Between Challenge and Response

"NATO at Fifty"

NATO: Between Challenge and Response

Andrew J. Goodpaster

Introduction

There are reasons-ample and timely reasons-to welcome the opportunity for thoughtful examination of NATO's future. Shaping NATO's future role can be regarded only as unfinished business. Major questions of deep significance persist. What should be the nature and scope of NATO's activities now that the Cold War is well behind us? How widely and on what terms should NATO membership be extended to additional nations? What should be the central focus of NATO's policy goals and deliberations?

For me, consideration of these issues can usefully begin by recalling the immediate round of visits I made as new Supreme Allied Commander, Europe (SACEUR), in the fall of 1969 to the chiefs of state or heads of government (or both) of the NATO nations, following in a valuable tradition started by General Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1951. As a young staff officer serving under the general when he took the NATO command and established the NATO command structure for NATO's collective force in Europe, I saw how important his round of visits proved to be at that time in the development of the common understanding that would guide his efforts during that formative period-one that shaped the years to come. Eighteen years later, as I tried to build a common NATO understanding, the following question served as my guide in each capital, "What would be the situation of your country (this in the latter part of 1969) if NATO suddenly did not exist?" The reactions and responses were quite fascinating and were remarkably similar. First came a kind of nervous laugh and a comment, "Well, we don't have to worry about that, do we?" When I persisted and asked for thoughtful consideration, again the responses were interesting and very similar. One was most sharply expressed, "We would be living in terror if we were still living at all." My reply was that I agreed, and that this response would be the basis on which I would undertake to serve the Alliance.

NATO in the Cold War

In my view, NATO's purpose at the time Eisenhower established the collective force and throughout the Cold War, including the period I myself served as SACEUR, was simply to work to maintain the peace and security of ourselves and of our allies. It was my conviction, which has never changed, that this was indeed the best course to follow in the interest of the true well-being of the American people. That well-being could best be ensured by working with allies in a manner that would be collectively designed and collectively carried out in NATO. I would identify five appropriate and preeminent operating objectives to serve this central purpose: deterrence, defense, solidarity, detente, and equity. I offer for consideration that the five operating objectives that guided us at the outset and through the Cold War are still valid today. Their purposes, however, differ in many and often different new ways.

A brief review is appropriate as to how the objectives could be seen to apply to the circumstances that existed then.

• Deterrence, we saw, as a primary objective for NATO-deterrence not only of war but also of threats of war and of pressures aimed at forcing concessions contrary to the peace and security of member nations and to the liberties and well-being of their citizens. The idea was to make it clear to any and all that the costs and risks of conflict would outweigh any likely gain for which an aggressor (specifically the USSR) might hope. And as was well stated then, an aggressor would find no fruits of war without the costs of war.
  
  
• Defense-a respectable posture of defensive military strength-provided essential underpinning for such deterrence and also provided a sound basis for confidence that, if conflict should nevertheless occur, aggression could be defeated. The defensive capability rested on the presence of a collective force headed by a carefully developed integrated command structure, the result constituting a force that was in place in Western Europe and was so organized that an attack on any part would indeed constitute an attack in fact on all.
  
  
• Solidarity came to be recognized as a strength of outstanding significance to the Alliance's success. Through that solidarity, the nations were not exposed and left singularly vulnerable to the threats and pressures of the Soviet Union, nor would they waste their strength in inter-country conflicts of a kind that had left them weak and devastated in the past. Eisenhower often spoke of this himself-in saying that NATO nations working together would accomplish a result that, if they acted separately, would be beyond the reach of any one nation or of all nations. More pithily on occasion, he declared that apart we could do very little; together we could do everything we needed to do.
  
  
• Detente from the outset was part of the Alliance's aim-somehow to reduce the harsh and dangerous military confrontation and to lower the levels of tension between the Soviet Union and the West. My own approach was always to emphasize reduction in the causes of tension-the combination of Soviet expansionist and adversarial policies with a massive military force that far exceeded any needs of defense on their part. NATO's lengthy efforts at mutual force reduction at last bore fruit after the Berlin Wall came down.
  
