NATO@75 - Gateway House

Seventy-five years ago, in 1949, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) was formed. Its members signed the Washington Treaty. Its objective was to guard the independence and security of its members, strategically using both political and military means.

Starting with 12 members, NATO now has 32 Member States mainly from Europe, and the U.S. and Canada from North America. The U.S. traditionally led the funding and policy of NATO.

NATO hinges on Article 5 of the Washington Treaty, which provides that any assault on one member will be considered an attack against all members. This idea of collective defence emanated after World War II. Article 4 of the Treaty suggests consultations among members on matters of common interest.

Structurally, NATO has two divisions, one dealing with military affairs, and the other political. The NATO headquarters in Brussels have representatives from all member states and outnumbers the members in the EU headquarters. Decisions are meant to be consensual.

The Military Committee has Chiefs of Defence of NATO members and its executive arm is the international military staff and military command structure. This includes Allied Command operations and Allied Command Transformation, which are headed by the Supreme Allied Commander Europe and the Supreme Allied Commander Transformation. The forces under their command are expected to act as a deterrent. They hold military exercises among all or some of its members to counter common threats under Article 5 and in crisis response situations which do not invoke Article 5.

Over the years, as the membership expanded, the immediate objective of NATO to defend itself from the threat of the Soviet Union, which was its ally in World War II, altered too.

NATO succeeded when the Berlin Wall fell, and the Soviet Union disintegrated. It was perhaps the most emphatic victory for the ideas behind NATO, though the diminution of the Soviet Union was not through arms but by ideology. Yet, NATO was seen as an essential part of the victory in the Cold War.

NATO was careful that when US-USSR détente was being negotiated in the 1970s and there was aggressive Soviet intent in Mozambique and Angola in Africa, NATO was not provoked into action, though it expressed its views on Soviet action. In the post-Cold War period, NATO’s success became more visible since many East European countries, which were a part of the rival Warsaw Pact led by the Soviet Union, began engaging with both NATO and the European Union. More of them ultimately joined NATO once the Soviet hold was removed in 1991[1].

The enlargement of NATO therefore gave it the opportunity of becoming a peace maintenance agency in Europe. It perhaps took its role too seriously when it undertook peacekeeping in Kosovo[2] and action in Serbia[3]. Thereafter, the mission in Afghanistan[4] was an example of NATO’s new actions. These were not categorized under Article 5 and did not involve any attack on a member state.

American-led action in Iraq or Western-led action in Libya involved many NATO countries but were not seen as NATO action because of restrictions imposed by consensual decision-making. Some NATO members did not agree with all the aspects of these operations, leading these to become allied rather than NATO actions.

Whether it was Serbia, Kosovo, Afghanistan, Iraq or Libya, the success rate of NATO action remained limited. Overwhelming firepower would certainly subdue the territories, but politically, even in the medium term, these countries remained outside the objectives of NATO. The anti-piracy action under Operation Allied Protector in 2009 in the Gulf of Aden and Indian Ocean, has not prevented recurrence of piracy, most recently earlier this year during the Houthi attacks during Israel-Gaza war.[5]

Thus, after the Cold War, instead of becoming a more political, rather than military organization, NATO had limited success and was unable to pursue its political goals beyond a point.

Europe went beyond NATO’s confines to engage with Russia in its economic and energy cooperation for peace in Europe. By 2021, the EU and UK were importing almost $150 billion of oil and gas annually from Russia.

It was NATO’s inclusion of countries right on Russian borders that led to the Ukraine crisis. NATO decided to challenge Russia, but could not invoke Article 5 since no NATO member had been attacked. At this time two internal cleavages emerged. First, European autonomy which, after Brexit, the German-Franco alliance wanted to pursue, came to a halt and they had to reverse their Russian policies under pressure especially from the U.S. within the NATO alliance. Within the EU, many countries still continue to seek strategic autonomy and consistency of policy from the U.S., the de facto governor of NATO action.

Secondly, the new members who came in from East Europe have a different view on Russia than the West European members, both within the EU and in NATO. They play all sides. American support for them within NATO, make some look askance at traditional European leaders. Sometimes this is retaliation for positions taken within the EU.

NATO remains the EU’s real defence arm.[6] The EU still believes that one day it will have its own defence; yet under American pressure many countries which had a free ride under the U.S. security umbrella, now have to pay more. The entire question of NATO members providing 2% of GDP for defence has become real only during the Ukraine crisis and under U.S. insistence. At present, only 11 countries meet that criterion. Larger countries like Germany are rushing to get there to show their commitment.[7]

NATO, meanwhile, continues its expansionary pursuits. It is now seeking a non-European presence. Its effort to open an office in Japan was stymied by resistance from France, but shows clearly the direction in which the U.S. wants the NATO to go. NATO summits now include non-NATO allies in the Indo-Pacific, like Japan, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand.[8] These countries are American allies and their policies are now coordinated with NATO action in Europe, including in Ukraine. The threat for many of these countries, though, is from China. However, they are being persuaded to participate in NATO’s efforts to restrain the rise of Russian influence globally.

Countries in the Indo-Pacific possibly think that by agreeing to work with the U.S. they can raise their own stature and perhaps receive reciprocal support in case of problems in their regions. Examples are South Korea vis-à-vis North Korea, Japan vis-à-vis North Korea and China and Australia vis-à-vis China. For the U.S., its effort to coordinate allies in Asia with NATO is more aligned with guarding US interests in the region, particularly in Taiwan.

Thus has the resurgence of NATO in its 75th year become a support for America’s policies at a lower cost to it than in the past. Now on this track, NATO is compelled to look beyond Europe and face other challenges such as from China and nontraditional sources. For this, it must be more dynamic and nimbler with its responses and resources. Whether this version of NATO can carry these additional responsibilities, will become evident over the next five years.

Gurjit Singh is a former Indian Ambassador to Germany. He is currently promoting the impact investment movement for implementing SDGs in Africa.

This article was exclusively written for Gateway House: Indian Council on Global Relations. You can read more exclusive content here.

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References

[1] The Warsaw Treaty Organization, 1955, US State Department, https://history.state.gov/milestones/1953-1960/warsaw-treaty

[2] NATO’s role in Kosovo, NATO 20 November 2023, https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/topics_48818.html

[3] NATO action against Serbian military targets prompts divergent views as security council holds urgent meeting on situation in Kosovo, UN Press Release
SC/6657, 24 March 1999, https://press.un.org/en/1999/19990324.sc6657.html

[4] NATO and Afghanistan, NATO, https://www.europarl.europa.eu/meetdocs/2014_2019/documents/d-af/dv/nato_afghanist/nato_afghanistan.pdf

[5] Addison Heintz, Failures and Success of NATO, ACE, 22 July 2022, https://ace-usa.org/blog/research/research-foreignpolicy/failures-and-successes-of-nato/

[6] The European Union Charts Its Own Path for European Rearmament, CSIS, 8 March 2024, https://www.csis.org/analysis/european-union-charts-its-own-path-european-rearmament

[7] Defence expenditures and NATO’s 2% guideline, NATO, 5 April 2024, https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/topics_49198.ht

[8] 2023 NATO SUMMIT, NATO, 28 June 2023, https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/216570.html