NATO, Amor Fati.

NATO’s Origins

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) was founded with the signing of the Washington Treaty

in 1949 by 12 sovereign states. It is therefore an intergovernmental organization. It had three primary

purposes at the time: to deter Soviet expansionism, forbid revival of nationalist militarism through

American presence in Europe and encourage European political integration1. This political and military

alliance was permitted as per the UN charter, and it has endured through times beyond its original

purpose. Its core decision making mechanisms have not changed. As a political-military alliance, its

structure is twofold: civilian and military. Member states send delegations to the Headquarters in

Brussels which are welcomed by a permanent International Staff and International Military Staff. When

a state makes a decision thought to have military implications, the Military Committee produces

recommendations and guides to the Supreme Allied Commanders in charge of NATO operations. The

alliance does maintain a public figure head, the secretary general. This individual becomes the chairman

over the most important decision making bodies: the North Atlantic Council, the Defense Planning

Committee and the Nuclear Planning Group among others. His job is very difficult: he must forge

consensus among member states (to the count of 28 at this time), facilitating decisions. He is assisted by

his Deputy Secretary General both of which supervise the proper functioning of the International Staff

(IS). The IS is critical for guiding proper policy implementation including development of new

capabilities. It must also manage operational commitments, crises and exercises. The IS encompasses

1200 workers. HQ accounts for approximately 4200 workers when including the national delegations2.

NATO’s full theoretical capacity as a military alliance is the aggregate of all 28 member states militaries.

1 A short history of NATO. Nato website. Link: http://www.nato.int/history/nato-history.html2 NATO Handbook, Public Diplomacy Division. Brussels, Belgium.2006. P. 77

A Shared Demise

With the collapse of the Soviet threat in the early 1990s, the continued presence of US military bases in

Europe and the evolution of the European Union one could say the organization has achieved

remarkable challenges and fulfilled its purpose. In fact, Mersheimer, a famous “realist” theorist foresaw

the abrupt end of this organization in 19903. The Soviet threat, the glue keeping NATO together, once

removed, would have the alliance dissolve. A reunified Germany would not take kindly to an alliance

meant to narrow its foreign policy options. As we know now, Mersheimer was wrong.

I believe Anthony Downs’ life cycle theory and the “characters” which animate it partly explain NATO’s

ongoing struggle for meaning. Mersheimer is correct that the end of the Cold War delivered an

existential crisis to NATO. The Soviet threat was a rallying cause for Western nations and once gone,

political integration of Europe seemed feasible under the CEE framework (Germany reunited, newly

independent nation-states in the East) and a US presence on the continent could be questioned as a

misallocation of resources or at the least being on its way out with the Organization for Security and Co-

operation in Europe (OSCE) taking the torch. With this existential crisis we would expect NATO to fall

apart. But instead it endured.

NATO’s Metamorphosis

Rather than dying, NATO entered a maturity stage, where senior political leaders sought to preserve the

alliance, its institutions, and its corridors. After all, these nations had trained together and were

expected to fight together and had been well on their way to harmonizing mechanisms and capabilities

(e.g: NATO alphabet, joint exercises, shared bases). These conservers wanted to keep an organization

that had fulfill its purpose but had also become routine. NATO could be the whole that was greater than

the sum of its parts. In so doing, the notion of a “changing security environment” emerged as a motif.

3 Back to the Future: Instability in Europe After the Cold War. John J. Mersheimer. International Security summer 1990. Link: http://mearsheimer.uchicago.edu/pdfs/A0017.pdf

NATO couldn’t pass away, it had to be quick, cunning, agile, alert to overcome future challenges

whatever they may be.

NATO had to rethink, reorganize its reason d’etre to be part of this new world, it had to transform. The

International Staff (IS) is constantly changing, a sort of permanent restructuring to reflect what is

believed to be the needed Subject Matter Experts (SME) to confront the new threats of the day. The IS

provides guidance in security, regional, economic affairs and administrative support. As part of the

restructuring, soviet experts could be expected to adopt a full diplomatic route with the beginning of the

NATO-Russia Council. NATO was now going to operate in new regions. New economic models were

going to be implemented in Europe. The Partnership for Peace endeavor now sought to find allies of all

sizes and importance to the alliance across the globe, even as far as Australia. The golf war in 1990

brought NATO to its first Operation. Terrorism then appeared on the agendas of national security

discussions with the bombings in Nairobi in 1996 and the infamous 9/11 attack against NATO’s largest

member: the United States. It was a remarkable recovery from the death bed.