  
• Finally, equity was sought, meaning a fair sharing of the risks and burdens that the overall NATO undertaking involved. We soon learned that the peace and security that formed NATO's central common purpose fell in the category of a "public good," for which no simple allocation or formula could be written. Rather, this sharing formed a major part of the deliberation process that became the hallmark of the NATO commitment. The functioning forum for top-level deliberation was the North Atlantic Council in Permanent Session (supported by the various staffs and military commands). It became, along with the well-structured and well-organized force in being, one of the two most manifest sources of strength for NATO.

These objectives, in the manner and degree to which they were attained, brought us successfully, with peace and security, through the Cold War.

Challenge and Change

Massive change has, of course, now occurred and has brought new questions to confront us. The change sprang from the end of the Cold War-what may well be called "World War III"-which was conducted without actually resorting to military force or to the weapons arsenals that extended to thousands of nuclear weapons. Today, no evident reason can be seen for armed conflict between and among the world's major nations. (This, of course, sets aside the continuing tensions across the Taiwan Strait-tensions that can, it must be said, surely be resolved by reasonable levels of serious statesmanship.) The changes, however, have not brought about the "end of history" as was suggested soon after the Cold War's end. A continuous flow of security issues has existed and seems certain to occur perpetually in the future. The task of safeguarding and advancing the well-being of the American people remains a "work in progress." A thoughtful look at the issues with the greatest potential for causing serious harm to our country (as we know it), or for renewed confrontation, identifies four main policy challenges: our relationships with our Allies, our relationships with Russia, our relationships with China, and our ability to rein in and reduce to the lowest practicable minimum the threat posed by nuclear weapons arsenals. NATO retains its central importance in connection with three of these challenges and can be of aid as well in the fourth: the building of a constructive relationship with China.

It seems evident that our guiding purpose can be and should now still be peace and security, but new questions of the deepest possible significance in terms of NATO's future have emerged to confront us all. Most important, they include whether NATO's scope should extend to the whole area of Europe and the North Atlantic or only to the "treaty area" of the members to whom Article 5 (the attack on one is an attack on all) applies. How then will further challenges such as Bosnia and Kosovo be dealt with if they occur?

Another vital question is whether NATO will continue to apply to countries, the territory of which is to be defended, or whether NATO will now extend to individuals within countries, individuals who would thus henceforth enjoy the assurances of peace and security to which NATO is dedicated. The question of how far to go in intervening for such purposes must be recognized as one that rises to the highest levels of political significance and difficulty. Specifically, if one is speaking just for our own country, it is by no means clear how far our people and our Congress will be willing to support such interventions. Neither is it clear what range of instruments, both civil and military, they will be prepared to use. How far will our Allies support such interventions or support the United States when we undertake them? How likely is it that some nations (Russia, for example) will oppose particular interventions? If they do, how is such opposition to be dealt with?

NATO Now and Future

In a large sense the question we face is whether the purpose of peace and security applied in the new ways-especially where there is a clamor for action-will still command the support it received in the past, and, if so, whether the five preeminent operating objectives are still appropriate. To what extent and in what ways will they still apply? Where will NATO stand and what will the U.S. position be in applying and pursuing them? These are still in major respects open questions, but it is not too early to present a few propositions for consideration. These could form the core of policy and the basis for well-thought-out strategy as we and our governments look to the future, as indeed we quite evidently should now be doing.

• Deterrence. Some see the role of the United States as that of a benign 800-pound gorilla. With the United States in this role, there would be no temptation for others-major nations or lesser nations-to revert to the politics of threat and force that characterized the past. Deterrence now means doing what we can to restrain and dissuade additional nations, particularly rogue states, from proliferating nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons. Likewise, it means suppressing terrorism, whether from national or transnational sources.
  
