Three things for NATO to think about by Ian Bond
When NATO leaders meet in Wales in September, they should do more than deliver statements and adopt declarations stitched together from well-polished clichés. The world does not need to hear how important defence is to the allies (though most spend a lot less than 2 per cent of GDP on it); how vital NATO remains in a challenging international environment (though members avoid using NATO’s tools, even where they might help); or how NATO’s door remains open to new members (except for those who want to join). At some point, unity in vacuity does more harm than good to European security; better to have a proper argument about NATO’s future. NATO leaders should take this chance to thrash out in private three key issues. These are what to do; with whom; and how. NATO allies face an enormous range of security problems, yet generally they look to other organisations, not NATO, for solutions. PostAfghanistan, no ally seems keen on large-scale expeditionary warfare in a NATO framework. Led by the UK and France, NATO intervened in Libya in 2011 but did little to tackle the subsequent mess. In Syria, despite every atrocity, NATO stayed on the sidelines. The allies sent Patriot air defence missiles to protect Turkey, but looked to the UN to resolve the Syrian conflict and the EU to deal with refugees in neighbouring countries. As violent jihadis have advanced through Iraq, the US has sent 300 advisers to help the government, but NATO secretary general Anders Fogh Rasmussen has said
that he sees no role there for the alliance (even though Iraq shares a border with Turkey). Farther afield, the economic interests of NATO members would certainly be damaged by territorial conflicts in the South or East China Seas. Most European governments, however, are either content to leave the US to deal with Asian problems, or see EU soft power as their contribution in the region; NATO’s capabilities are not part of their toolkit for Asia. The one area in which NATO should unarguably have a role is territorial defence. Russia has put European geopolitics back on the agenda, by annexing Crimea, interfering in Eastern Ukraine and almost certainly supplying the missile that shot down Malaysian Airlines flight MH17. The German defence minister, Ursula von der Leyen, told Der Spiegel on June 11th: “Russia cannot be allowed to become our opponent”. But Rasmussen rightly thinks that NATO should be ready to respond in