House of Commons - Defence

Select Committee on Defence Third Report

NATO's Area of Action

58. The area covered by Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty is strictly circumscribed by Article 6 of that Treaty: it is—

... the territory of any of the member states in Europe or North America, the territory of Turkey and the islands under the jurisdiction of any of the Parties to the Treaty in the area north of the Tropic of Cancer.

Moreover, Article 5 applies to the forces, vessels, and aircraft of any of the member states—

... when in or over these territories or any other area in Europe in which occupation forces of any of the Parties were stationed [in 1949] or the Mediterranean Sea or the North Atlantic area north of the Tropic of Cancer.

There is however no restriction in the Treaty with regard to any other area in which its members can choose to co-operate in military or other operations, over and above the obligations of Article 5; the subject is simply not covered.

59. Two other parts of the Treaty lend themselves to wider interpretation. In the Treaty's preamble, the Allies have pledged to 'seek to promote stability and well-being in the North Atlantic area', which is not specified geographically. Article 4 stipulates that the member states—

... will consult together whenever, in the opinion of any of them, the territorial integrity, political independence or security of any of the Parties [to the Treaty] is threatened.

There is no word in the Treaty about the type of action that might ensue from such consultation.

60. In the past few years there has been an ongoing debate about whether or not NATO should assume a more global role, and the subject remains controversial, not least amongst the Allies themselves.[119] It is not entirely a new debate; for example, the 1991 Gulf War was not undertaken by NATO as it was clearly out-of-area. Nevertheless, many of the Allies were involved in the eventual ad hoc coalition that undertook the operation, which was undoubtedly made more effective by those nations' habits of cooperation through NATO. As John Roper wrote in his submission to the Committee, the formal adoption of a global role—

... may be considered by some to be a move too far, with overtones of great power neo-imperialism.[120]

And Dr Jonathan Eyal told us that—

... almost everyone within the Alliance, especially the Americans, is schizophrenic about this entire question of the geographical remit of the Alliance's operations.[121]

Many others share General Sir Michael Rose's opinion that—

It is far better to use NATO in its own theatre ... than to try and say that NATO has some sort of magic which we can deploy anywhere in the world,[122]

and that operations outside the Euro-Atlantic area should be left to other regional bodies, such as the Organisation for African Unity. However, according to some witnesses, some groupings in the USA apparently see no need to limit future activities of NATO that are of a non-Article 5 type to any particular area.[123] However, the French[124] and German governments have been more circumspect, and we have heard that they are most unwilling to have NATO commit to a more global role without specific assurances on NATO's mandate for out-of-area operations, discussed above.[125]

61. The question now is to what extent any global limitations will be spelled out in the new Strategic Concept. We were told that—

... the British government's instinct will be to leave [the definition of NATO's area of operations] as it is at the moment, very flexible,[126]

but that the new Strategic Concept would, according to the MoD's Policy Director—

... give ... a clear flavour of where NATO sees its prime interests as being, which is in European security ... what it will not do is lay down precise limits ... for a number of very good reasons, one of which is [that] we want to avoid the slight mistake of the last Strategic Concept of writing down something which looks really quite sensible today but looks dated only two or three years later.[127]

The legitimacy of out-of-area operations by NATO as a whole, or by Allies in ad hoc coalitions, where there is no direct threat to NATO's interests, continues to be debated. The Secretary General of NATO has said[128] that the question of NATO's global reach will be addressed in a precise manner in the new Strategic Concept and we look forward to this clearer indication of NATO's view of its global role.