand and South
Africa). But this is not a practical possibility. The idea of an
American Commonwealth would seem too close to the idea of an American
Empire, and it would be unacceptable to both Europeans and Americans.
There is only one American-led organization for Europe that can have
legitimacy among the major states of Europe, and that is NATO. The
fact that NATO is supposed to be primarily a military alliance makes
it ill-suited for organizing all of the complex relations between
Europe and America, which add up to something actually as dense as an
American Commonwealth. On the other hand, it is because NATO is
supposed to be a military alliance that provides useful military
benefits to the west Europeans that it can remain legitimate while
actually furthering other purposes and performing other functions.
But it is, of course, the construably narrow military character of
NATO, which makes it more legitimate with thewest Europeans, that
makes it illegitimate with the Russians.
An economic organization, in contrast, would very likely be
legitimate to Russia. Russia would agree to the enlargement of the
European Union to include the Baltic and the Balkan nations. This
would not be that different from its earlier agreement to the EU's
admission of Austria, Sweden and Finland, other nations that have
been of strategic concern to Russia but that have never become
members of NATO. The European Union should have taken the lead in
admitting Poland, the Czech Republic and Hungary before NATO did, and
it should do the same for the Baltic and the Balkan countries now.
However desirable this would be for international comity, it is
unlikely to happen.
The admission of new members into NATO, even though they are weak
militarily, does not entail any immediate and substantial costs for
the existing members; the price that they will have to pay to help
upgrade the militaries of the new entrants is modest. However, the
admission of new members into the European Union, since they are poor
economically, does entail immediate and substantial costs for the
existing members; the price they would have to pay to help upgrade
the economies of the new members is large and burdensome. It is not
surprising that the EU's current members have persisted in stalling
what, as an abstract ideal, would seem to be an obviously good thing.
The recent vote in Ireland against the admission of new members is
only an explicit and crude expression of a more implicit and
sophisticated policy pursued by most of the other members of the EU.
There has not been enough vision or inspiration, either in the EU
institutions or in the major west European states, to overcome their
wholly natural, if narrowly-conceived, economic self-interest. But
since western Europe has not filled the vacuum in central and eastern
Europe with its economic organization, the EU, the United States can
readily propose filling it with its military one, NATO.
The expansion of NATO to include the Baltic states, however, would
bring this American military organization, indeed an implicit
American Commonwealth of Nations, right up to the Russian border. Of
course, this is not the first time that an American military alliance
has immediately abutted a Russian border. NATO, with Poland, has
bordered the Kaliningrad region of Russia since 1999; NATO, with
Norway, has bordered the Kola Peninsula of Russia since 1949; and the
United States itself has bordered eastern Siberia at the Bering Sea
since it purchased Alaska in 1867. From the Russian perspective,
however, the admission of the Baltic states into NATO would produce a
quantum leap in the strategic significance of their vulnerable border
regions, a few dozen miles from St. Petersburg, and with the three
Baltic countries together located astride the military approaches to
all of Russia lying between St. Petersburg and Moscow.
Some analysts have argued that there are better ways to provide for
collective security in the Baltic region than by NATO expansion. One
alternative would be to follow the example of Finland, a Baltic state
that is a member of the EU but not a member of NATO. Finland is
clearly in the Western sphere in regard to politics, economics and
culture, even though it is practically in the Russian sphere, at
least as a buffer state, in regard to security. Another alternative
would be to admit Russia itself into NATO. This would redefine NATO
from an American military alliance into a European collective
security system. It would also dissolve the line dividing Russia from
Europe.
There is much to be said in favor of each of these two (very
different) alternatives to NATO enlargement. Clearly the Russians
prefer them, but many west Europeans may do so as well. Indeed, the
admission of the Baltic states into NATO may eventually be blocked by
one or more of its west European members. However, just as clearly,
the Baltic states themselves much prefer NATO enlargement, as does
the United States. From the Baltic perspective, only NATO membership
will consolidate their hard-won national independence. From the U.S.
perspective,only NATO enlargement will consolidate Europe into a
secure core of the American way of globalization. This is why we can
expect the United States to press forward with an enlargement of NATO
that focuses upon the Baltic nations, which have progressed so far
and so successfully along the American way.
A Tale of Three NATOs
Almost all discussions of NATO speak of it as a homogenous alliance
with its different members integrated into the organization in
similar ways. In reality, however, NATO has always included a wide
variety of forms and degrees of integration. It would be useful,
particularly in future negotiations with the Russians, to distinguish
between three quite different NATOs, to be found respectively on the
Central Front, the Northern Flank and the Southern Flank.
The Central Front: "High NATO." During the Cold War, the highest,
fullest degree of integration of NATO was reached on the Central
Front, especially in regard to West Germany but also at times with
the Netherlands, Belgium, and Britain. High NATO was distinguished by
three major features: (1) U.S. troops were permanently stationed on
the member's territory; (2) U.S. nuclear weapons were positioned on
the member's territory; and (3) the member possessed serious and
substantial military forces, which were integrated with U.S. military
forces in regard to strategy, planning and command. The ideal-type or
model for NATO was West Germany. Given the central importance of West
Germany and the Central Front during the Cold War, it was natural to
think of this model when thinking of NATO. But even in regard to the
Central Front, France provided an exception after 1966, when
President de Gaulle had France, including French forces in West
Germany, withdraw from NATO as an organization, while remaining
within the North Atlantic Treaty as an alliance.
The Northern Flank: "Low NATO." A very different NATO existed on the
Northern Flank, particularly in regard to Denmark and Norway. Here,
none of the three features of "high NATO" was present: (1) U.S.
troops were never permanently stationed on Danish and Norwegian
territory (although Greenland is an atypical exception in the former
case, and U.S. troops did engage in periodic exercises in both
countries); (2) U.S. nuclear weapons were never positioned in these
countries, nor did U.S. naval ships carrying nuclear weapons normally
visit their ports; and (3) the military forces of Denmark and Norway
were hardly serious or substantial--in reality they were more like a
national guard--and they were not integrated with U.S. forces in any
operationally important way. For all practical purposes, the NATO of
the Northern Flank was neither an integrated organization nor an
alliance of equivalent powers; it was essentially a unilateral
military guarantee given by the United States. Yet Norway actually
bordered upon Soviet territory (for about 80 kilometers along the
Kola Peninsula).