END NOTE
ADAPTING NATO FOR THE 21ST CENTURY
By Stephen Flanagan
CHALLENGES OF GLOBAL SECURITY. NATO has weathered countless crises since it was founded in 1949 and has shown remarkable agility over the past decade in adapting to the post-Cold War security environment. However, the increasingly divergent trans-Atlantic responses to the challenges of globalization, particularly with respect to terrorism and other transnational security threats, coupled with the widening gaps between the United States and Europe in risk assessment and military capabilities, present the Atlantic alliance with profound new challenges.
In the aftermath of the war in Afghanistan, many Europeans see the United States as increasingly unilateralist and disinterested in using the alliance for fear it would constrain Washington's freedom of action. This apparent disinterest causes great concern among the alliance's newer and prospective members, who fear that NATO no longer offers the certainty and hard security they have long sought. Indeed, many Europeans are concerned that Russia has emerged as a more important and capable strategic partner for the United States in waging the war on terrorism. Official Washington finds Europe a less capable partner in combating terrorism and new security threats and is dismayed that its longtime allies do not come to these struggles with the same sense of intensity or a common assessment of the nature of the problems.
To assure NATO's survival in the coming decades, the alliance will need to take concrete steps at the Prague summit to bridge divergent trans-Atlantic risk assessments, narrow the military-capabilities gap, adapt alliance decision making to its much larger size, develop a strategy for managing its new relationship with Russia, and address the future of the Partnership for Peace program and relations with other nonmembers that share the Eurasian security space.
DIVERGING RISK ASSESSMENTS. The United States has always had a more global perspective on defense planning, but this perspective has intensified in recent years, particularly as the war on terrorism has unfolded. Washington sees the main threats to its security as emanating from outside Europe. While the United States is waging a war against terrorism -- with all the urgency and commitment of resources that term implies -- Europe is decidedly not on such a footing. Even more corrosive, there is a sense in Europe that terrorism is largely a U.S. problem that Americans have brought on themselves as a result of what they see as unbridled use of military force in the Islamic world and unfailing support for Israel.
Europeans have been dealing with low-level terrorism for decades and have found means to cope with it. They do not have the same sense of urgency about Al-Qaeda and other contemporary terrorist groups with global support networks. There is grave danger in this complacency, particularly in light of evidence that Al-Qaeda planned attacks on major European cities and the enduring potential for these groups to take actions using weapons of mass destruction. Some of these terrorist groups pose a profound challenge not merely because they have demonstrated a capacity for a more deadly and effective form of terrorism, but because they are determined to do whatever is necessary to undermine the core values and social fabric of Western, free-market democracies, which they see as inimical to their vision of Islam.
This fundamental divergence has shaped the scope and nature of the responses on both sides of the Atlantic. Global terrorism has achieved somewhat greater political salience in the United Kingdom and France. But for the most part, the events of 11 September 2001 have not resulted in a fundamental shift of the security paradigm of most European governments, which, along with their elites, see the U.S. response as overly militarized, too focused on punitive actions, and neglecting what they see as better and more effective steps to get to the sources of terrorism, through "constructive engagement" and development assistance. They are also appalled by what one French observer characterized as U.S. "unilateralist fever and staggering casualness regarding NATO...changes that are in direct contradiction to the corpus of Europe's principles on security."
Such expressions of European anxiety have come in waves. Despite many predictions in Europe and elsewhere, the initial U.S. response to the events of 11 September was not a series of spasmodic military strikes but a deliberate and considered series of diplomatic, law-enforcement, and financial measures. There was a noticeable sigh of relief in Europe in October and November. But since December, Europeans have been very apprehensive regarding the next steps the United States has been contemplating in the war on terrorism, and many European governments have misgivings about a military campaign designed to eliminate Iraqi's capabilities for weapons of mass destruction and/or the regime of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein.