In 2002’s Prague Summit, the decision was made to reorganize the NATO Supreme Commands to make

them leaner and more efficient. Two separate Commands once existed according to geographic areas:

Europe and the North Atlantic. Two new Commands replaced them: Allied Command Operations would

be the strategic command of all NATO forces, wherever they may be and the Allied Command

Transformation a functional command responsible for….transforming the Alliance.

The (Supreme) Allied Command Transformation (SACT) was created I presume for the purpose of solving

the existential crisis, to focus solely on “transformation” to ensure the relevance of the alliance in a

rapidly changing environment. This means military capabilities and interoperability of armies. SACT does

this by producing strategic thinking and policies to remain relevant, it develops new capabilities and co-

ordinates with the various training facilities of NATO to keep NATO forces integrated and operational.

Although NATO has changed quite a bit, this need for SACT is “systemic” which in laymans terms means

“very, very…very important to us” and the purpose of which has neither changed, nor its focus even

though the “environment is constantly changing”. According to the NATO handbook:” this reform

provided a structure with the capacity to focus systematically on facilitating the transformation of

military capabilities on a continuous basis as new needs are identified”4. In other words, the more things

change, the more they stay the same.

These transformations maintain the corridors of NATO alive, and emerging threats are its sustenance.

The alliance’s organization is maintained by the struggle against “known unknowns” but also keeps the

door open indefinitely for upcoming “unknown unknowns”. There are many new so called “emerging”

threats: non state actors using terrorism, BCNR (Biological, Chemical, Nuclear and Radiological), cyber

threats and the mixtures of these, hybrid warfare. As the older zealot and older conservers wither away,

NATO might become the kind of organization in which one foresees a rite of passage for their career.

Already many of the contracts within NATO have fixed dates and many internships are temporary as

well as research fellowships, perhaps these are signs of a change in nature.

Transforming is Learning

NATO becomes a learning organization as it strives to define new security threats, and develop

capabilities for deterrence and defense against them. In respect of Open-Systems theories, NATO

researchers are paid a salary and work fixed hours to educate fellow brothers in arms as well as doing

full-fledged research. These researchers are on the watch from 9 to 5, 5 days a week. NATO has made

4 NATO Handbook, Public Diplomacy Division. Brussels, Belgium.2006. P. 21

research initiatives56, created teams7 and prototypes as well as a missile defense grid8 to protect NATO

missions but also civilian populations. These new threats progressively enter NATO’s core tasks as

discussions and events make them more salient. These are good things because the risk of proliferation

although (hopefully) minimal, still exist. NATO’s learning approach empowers researchers, on a

professional level but also for the organization by enriching its knowledge base9. To facilitate the

learning process NATO has created the NATOSource10, a one click resource that provides all the relevant

news about NATO for citizens but most particularly NATO workers. Information here is transmitted

vertically from top to bottom and vice versa. This new technological procedure to transmit new

knowledge is reminiscent of High Reliability Organizations and could only have existed with the proper

design. It was much more difficult to perform outreach on such magnitude prior to the internet, during

the cold war. By performing exercises and active operations, NATO maintains explicit learning (by doing)

on the ground.

What I mean to say is that NATO has always been a learning organization. Making 28 nations

that once hated each other, train together to fight together required some learning to say the least. The

new nuclear bombs were also highly theorized through game theory and NATO has had to learn how to

use them as effective deterrence. These were new destructive technologies for mankind and NATO has

not blasted us off the planet yet. NATO’s transformation was therefore not an impetus for learning,

learning was a priori to the existential crisis.

5 Fellowship programmes. Nato defense college website. November 2015 last updated. Link: http://www.ndc.nato.int/research/research.php?icode=46 The Science for Peace and Security Programme. Nato website. Last updated April 2015. Link: http://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/topics_85373.htm?7 Researchers at NATO Defense College. http://www.ndc.nato.int/research/research.php?icode=78 Ballistic missile defence. Nato website. Last updated November 2015. Link: http://www.nato.int/cps/en/natolive/topics_49635.htm9 Research Publications at the NDC. Nato Defense College website. Last updated December 2015. Link: http://www.ndc.nato.int/research/research.php?icode=610 NATOSource. Hosted by the Atlantic council. Link: http://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/natosource

I believe NATO’s over stayed welcome is justified. Threats to our institutions, our values, our goods have

always been part of human affairs. NATO exists for this purpose, it is a hammer in the toolbox. I believe

it is to the elected politicians to use it wisely. Some threats are greater, are more organized, some are

smaller and less organized. Threats have shifted and NATO’s actions reflect this, the Alliance has focused

towards consulting and civil emergency planning and this makes sense because the risk of interstate war

no longer seem realistic. Our states have learned to trust each other through this alliance and it seems

like there is still a way ahead together.

