Letters

Apr 2010, Vol. 155, No. 2

Sir, in his article ‘NATO: Taking a Fix, Charting a Course’ (RUSI Journal, Vol. 154, No. 6, December 2009), the Supreme Allied Commander Europe talked about the need for NATO to provide ‘security’ and ‘ideas’ if it was to continue its important role of assisting the provision of peace and stability around the world. He alluded to the lessons from the history of NATO in providing a basis for the future.

However, he said little about ‘defence’ although NATO was set up as, and has for most of its life been, a common defence alliance. Although NATO has continued to be structured for this role, in recent years it has concentrated more on leading various coalitions of member and non-member nations in expeditionary operations; in fact most are NATO-led, rather than NATO, operations. This has led to a shift in Alliance common resources from the operation and maintenance of defence activities to support of coalition operations; a trend which has been exacerbated by the recent global financial crisis. Whatever the intellectual imperatives, there is no doubt that the upcoming Strategic Concept Review will be skewed even more than usual by the need to decide priorities for allocating insufficient funds.

There has been much discussion of the future roles of NATO, especially on the relative weight to be given to the provision of security of national interests through expeditionary operations against the provision of territorial defence. However, less thought seems to have been given to the need to ensure that the future structure of NATO will support whatever roles are envisaged. How will NATO remain an alliance if its emphasis is in provision of coalitions including nations outside NATO? Is NATO to base its future strategy, military objectives and structure primarily on the model of the later phases of an operation in Afghanistan, which it is aiming to complete in the foreseeable future (that is, within the life of the next Strategic Concept), or should NATO retain elements of its traditional defensive role?

Currently, most coalition operations do not include a military contribution from each member nation. How is NATO to maintain a common purpose amongst all its member states? Most importantly, how is NATO to balance the wishes of those nations who see little or no continuing need for a ‘defence’ role and wish to concentrate on expeditionary operations, with those who joined NATO to ensure their territorial defence? The question of structure based on enduring alliance versus ad hoc coalitions is not trivial. In economically straitened times, what benefits accrue to a nation by signing up to membership of a formal alliance and investing in common alliance resources when it could just pay its share of whichever coalitions are in its immediate interests when they arise? To answer that, we need to consider NATO’s continuing strengths and how we can maintain them. Clearly, what NATO can bring to the table is the intelligent application of military muscle. It is the only major alliance which can provide multinational force generation capabilities; force command, control and management; operational planning; acquisition and operational budgeting systems; logistics organisation and facilities; common operational and support procedures; common political and military doctrine; and a large degree of equipment standardisation.

If NATO is to improve its ability to work within multi-faceted coalitions of nations, agencies and NGOs, it should recognise and concentrate on the areas where it can provide the most effective contribution. It must not focus on shortterm objectives aimed at filling functional gaps left by other organisations; let others supply the aid, and so on. Of most importance, NATO must not discard its unique organisational strengths built up over many years of common purpose. Without the underlying coherence of common and commonly-funded ‘alliance’ programmes (such as, for example, the integrated air defence system) involving all NATO nations at the military level, NATO will lose its sense of common purpose and will degenerate into a bureaucracy holding together a loose matrix of disparate and variable national coalitions with no common basis or rationale.

Graham Robertson
Wing Commander, RAF (Rtd)

Copyright © 2012 RUSI Registered Charity (no. 210639)

• Site Map
• Privacy Policy
• Legal Notice
• Site by 4T2