"On balance it's still better to have Turkey as a nominal ally than as a potential adversary, probably teaming up with Russia -- that's the unpalatable situation that NATO finds itself in now," Elisabeth Braw, a senior research fellow at the RUSI think tank in London, told AFP. As a military alliance with a clear mission -- the defence of its members' territory -- rather than a political project like the EU, NATO can take a more pragmatic, hard-headed view of crises like the present one, Braw said. "Throughout its history NATO has had to put up with a lot of unattractive behaviour by its different member states and has still remained this successful military alliance," she said.