NATO'S NEW ROLES AND MISSIONS
The New Roles
THE BALANCE BETWEEN THE OLD AND NEW ROLES
26. Article 5 of the Alliance's founding document,
the North Atlantic Treaty,[40]
has always been at the very core of the Alliance,[41]
committing the Allies to agreement that—
... an armed attack against one or more of them ...
shall be considered an attack against them all.
The Foreign Office told us that—
There will be no dilution, obviously, of the Article
5 element envisaged in the Strategic Concept, but there will be
some discussion and paragraphs concerning the sorts of actions
outside Article 5 in which NATO might anticipate being involved
in the future.[42]
The necessity of NATO continuing to have an Article
5 capability was described by the US Deputy Secretary of State—
NATO must maintain its capability to deter, and if
necessary defeat, what might be called classic aggression. Even
though such a threat does not exist today, two facts remain: first,
it could arise in the future; but, second, it is less likely to
do so if NATO remains robust and ready.[43]
In the past the Organisation's energies were directed
to having the military capacity to fulfil its Article 5 commitments
with its strategy and force structure designed to repel a Soviet
attack on its territorial integrity. This is a scenario which
now "does not form part of [NATO's] day to day thinking",[44]
and all commentators agree that in the future—
NATO ... will find itself ... having to deal more
with non-Article 5 problems than with Article 5 itself.[45]
Hence NATO's attention is becoming increasingly focussed
on crisis management involving military actions in support of
the interests of the Allies (under Article 6 of the Treaty)
or to ameliorate humanitarian crises. NATO is therefore moving
in a similar direction to the UK in the post-Cold War world; as
the Secretary of State said in his introduction to the SDR, 'we
must be prepared to go to the crisis, rather than have the crisis
come to us'.[46] Issues
such as the nature of NATO's 'core' and 'peripheral' military
missions and defence planning processes for these missions have
been crucial in the formulation of the new Strategic Concept.
As we were told by the MoD's policy director—
... there is a quite animated theological debate
going on about just how much emphasis is placed on which mission
and what the practical consequences of that are.[47]
27. The Foreign and Commonwealth Office's Director
of International Security told us that the new Strategic Concept
should "encapsulate the idea of NATO as an all-purpose organisation
for dealing with security challenges relevant to Europe".[48]
He later said that, in relation to the new Strategic Concept—
I think NATO will avoid, for example, any attempt
to define a geographical area or a particular size or nature of
a conflict which will automatically call for or rule out a NATO
response. I think it will include a lot of generic language about
the sort of situations, challenges to regional securities, threats
to stability, humanitarian situations which could promote a NATO
response.[49]
28. Within NATO, the eastern states, including the
three new members, are particularly concerned about the possibility
of erosion of the mutual defence function of the Alliance.[50]
The MoD's Policy Director told us that—
For very understandable reasons the three invitees
show a strong interest in the collective security dimension,
(but that, "I have not seen them avoiding the
new missions".[51])
Other states want to see non-Article 5 activities given the same
strategic emphasis as territorial defence, or to see new activities
which could fall under Article 5 but have not featured previously
given greater prominence, such as measures to counter the proliferation
of weapons of mass destruction, or combatting terrorism.
29. Sir Michael Alexander told us that much of the
debate can be boiled down to two diverging requirements on NATO,
one to provide for collective defence, the other to provide for
collective security measures. There remains a concern that NATO
is currently straddling two horses which are vigorously pulling
in opposite directions,[52]
and that even the most skilful and inventive riders will not be
able to stay on top of both indefinitely. However, not all of
NATO's non-Article 5 activities will necessarily be military-led;
Dr Beatrice Heuser told us that such tasks could include outreach
activity, the projection of stability through the Euro-Atlantic
area and the exchange of information with non-Allies.[53]
These tasks have not been forced on NATO,[54]
and many are not 'new'. We have seen the UK armed forces progressively
be reconfigured to provide capability for a wide range of tasks,
and hope that NATO forces will be able to demonstrate a similar
flexibility. We were encouraged by the Minister of State at the
Foreign and Commonwealth Office's statement that—
We are coming now to a sensible balance between the
['old' and 'new' roles], which is based on the pragmatic role
that NATO will have.[55]
We wish to see the new Strategic Concept outline
a new direction for NATO for the years ahead. New roles must be
outlined and prioritised. The changing security environment means
that new challenges must be faced, and new roles and responsibilities
taken on. NATO has already done well to reconfigure itself to
meet post-Cold War challenges. However, its core function of territorial
defence must not be undermined by its new missions, and NATO must
retain its military capability to fulfil Article 5 tasks, however
remote such threats may seem.
40 See Appendix 1 Back
41 Ev
p 89 Back
42 Q
3 Back
43 Royal
United Services Institute, 10 March 1999 Back
44 Q
11 Back
45 Q
288 Back
46 The
Strategic Defence Review, Modern Forces for a Modern World,
Cm 3999 Back
47 Q
12 Back
48 Q
3 Back
49 Q
59 Back
50 Ev
p 95 Back
51 Q
16 Back
52 Q
103 Back
53 Q
111 Back
54 Q
111 Back
55 Q
292 Back
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