NATO’s Reorganization as Symbolic

The reorganization was a necessity to maintain the alliance for the sake of a common identity. Firstly,

the nations that comprise NATO expressed a desire to remain united even after the Soviet threat

dissipated. This desire to remain united displays a level of trust and cooperation among nations that was

transcendental to the original cause of deterring soviet expansionism. The threat of containing militant

nationalism had also slowly been erased of common memories as the European Union furthered

political and economic integration on the continent. If the “West” as a concept is to be symbolized by

anything at all, it would be NATO as it remains the mold that binds the Atlantic states to a common path.

Reorganizing the alliance along the lines of new threats is the salvation of this common identity.

Secondly, shifting policy priorities towards non state actors implied a new dawn for the international

system. With states no longer being a priority for NATO, the idea of interstate warfare for western

scholars, politicians and their publics faded. Fear momentarily gave way to euphoria albeit not for long.

With the end of an international system, what was going to keep “the West” from dissolving? Perhaps it

is dissolving, but that would not be due to NATO unless history proves more ironic than I imagine.

These symbols are not enough however to justify the maintenance of joint military programs, which

have high costs and could be allocated elsewhere according to the interests of their proper states. The

motivations for reorganization were certainly policy-driven. The fears for non-state actors are not

entirely unfounded, the greatest of all being a small fanatic group getting hands on Weapons of Mass

Destruction in order to receive concessions or cause harm. 9/11 made these fears believable and spread

throughout the western world. It made political sense to join efforts in countering terrorism in a

globalized environment. INTERPOL already existed but NATO’s institutions brought together the

respective militaries and national defense bureaucracies as a convenient solution to obsolescence and

eventual downsizing. Perhaps this redundancy between NATO and Interpol to maintain the international

systemic structure is worthwhile. Anyhow, their collective capacities were put to use for the new

policies of counter terrorism. The Partnership for Peace programs, which are practical bilateral

cooperation programs between states and NATO provide these individual states with tailored training

and counseling. The PfP was established in 1994 and touches virtually all of NATO’s activity fields,

rendering them useful as opposed to being mere sunk costs. With its 22 Partners, NATO is doing

something about maintaining the current global balance of power by aiding established states against

potential non state actors11.

Along with new partners, NATO’s quest for significance in the post Cold War era led it not to shrink and

downsize but quite the opposite. According to Article 10, the alliance can jointly invite new states. The

end of the cold war witnessed spectacular waves of accession. 10 countries, with more joining the

Membership Action Plan (MAP). For the most part these are eastern European states, former soviet

satellites. According to the NATO handbook, these strides are the results of policy decisions made

decades prior. The Harmel doctrine (1967), Chancellor Brandt’s Ostpolitik (1969), and the Helsinki Final

Act of 1975 which created the bonds upon which eastern enlargement was later to make sense. These

are clearly efforts on behalf of the Alliance, its states but also personalities to influence the

“environment”, to relax and ease tensions between east and west. Why enlarge though, in light of this

11 The Partnership for Peace programme. Nato website. March 2014. Link: http://www.nato.int/cps/en/natolive/topics_50349.htm

existential crisis? Well it seemed perfectly fitting. As an institution dealing with Euro-Atlantic security,

the liberal beliefs in democracy (notably for control of the military), transparency, and consensus were

thought to reinforce European integration and its security. NATO’s abilities would strengthen the

Europeans’ sense of security on the continent. This perfectly quenches whatever existential crisis the

organization may have had at the collapse of the Soviet Union. From 12, NATO grew to have 28

members since inception.

NATO as an organization was and continues to be a convenient tool for states to disperse responsibility

and damages received by external threats. Its forums, corridors, serve as channels to signal concerns

with fellow states and its agencies, including the IS are solution driven. NATO’s article 5 was used only

once in history, and that was as a response to 9/11. For the next 5 months, NATO Airborne Warning and

Control System aircrafts patrolled the US coasts12. Even though the US Air Force and Navy most certainly

could by themselves fulfill this task, employing NATO had the benefit of drawing in allied states. 9/11

was no longer an attack against New York City, or the United States alone, but against a united “West”.

This attack was an occasion to rally around a common cause and impose a new narrative that had not

been seen since the cold war. More than ever, the various surveillance and intelligence agencies of

NATO member states had a shared responsibility to collaborate. Even though the United States may be

the most powerful entity in the international system, distant campaigns are extremely costly. NATO is an

alliance of 28 different member states, some of which have no military capabilities whatsoever (e.g:

Iceland) and others which have demonstrated resolve (e.g: France) which together diffuse the costs for

foreign interventions.