The new U.S. defense concept articulated in the 2001 "Quadrennial Defense Review Report," which was finalized last September, moved away from regional-based scenarios to capabilities-based planning and sees the need for forces that can handle two major conflicts and multiple smaller military operations simultaneously. The events of 11 September confirmed the strategic direction of this review, particularly, its emphasis on homeland defense, preparing for surprise and asymmetric threats, and the need for on expeditionary operations in diverse and distant places. The new force-planning construct calls for U.S. forces that can defend the United States; reassure allies and friends, deter aggression, and counter coercion in various regions around the world; swiftly defeat aggression in major overlapping conflicts while preserving the option to achieve decisive victory in one of those conflicts; and conduct a limited number of smaller-scale contingency operations in peacetime, preferably in concert with allies and friends.
This shift in strategy moved the strategic focus of defense planning from Southwest and Northeast Eurasia to the southern and eastern regions of the Eurasian land mass, North Africa, the Middle East, and Southeast Asia. The "Quadrennial Defense Review Report" recognized that growing turmoil in this "southern arc" is acquiring greater strategic importance because it can have a significant detrimental impact on the global economy and stability and trigger U.S. security commitments. Significant engagements are also seen as possible in sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America for humanitarian and certain security interests. Coping with these needs will require maintenance of military capabilities to project power rapidly into the outlying world, continued forward presence, and the enhancement of military cooperation with allies and partners. This new strategy also notes the need to cope with the further proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.
Although large U.S. forces are likely to remain stationed in Europe and Northeast Asia, the "Quadrennial Defense Review Report" notes that they often will be called upon to deploy elsewhere and to serve as instruments of power projection. The review underscored that U.S. forces will need to be highly flexible and adaptive. The new strategy places demands for more "low-density/high-demand" units, for example, special forces, construction engineers, command-and-control units, and defense-suppression aircraft that can support peacekeeping and combat operations.
In contrast, the EU's geographic focus and security goals are limited. Europeans continue to focus European security and defense policy on handling tasks pertinent to Europe's immediate periphery. A common "European" threat perception has yet to emerge. Europeans evince increasingly grave reservations about the role of military force in international affairs, stressing the need to seek compliance with international norms, and are unwilling to spend the resources on defense to maintain robust forces. Some have even expressed the dismaying assessment that European governments may not have acted any differently if there had been major terrorist attacks on European cities in 2001. Despite increasing European self-confidence since the Maastricht and Amsterdam agreements, the Common European Security and Defense Policy (CESDP) now seems confused and impotent.
Many also question the seriousness of the European response to the events of 11 September. No EU government has made the case for increased defense spending since 11 September. NATO Secretary-General Lord George Robertson and EU security-policy chief Javier Solana have been urging Europeans to take this opportunity to bolster defense capabilities and the development of the CESDP, but nobody's listening. Yet opinion polls in early 2002 suggest that even in Germany, European publics would be prepared to support increased defense spending. But the political will is simply not there. Europeans have been happy to reap the peace dividend. Most countries spend 1-2 percent of their GDPs on defense, resulting in a major under-resourcing of defense plans. A commitment of 2 percent of GDP for defense by all participating states would likely ensure the realization of a planned rapid-reaction force. With current resource plans, some defense experts project that while the rapid-reaction force may be declared operational in December 2003, it may not be capable of taking on the high end of outlined tasks until 2010. In addition to resources, EU leaders will have to enhance their defense planning and review process in order to ensure that the rapid-reaction force is not a hollow success.
Many Europeans seem quite comfortable with keeping the CESDP's capabilities limited to a narrow geographic perimeter, rather than expand them to support wider actions in the war on terrorism. However, this division of labor with Europe more focused on peacekeeping and global support for development, as a "complement" to U.S. global military action, could prove corrosive to the trans-Atlantic security community over the long term. Such a narrow application of European security cooperation would make it less relevant to the United States.
U.S.-EU AND NATO-EU COOPERATION. That said, NATO is clearly not the right instrument for orchestrating all aspects of the campaign against terrorism. Countering terrorism requires the integration of diplomatic, military, financial, intelligence, information, and law-enforcement actions by a broad range of partners. Trans-Atlantic cooperation must also be measured by joint efforts to shut down terrorists' financial networks, investigate terrorist organizations, and bring terrorists to justice. While Europe's response to 11 September remains circumspect on the military front, important strides have been made in European law enforcement, financial tracking, and justice actions relating to terrorism.
