THIRD REPORT
The Defence Committee has agreed to the following
Report:—
THE FUTURE OF NATO: THE WASHINGTON SUMMIT
INTRODUCTION
1. 4th April 1999 marks the fiftieth anniversary
of the signature of the North Atlantic Treaty, the basis for the
establishment of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO).
NATO will celebrate its anniversary at a Summit to be held in
Washington DC on 24th and 25th April 1999. This Summit should
be marked by the publication of NATO's new Strategic Concept,
a document which will outline NATO's purpose, missions and roles
and from which NATO's future military planning will be derived.
2. At the time at which we agreed this Report (31st
March), NATO forces had been engaged in air strikes against the
armed forces of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia for a week.
The purpose of Operation Allied Force is, in the words of the
Foreign Secretary, to prevent—
... the present humanitarian crisis from becoming
a catastrophe ... by taking military action to limit the capacity
of Milosevic's army to repress the Kosovar Albanians.[1]
The UK is among 14 NATO nations currently contributing
to NATO operations in support of United Nations (UN) resolutions
in the Balkan region. This operation is the culmination of ten
months' work by NATO and the international community to attempt
to find a peaceful and lasting solution to the problems of Kosovo,
including diplomatic efforts, enhanced Partnership for Peace activities
with Albania and the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, air
demonstrations over the region and the deployment of an extraction
force to safeguard unarmed international verifiers in Kosovo.
Operation Allied Force, in pursuit of humanitarian goals, represents
the first instance in its 50-year history of NATO military action
against an independent state.
3. The future form and outcome of NATO's actions
in the Balkans is uncertain, and it would be inappropriate for
us to draw wider conclusions at this juncture. However, current
events have thrown into sharp relief many of the pressing questions
that NATO faces at the Washington Summit. Kosovo provides a compelling
example of instability on the borders of NATO and of the type
of conflict in which NATO may expect to become more involved in
the future. While ground troops have been deployed to the region,
as yet none have been involved in either combat or confrontation.
It is possible, however, that we shall in the near future see
NATO troops deployed within the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia
in support of any peace deal, as presently envisaged by NATO,
and it is at that point that it will become clear whether or not
the lessons of NATO's involvement in Bosnia and Herzegovina have
been learned.[2]
However, there are those who argue that ground troops will have
to be deployed against opposition in pursuit of NATO's military
goals. The debate on NATO's mandate for such operations, until
now mainly theoretical, has been overtaken by events; although
it still rages between those who would wish to see an unambiguous
UN mandate for NATO's actions and those who are satisfied that,
as 'an exceptional measure to prevent an overwhelming humanitarian
catastrophe',[3]
the operation is justified under international law.
4. NATO can now peer into its future by examining
the present. The political and the military lessons of recent
and current operations in Former Yugoslavia are already beginning
to be learned, and they may have to be brought to bear on the
drafting of the new Strategic Concept. We must hope that the Washington
Summit is not completely hijacked by the Kosovo crisis, however
grave it is, and however critical the juncture it may have reached
by the end of April. It would be regrettable if NATO planners
were forced to delay the preparation of the new Strategic Concept.
However, there are many competing and pressing demands for attention
currently faced by NATO's International Staff. It will be for
the Heads of Government to decide whether the new Strategic Concept
can be fully promulgated at the Summit, but NATO will still need
to map a path to the future.
5. The North Atlantic Alliance was founded in April
1949 to counter the power and influence of the Soviet Union and
to provide mutual defence guarantees to its members. Its founding
members were Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Iceland, Italy,
Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, the United Kingdom
and the United States; Greece and Turkey joined the Alliance in
1952, the Federal Republic of Germany in 1955 and Spain in 1982.
The Washington Summit will also be the first Summit that the Czech
Republic, Hungary and Poland will have attended as full members
of the Alliance since their accession on 12th March 1999. NATO
invited these countries to become members of the Alliance at its
Madrid Summit in July 1997. Between that time and the formal ratification
of the protocols of enlargement by NATO's member states, intensive
debate occurred about the merits and disadvantages of this and
further enlargement of the Alliance.