NATO in Action

12 NATO’s finest Hour: the day the Alliance stood up for America. Ivo Daalder. Excerpt from Wall Street Journal by the United States Mission to NATO. September 12th 2011. Link: http://nato.usmission.gov/natos-finest-hour-9-12-2011.html

NATO has fulfilled quite a few of these costly expeditions far away from its borders since the end of the

cold war: International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) from 2003-2014 in Afghanistan, Operation Ocean

Shield off the Horn of Africa since 2009, Operation Display Deterrence during the second gulf conflict

(Feb-April 2003), NATO Training Mission in Iraq (NTM-I) from 2004 to 2011, Humanitarian relief in

Pakistan in 2005, assisting the African Union in Darfur from 2005 to 2007. All states share responsibility

either financially or by sending troops or donating materials13.

NATO’s nemesis

However the mot d’ordre remains budget cuts, austerity measures. Emerging threats, enlargement,

transformation, symbolism and even pragmatism are insufficient to quench the existential angel of

death that lulls above. NATO has had to reorganize under the auspice of “Smart Defense”, as opposed to

“dumb defense”…

NATO alone has small standing forces and limited centers in comparison to the expectations this

organization must confront. As such the resources allocated to it are best understood not directly but by

the respective military expenditures of their member states, the Alliance is not alone in its missions. It is

more akin to a conveyor in this regard. Member states do contribute according to their ability to pay and

NATO manages the budget according to an agreed cost formula, once again another responsibility for

the IS. These contributions are small in comparison to the members’ overall defense budgets. The Civil

budget is funded primarily by the foreign ministries of each member country and is supervised by the

Civil Budget Committee and implemented by IS. The military budget is primarily funded by the ministries

of defense of each member country14.

13 Operations and missions: past and present. Nato website. November 2015. Link: http://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/topics_52060.htm14 NATO Handbook, Public Diplomacy Division. Brussels, Belgium.2006. P. 58-60

“Smart defense” was coined by Anders Fogh Rasmussen, the previous Secretary General of NATO and

comes to incarnate the age old concerns of “pooling and sharing” or collective action problem. Smart

Defense is in short doing the same or more, with less. NATO’s duty to protect its members has not

changed, but the means provided to it have lessened. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, states have

changed their allocations for defense. In constant 2010 dollars, nearly all members have lowered their

defense budgets15 in the past 10 years.

16

15 Defense expenditures of NATO countries (1995-2015), nato website. Link with data: http://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/news_120866.htm16 NATO Members’ Defense Spending, in Two Charts. Kedar Pavgi. Defense one. June 22nd 2015.Link: http://www.defenseone.com/politics/2015/06/nato-members-defense-spending-two-charts/116008/

Most states are even below NATO’s target level of 2% of GDP. With lowered means, NATO becomes

actually more salient as a matchmaking center for states seeking to fulfill common interests17. Smart

Defense is more so an imposition than a decision. It is a result of austerity measures, tightening budgets

and policy prioritization. What is ironic is that by cutting the military budgets, which on face value seems

to hurt NATO, only makes NATO more essential. NATO’s abilities to success are penalized, but failure will

not be tolerated and given a crisis, future means are hoped to be unlocked. As members states have to

forgo funding entire capability branches, pooling various capabilities together will be necessary for any

levels of success in future operations. Imagine a war effort led by one state which neither has boats,

planes or ammunition but only troops, or better yet, boats, planes and ammunition but no personnel

nor troops. In the Alliance, the member states capable of leading a foreign campaign entirely by

themselves are very limited. We have had the United States in the Middle East and France in the

Maghreb. Through austerity, each state cripples itself to the point that it needs NATO for its own proper

defense. This might be a glimpse into the future of conglomerated states and interdependent needs in

Western Europe. In this future, there will be NATO to respond to the barrage of threats.

Conclusion

NATO should have died with its rival: the Soviet Union. But it did not, it has endured and currently it

seems to be at an impasse with member states unable to reach targeted levels of defense expenditure.

However NATO’s survival is owed to its organization’s flexibility. Under the purpose of transformation,

NATO created its very own death-proof serum. But I am not quite sure if the serum is a placebo. I

believe there is also something beyond NATO at work here, something unique to security apparatuses.

Security is so essential to the primal legitimacy of states that they cannot be separated. A state’s

authority is defined by its ability to defend its citizenry. But alliances have come and gone in the past,

what is to say NATO will endure forever. The irony for NATO is that it has hardened as it has shrunk. It is

17 NATO After Libya, Anders fogh Rasmussen. Foreign Affairs. May/June 2011.

a necessity for its weaker member states and a continued benefit for its strongest.The sum of all parts

may truly be greater than the parts.