EU cooperation on home and justice affairs, the "Third Pillar" of the union, has been very slow to evolve due to national differences. However, since 11 September, in contrast to the CESDP, there have been significant enhancements of EU Third Pillar cooperation and bilateral EU-U.S. cooperation in these areas. While there have been some differences in designating certain terrorist organizations and the pace of pursuit, the United States and the EU did agree in December 2001 to designate several European-based groups as terrorists and announced the coordinated targeting of an expanded list of terrorists and terrorist entities at the 2 May 2002 U.S.-EU summit. These groups and individuals were subject to asset freezes and other sanctions in accordance with national laws. EU foreign ministers agreed to expand the EU terrorist blacklist such that it is now further in line with the U.S. list on 18 June. The EU has also made good progress in working with other G-8 countries to implement the Financial Action Task Force on Money Laundering's (FATF) eight special recommendations on terrorist financing. These agreements, combined with the FATF's 40 recommendations on money laundering, set out the basic international framework consistent with UN Security Council Resolution 1368 to detect, prevent, and suppress the financing of terrorism and terrorist acts. So too, the United States and the EU have assigned liaison points of contact between EUROPOL and EUROJUST, entered into agreements on the sharing of terrorism and crime data between the United States and EUROPOL, and collaborated on threat assessments.
Credit does need to be given to the fact that the EU is making major contributions to addressing the sources of terrorism through its extensive development-assistance programs. While the United States spent $9 billion in foreign aid in 2000, the top seven EU countries spent $22 billion.
Thus, if the United States and Europe want to work together, a new EU-NATO institutional relationship is needed in part due to the overlapping responsibilities that have become evident with NATO's involvement in both the war on terrorism and postconflict-stability operations in the Balkans. The long-term health of trans-Atlantic relations will require better ways to integrate EU and NATO actions to address such diverse threats to international security. This could help slow further divergence of threat assessments as NATO and EU memberships differ. This new institutional framework should also provide modified decision making for counterterrorism operations to include the G-8 to allow for engagement of Japan.
DIVERGING CAPABILITIES. Although the April 1999 Washington summit adopted the Defense Capabilities Initiative to bridge the growing capabilities gap between the United States NATO's European allies, the gap has widened. It will not only likely widen further with the U.S. augmentation of its defense budget by $48 billion after 11 September but also after the accession of NATO's new allies sometime after the Prague summit. The capabilities gap cannot be closed but must be "filled."
Considering available resources, the 58-task Defense Capabilities Initiative was too ambitious. It also failed because it did not prioritize force goals. The new NATO Defense Capabilities Initiative should be reduced to three to five priorities (such as transportation, command-and-control units, and air-traffic control) and incorporate successful national experiences such as the U.S. use of commercial assets for strategic lift. The new NATO Defense Capabilities Initiative also needs to focus on niche specialization as a way to "extend" national capabilities and "fill" (not close) the gap; it needs to develop new NATO projects that focus on role specialization, niche capabilities, and multinationality.
Among the "lessons learned" by the three members that joined NATO in 1999 were: that the process of developing capabilities involved "severe bumps," that NATO did not increase common support funds, and that the anticipated "savings" from cutting armed forces did not materialize for modernization. These "lessons" have relevance to NATO's prospective new members.
Unless NATO introduces and institutionalizes a new approach to defense and force planning, then any capabilities goals that are adopted at Prague will likely remain only headline goals. The new defense- and force-planning approach should include the following:
* NATO needs to provide specific advice for specialized force planning. The Bosnia Implementation Force (IFOR) experience demonstrated that NATO needs to develop a new approach to joint training. NATO needed 30 countries to field 50,000 troops. Bosnia demonstrated that NATO's concept of "national responsibility" is no longer useful.