6. The Defence Committee's contribution to that debate
was an extensive inquiry into NATO enlargement. The Committee
reported its findings to Parliament in March of last year.[4]
Our Report outlined the run-up to enlargement, noting that the
possibilities for Central and Eastern European countries of becoming
full members had led to real improvements in the security of Europe
as a whole, by providing incentives for these countries to improve
the structure and control of their militaries, to enhance democracy
and to resolve border disputes and internal problems with ethnic
minorities.[5]
We recognised the misgivings that Russia has about enlargement,
but concluded that in this case they were outweighed by those
advantages.[6]
We approved the choice of candidates,[7]
but urged that any further enlargement should be approached with
caution.[8]
The Report also discussed the financial ramifications of enlargement,
concluding that, despite widely varying estimates of cost, enlargement
offered value for money.[9]
7. After the publication of our Report into enlargement,
we agreed to continue our inquiry into the future of NATO to consider
the development of NATO's new Strategic Concept and the prospects
for further enlargement, with the intention of publishing a Report
to inform Parliament before the Washington Summit. In this Report
we explore the purpose of a new Strategic Concept; NATO's new
roles and missions and its mandate for those missions; NATO's
relationships with other international organisations and with
non-NATO countries; the development of a European Security and
Defence Identity (ESDI) within NATO; and the progress of the current
round of enlargement together with the prospects for further accessions
to the Alliance.
8. This Report looks at issues likely to be debated
at the Washington Summit, and the conclusions likely to emerge
within either the new Strategic Concept or the Washington Declaration.
We consider the strategic issues that underpin the need for a
new Strategic Concept, and ask how NATO should formalise its new
roles and missions and what priority it should accord its 'traditional'
self-defence function. We evaluate the debate on the transatlantic
relationship, examine new initiatives on European defence and
discuss the implications of these for Europe, North America and
the various security organisations of the Euro-Atlantic area.
We explore the issue of NATO's global reach and discuss where
it can expect to be involved in operations in the future, and
examine the question of the mandate for NATO operations. We also
examine the potential for NATO's outreach and cooperation programmes
with its former Cold War adversaries and those countries who now
aspire to NATO membership. We will look at the process that led
up to the accession of NATO's new members and discuss how the
Washington Summit is likely to address the hopes and concerns
of the remaining aspirant members. This Report is addressed primarily
to Parliament and the UK government, but we hope that a wider
readership will find it useful. The debate on defence and security
issues, both within Parliament and the media, is often muted and
sometimes ill-informed, and has been for many years now. The future
shape and scope of NATO is fundamental to the future stability
and security of the UK, Europe and the world at large. It should
be of concern to us all. We hope that Parliament will be given
an opportunity to debate this issue in advance of the departure
of Ministers to the Washington Summit.
9. Over the last six months we have taken formal
evidence from the Secretary of State for Defence, the Minister
of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, officials of both
the Ministry of Defence (MoD) and the Foreign and Commonwealth
Office (FCO) and experts in peacekeeping operations and academics.
Following on from our formal meetings with the Prime Minister
and Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Hungary and
the Polish Minister of National Defence during our last inquiry,
we took formal evidence from the Minister of Foreign Affairs of
the Republic of Slovakia and the Chairman of the Bulgarian National
Assembly's Foreign Policy Committee. We have met informally with
many others to discuss NATO's future, including Ambassador Thomas
Graham of the Lawyers' Alliance for World Security. In November
we divided into two delegations and visited Bulgaria, Hungary,
Romania and Slovenia; in January we visited Paris, NATO Headquarters
and the Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe; and in March
we visited the Federal Republic of Germany, the Russian Federation
and Ukraine. Our itineraries are published as annexes to this
Report. The Ministry of Defence, academics and other interested
parties provided us with written submissions, many of which are
published with this Report. We are most grateful to the many people
who have assisted us with this inquiry, including our specialist
advisers: Professor Michael Clarke of the Centre for Defence Studies,
King's College London; Rear Admiral Richard Cobbold of the Royal
United Services Institute; Professor Keith Hartley of the Centre
for Defence Economics, University of York; Dr Beatrice Heuser
of the Department of War Studies, King's College London; Dr Colin
McInnes of the Department of International Politics, University
of Wales Aberystwyth; and Mr James Sherr of the Conflict Studies
Research Centre, Royal Military Academy Sandhurst.
1 HC Deb 25 March 1999, c 538 Back
2 See
eg First Report, Session 1997-98, Peace Support Operations
in Bosnia and Herzegovina, HC 403 Back
3 MoD
document Legal Basis for Operation ALLIED FORCE, available
on the Internet at www.mod.gov/news/kosovo/legal.htm Back
4 Third
Report, Session 1997-98, NATO Enlargement, HC 469 Back
5 ibid,
para 33 Back
6 ibid,
para 42 Back
7 ibid,
para 98 Back
8 ibid,
para 108 Back
9 ibid,
para 88 Back
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