We have an open but fleeting moment to forge a more effective Atlantic partnership. We must seize it now. Europe and North America have allowed their relations to become discordant, yet the times demand vigour and unity. Courageous decisions are needed to breathe new life and relevance into the Atlantic partnership, which must be recast to tackle a diverse range of serious challenges close to home and far away.
A new NATO
Despite six decades of change, NATO’s original three-fold purpose remains: to provide for the collective defence of its members; to institutionalise the transatlantic link; and to offer an umbrella of reassurance under which European nations can focus their security concerns on common challenges rather than on each other. Yet each of these elements is being questioned today.
In past decades, the Alliance met its purpose by adjusting to changing strategic circumstances. Yet NATO’s current Strategic Concept was adopted in 1999 and is woefully out of date. Reaching consensus on a new long term strategy is a high priority.
If NATO is to be better, not just bigger, we must transform its scope and strategic rationale in ways that are understood and sustained by parliaments and publics. We must change the nature of its capabilities, the way it generates and deploys forces, the way it makes decisions, the way it spends money, and the way it works with others.
Most importantly, NATO needs a new balance between missions home and away. For the past 15 years the Alliance has been driven by the slogan “out of area or out of business.” Today, NATO operates out of area, and it is in business. But it must also operate in area, or it is in trouble.
Home missions
At home, NATO is called to maintain deterrence and defence; support broader efforts to strengthen societal resilience against threats to the transatlantic homeland; and contribute to a Europe that truly can be whole, free and at peace.
NATO’s collective defence commitment is the core of the Alliance. Yet a NATO that continues to expand without having the capabilities to defend an enlarged treaty area runs the risk of becoming a hollow alliance. Lack of confidence in NATO’s fundamental commitment risks undermining a key element of NATO’s purpose - preventing the kind of re-nationalisation of European defence and conflicting security guarantees that led Europe to disaster in the 20th century. In Strasbourg/Kehl, Alliance leaders should reaffirm their mutual defence commitment, while ensuring that this commitment is backed up by credible solidarity and capability.
At the same time, Alliance leaders should consider the meaning of their commitment to “ensure the security of the North Atlantic area” in light of the challenges our societies face today. What do cyber hackers, energy cartels and al-Qaeda have in common? They are networks that prey on other networks - the interconnected arteries and nodes of vulnerability that accompany the free flow of people, ideas, energy, money, goods and services, and the complex interdependent systems on which free societies depend. It is our complete reliance on such networks, matched with their susceptibility to catastrophic disruption, that make them such tempting targets. In the 21st century, we are called to protect our connectedness, not just our territory. NATO should be a supporting player in a much broader strategy of transatlantic resilience that goes beyond “homeland” security. Our ultimate goal should be a resilient Euro-Atlantic area of freedom, security and justice that balances mobility and civil liberties with societal security. Bilateral efforts and US-EU cooperation will be paramount. But NATO has a role to play.
NATO’s third home mission is to contribute to overall transatlantic efforts to consolidate democratic transformation in a Europe that is not yet whole, free and at peace. The situation today is different than at the end of the Cold War or when new members joined NATO in this decade. Nonetheless, allies should be careful not to close their door to the people of wider Europe, while at the same time working to create conditions under which the question of integration, while controversial and difficult today, can be posed more positively in the future.
Away missions
Threats to allied security do not necessarily originate in the area covered by the North Atlantic Treaty. Many are non-military and asymmetric in nature. Yet they can pose a direct danger to our citizens and our societies. These threats mean that NATO also has three away missions: to engage in crisis prevention and response, including through humanitarian assistance and disaster relief; to perform stability and reconstruction operations; and to improve NATO’s ability to work effectively with partners, whether they are nations, intergovernmental, or non-governmental institutions.
These missions underscore the importance of developing what is being called a “comprehensive approach” - deploying military forces and civilian assets in a co-ordinated way, across the range of our institutions. NATO’s support for the African Union in Darfur, or NATO-EU co-operation in the Balkans, for instance, may be models of global engagement for which the alliance needs to prepare better.
From collective defence to collective security
Today’s strategic environment is complex and unpredictable. North America and Europe still face the menace of terrorism and the potential for conflict between major states. Yet a host of unorthodox challenges demand our urgent attention - economic crisis; networked threats; regional conflicts with global range; environmental degradation, climate change and resource scarcities; and a Europe that is not yet whole, not yet free, and not yet at peace with itself.
These challenges require us to stretch our mutual commitment from collective defence to collective security; reposition our key institutions and mechanisms; and connect better with other partners. NATO is indispensable yet insufficient to this agenda. A revived US-EU framework is needed, anchored by a new clause of mutual assistance. New partnerships must be built through the UN, the OSCE, international financial institutions, and other mechanisms.
Institutions, however, cannot substitute for determination and will. Visions of a more effective partnership will be moot if allies fail to quell terrorism and turmoil in the Afghanistan-Pakistan borderlands. Threats emanating from this region present the most immediate acute danger to European and North American security. Afghanistan has become a crucible for the Alliance. NATO’s credibility is on the line.
A resilient alliance
To succeed in this new world, Europeans and Americans must define their partnership in terms of common security rather than just common defence, at home and away. This will require the Alliance to stretch. Depending on the contingency at hand, NATO may be called to play the leading role, be a supporting actor, or simply join a broader ensemble. Even so, NATO alone, no matter how resilient it is, simply cannot stretch far enough to tackle the full range of challenges we face. It must also be able to connect better with others. And if NATO is to both stretch and connect, its members will need to supplement traditional static territorial defence with dynamic societal resilience and - a particular challenge for Germany - to develop the expeditionary capabilities necessary to enable our Alliance to act effectively.
Daniel Hamilton is the Richard von Weizsäcker Professor and director of the Center for Transatlantic Relations (CTR) at the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University.