* NATO needs to provide international training support (especially for counterterrorism operations) and develop a new approach to multinational formations. NATO's 45 years of Cold War experience that national-level military operations below the corps level was "folly" has been turned on its head with the new concept of niche capabilities. But NATO's new members will have different capacities to develop niche capabilities. This will be easier for those countries that are building their militaries from the ground up than it will be for those that inherited Warsaw Pact force structures.
* NATO also needs to develop a new system to finance international military operations. NATO's new members have found it difficult to finance their military participation in Bosnia, Kosova, and Afghanistan. All new members have had to finance operations abroad by either increasing defense budgets, postponing modernization, increasing debt, and/or borrowing funds by floating government bonds.
MANAGING A LARGER NATO AFTER PRAGUE. After the summit, when NATO is likely to invite seven new members, the alliance will face many new political and military challenges.
* Political Challenges. Consensus building in the North Atlantic Council (NAC) and in various committees has worked to date. This will not necessarily continue in the future. NAC decision making will likely be further complicated by enlargement to 26, countervailing pressures that EU membership will place on certain allies, and divergent EU and NATO memberships. Some observers argue that the size of the NAC will not necessarily complicate decision making, claiming the Atlantic dimension will be strengthened once all 21 of the 26 NAC members are in the EU. While possible, experience suggests this is unlikely. NATO's present committee structure, which with working groups numbers 400, is too cumbersome and needs an overhaul. Consideration should also be given to expanding the authority of the secretary-general to initiate and orchestrate action.
The alliance might also want to reconsider the way the NAC makes decisions. While Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty states that actions may still require consensus, the NATO concept of "constructive abstention," not breaking silence for minor issues, could be expanded to include implementation of Article 4 operations. Certain Article 4 actions could even be undertaken under a broadly endorsed NAC consensus on "principle," with the main operational contributors providing military guidance. In effect, the main contributors would act more like a Combined Joint Task Force (CJTF) "within" NATO than a CJTF to the EU. Still another approach worth considering would be a modified NAC "minus, plus" concept for Article 4 operations. This would allow countries such as Finland and Sweden, which provide peacekeepers to NATO operations but have no political voice in the NAC, to participate.
NAC decision making will increasingly be challenged by the need to coordinate with the EU and to make the two processes complementary. In order to improve coordination, after enlargement more dual-member states might consider assigning the same ambassador to the EU and NATO. The creation of a NATO-EU political-military committee could facilitate cooperation and coordination.
* Military Challenges. NATO's military structure will also require a major overhaul. Targeting decisions during the 1999 Kosova air campaign became very contentious within the alliance. If another NATO-led operation outside the North Atlantic region is unlikely for the foreseeable future, then perhaps NATO's Military Command functions should be altered to prepare forces, rather than to command them operationally.
The war on terrorism has different requirements than defense against a traditional aggression in Europe. NATO's command structure for Afghanistan does not exist. The United States used CENTCOM instead. Hence, the Afghanistan operation involved a coalition of the willing under U.S. command. If NATO is to ever operate in a counterterrorism role, it will need to set up a special-operations, joint-task-force coordination cell that can be flexible for counterterrorism and include intensified intelligence sharing on terrorist activities and weapons of mass destruction.
Finally, NATO needs to reduce and reform its already overburdened, politically driven, military-command structure. Simplification is also necessary because many of NATO's new members will find it very difficult to fill personnel positions at the commands.
NATO'S RELATIONS WITH RUSSIA AND UKRAINE. Since 11 September 2001, Russia has made more concrete contributions to U.S. objectives in the war on terrorism than most NATO allies by not blocking U.S. military operations in Central Asia. That said, it is not at all clear that this convergence of interests will form a foundation for a more robust NATO-Russia cooperation. The NATO-Russia Council (NRC) was established at the 28 May Rome summit with the goal of building a cooperative security structure in the Euro-Atlantic region to deal with nine fields. Counterterrorism cooperation may prove quite problematic in the long term. The Chechen legacy and Russian assessments of the causes of terrorism could lead to the perception that NATO and Russia have joined forces against the "Islamic threat." There might be better potential for cooperation on problems in Central Asia, theater missile defense (where the Russians have expertise and hardware to sell), arms control and confidence-building measures, search-and-rescue at sea, and slowing proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and dual-use technologies (vis-a-vis Iran and Iraq).