  
• Defense. This word retains its former meaning. Stable peace and security still depend critically on NATO's defensive strength, and particularly on America's defensive will and capability. The question of public and political "will," its adequacy and steadfastness, poses a major challenge to NATO at a time when there is all too evidently a tendency to rely on "crisis management," by responding to egregious acts of inhumanity only after those acts have crossed some intolerable threshold of violence. It would be wiser for us to pursue the kind of forward-looking statesmanship that gave us NATO in the first place. That initial form of statesmanship helped bring us peacefully and securely through the second half of a century that had been marked in its first half by violence and death exceeding that of any other era of history. "Capability," the second component of defensive strength, offers its own challenges: the need to rethink the kinds and levels of military force that are required, along with the need to reduce the risks we face and the redundancy still to be found long after the Cold War's end, most notably in the massive nuclear weapons arsenals that still exist.
  
  
• Solidarity. This concept lies, as in the past, at the heart of NATO's strength. Here, however, we should thoughtfully note some failures, for they define future tasks. First has been the inability to institutionalize adequately a sense of solidarity within NATO in its new terms, specifically through Partnership for Peace and the Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council. These key processes create cohesion in the new circumstance wherein Article 5 has become a far less immediate concern than the kind of deliberation provided for in Article 4. The early approach that was based on extending the hand of NATO according to a "spokes in the wheel" metaphor seems, on reflection, to have been seriously misconceived. It was inappropriate to the new conditions of security and failed to provide opportunity to the new nations to participate on security issues on the basis of equality, that is, to sit at the table and engage in deliberations "each in the presence of all," just as the traditional NATO nations have done from the outset.
  
  
• Detente. In this, the Alliance has also thus far been poorly served. In the words of George Kennan, NATO made a fateful error in alienating Russia. NATO has failed to develop the kind of overarching relationship of peace and cooperation with Russia that would have fully taken up the opportunity presented by the end of the Cold War. It is true, as many have said, that the expansion of NATO did not and does not pose a military or security threat to Russia, but there can be no doubt as to its harmful symbolic effect on that country. Much now remains to be done to build a NATO-Russia relationship that will have the needed positive spirit.
  
  
• Equity. One can be sure that the questions of burden sharing and risk sharing will be continuing sources of argument and tension within the Alliance. Inevitably, finger pointing weakens cohesion, but to be realistic we must recognize that it is probably inherent in the functioning of alliances, even for NATO, the most successful alliance the world has ever seen. Central to the life of politics and politicians is "Who gets what and who pays for it." But finger pointing must not be allowed to jeopardize the great values that the Alliance brings to us.

The foregoing provides an assessment that can be regarded only as no better than "mixed." Some of NATO's strengths are being sustained; some are not ensured to continue. Some actions are constructive and well related to future needs, such as the Partnership for Peace, the Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council, and the Standing Committee for NATO-Russian Affairs, even though those actions still lack vigorous development. Others are definitely counterproductive: the alienation of Russia is most notable. Some decisions show resolution and readiness to confront significant difficult realities: Bosnia and Kosovo are examples. Other policy issues fundamental to NATO's future still await action, particularly in work on building a consensus on the scope of "out-of-area" commitments, as well as delineating the extent of responsibilities NATO will assume for individual freedoms from tyranny, violence, forceful "ethnic cleansing," and communal strife. Where does NATO stand? Is it changing from an alliance still centered on collective defense into one focused more broadly on collective security?

Conclusion

NATO-and its constituent member and partner nations-does indeed find itself between challenge and response.

• The challenge: Will NATO continue to build and sustain the political will and the policies supporting action to safeguard peace and the security-not just of our Western nations but of the basic sinews of our Western civilization?
  
  
• The response: Many of the essentials are in place. The approach, however, is still tentative; inadequate in some respects; uncertain; and lacking in coherence, completeness, and a clear framework of purpose. Much still must be done, and the world awaits the leadership needed in this era of unparalleled opportunity, which the fortunes of history have provided to this generation.

Return to top of page