In reality, the NRC may not differ too much from the Permanent Joint Council (PJC) created in 1997, but the perception that this is a new start, formed under different circumstances, makes it different. The PJC did not engage in real dialogue. It was not 19 plus one, but 19 against one. The NRC is also different from the PJC, which operated by the "troika" process. The NRC will have the secretary-general as chairman with all 20 sitting around the table. A "precooked" agenda, as formed for PJC sessions, does not have to prevail in the NRC. Hence, the NRC will be more similar to the NAC in form, and it remains to be seen if this will carry over to process (where the NAC often divides along Greece-Turkey or U.S.-France lines). One challenge of the new structure is that pulling back an issue from consideration in the NRC to the NAC could be immediately perceived as a crisis in NATO-Russia relations. It may well depend on how Russia chooses to play such an action.
The NRC is both a tremendous chance and risk for NATO. Will Russia use the NRC to develop constructive cooperation or attempt to exploit national differences and weaken the alliance? Optimists argue that it will take time to build trust in part because the "trust deficit" brought the PJC to a halt. Skeptics argue that 11 September did not change Russia overnight; that it still pursues an imperialist policy in Abkhazia, Transdniester, and Ukraine, and hides its brutality in Chechnya under the banner of the war on terrorism. The proof will come soon enough.
Russia's decision to seek a new relationship with NATO, coupled with NATO's commitment to a robust enlargement at the Prague summit and a post-11 September recognition by Ukraine's leadership that the country's security could not be guaranteed outside the framework of trans-Atlantic security institutions, set the stage for the 23 May decision of the Ukrainian National Security and Defense Council to make membership in NATO a long-term goal. Kyiv recognized that these developments could marginalize Ukraine in Euro-Atlantic security structures. Ukrainian public opinion toward NATO has also shifted, reducing the risk that closer relations with the alliance would exacerbate internal polarization. Ukrainians no longer fear a NATO-Russian confrontation. Now 40 percent of the population supports joining NATO with 30 percent opposed, compared to the past when 50 percent were opposed.
Although the original 1997 Ukraine Commission, compared to the PJC, contained extensive language of cooperation, Ukraine remains a NATO "gray area." U.S. policy has also been seen in Ukraine as tepid, beginning with the first Bush administration and including the Clinton administration's focus on cooperative threat reduction. Kyiv has also been concerned with Secretary of State Colin Powell's lukewarm reaction to Ukraine's 23 May decision to move closer to NATO. Also, most Western European countries do not have a Ukraine policy. The United States needs to activate a more energetic bilateral policy toward Ukraine and to the NATO-Ukraine Commission. Poland, which sees Ukraine as part of the European security solution, has concerns that Ukraine will be pushed to the side as NATO seeks cooperation with Russia.
THE FUTURE OF THE MEMBERSHIP ACTION PLAN AND PARTNERSHIP FOR PEACE. If, as expected, the Prague summit decides on a "big-bang" enlargement, NATO's Membership Action Plan (MAP) and Partnership for Peace programs will require substantial modification. In light of NATO's experience of the admission of Poland, the Czech Republic, and Hungary in 1999 and with more new members likely to be invited in 2002, there is the very real danger among potential new members of waning interest and energy for the MAP and the Partnership for Peace program. A North Atlantic Council comprising 26 countries will bring about a fundamental shift in balance between members and partners. A smaller number of less-enthusiastic partners without membership objectives will remain in the Partnership for Peace program, and the MAP will continue with only three partners.
The Reykjavik summit's 14 May communique was quite specific in continuing the 2002-03 cycle of the MAP through the spring of 2003, adding that "invitees will participate in subsequent MAP cycles until the ratification process has been completed." While the "goal is that all invitees should accede on a common date before the next summit," individual invitees will discuss specific issues and reforms and a "timetable for the completion of these reforms should be established, including for those unlikely to be realized until after accession." Croatia has since joined the MAP and expects NATO to maintain an "open door." Some Poles have argued that since Ukraine has stated its intention to join the alliance, NATO needs to clarify Ukraine's role. Indeed, the balance of attention and energy will shift more toward integration than a smaller MAP. The new NATO Defense Initiative also will have an impact on the Annual National Plans (ANP) under the MAP.
After accession of up to seven new members, there will be more members of NATO than of the Partnership for Peace program, and the size of the MAP will also be reduced. Will the changed member-Partnership for Peace balance affect the Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council (EAPC)? Can the Partnership for Peace framework and EAPC maintain their significance? Both remain important incentives for Bosnia and Serbia, and their weakening can have ramifications on Balkan stability and security.
After the next round of enlargement, NATO may need to augment the Partnership for Peace program's resources and reexamine some of its original concepts regarding self-differentiation and geographic coverage. The 1999 Strategic Concept defined the Partnership for Peace program as a "core function" of the alliance, but it remained a "headline goal" because of resource scarcity. Unless resources are added, the Partnership for Peace program will not likely actualize its potential. The program will require broadened activities with a more global view on asymmetric threats. When the notion of self-differentiation was introduced with Partnership for Peace in 1994, it worked for many partners but proved disastrous for the Caucasus and Central Asia because their internal absorptive capabilities were lacking, and NATO also failed to attract their interest. Future Partnership for Peace activities in the Caucasus and Central Asia, particularly in a cooperative counterterrorism campaign, suggest the need for a more directed program rather than one based simply on self-differentiation.
Finally, NATO needs to assess if the Partnership for Peace program's present geographic area is still valid. Improved relations with the Islamic world should be a larger priority of NATO's political and security dialogues. However, most Mediterranean countries are not very interested in the NATO Mediterranean Dialogue. This may provide a potential avenue for greater EU-NATO cooperation with the EU Mediterranean Dialogue countries and Partnership for Peace partners.
CONCLUSIONS. While European and U.S. risk assessments since 11 September continue to diverge, they are not irreconcilable. Common U.S. and European interests in the stability of the global economy remain more closely aligned than U.S. interests with any other group of states. These enduring interests form a strong foundation for maintaining NATO, even as its military and decision-making structures evolve to take into account the new security challenges of the 21st century.
While the alliance is no longer a focal point of U.S. security planning, fears in Europe that Washington is losing interest in NATO as a military body or views it as a military "chop shop" needed for spare parts that can be cobbled into a U.S. military operation are overstated. The promotion of a new defense-capabilities initiative at the Prague summit reflects the fact that Washington wants allies that are prepared to take more serious actions to narrow the military-capabilities gap in key areas and to work as fuller partners in the more stressful aspects of the war on terrorism.
A significantly enlarged NATO will have to find new ways to organize its decision making and operations if it is to maintain consensus and flexibility. If the NATO-Russia Council is to work, allies will have to work hard to give it more operational content and to be prepared to pull back an issue from consideration in the NRC to the NAC when allied and Russian interests diverge. Much will depend on how Russia chooses to deal with an enlarged NATO. At the same time, allies must not lose sight of their relations with Ukraine and other potential members. Finally, as the war on terrorism has shown, NATO needs to consider more directed programs for the Caucasus and Central Asia as part of an integrated strategy to provide security and stability throughout the Eurasian security space.
The author prepared this comment for the 24 June 2002 U.S.-German bilateral dialogue entitled "The NATO Prague Summit," which was sponsored by the Center for Strategic and International Studies. The views expressed are the author's alone and do not represent those of RFE/RL.
Stephen J. Flanagan is director of the Institute for National Strategic Studies and vice president for research at the National Defense University. He served as special assistant to the president and senior director for Central and Eastern Europe at the National Security Council and in several other senior positions in the U.S. government between 1989 and 2000. He has also been a member of the faculty at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government and the National War College. He is co-author of "Challenges of the Global Century," the 2001 report of the NDU Project on Globalization and National Security.
