Can NATO Deliver?

With enlargement underway, NATO is embarking on one of its most controversial exercises - one that could lead to a radical transformation of the Alliance. ¹ NATO will soon comprise countries with unstable neighbors. Observers are concerned that it will also have to swallow leftovers from Warsaw Pact times, such as generals trained to fight the West, military infrastructure masterminded in Moscow, and individual intelligence officers loyal to Russia. Furthermore, NATO’s new mechanism of coordination with Russia could hamper joint decision-making and lead to new conflicts among the allies.

There are two additional aspects troubling NATO. First, NATO enlargement comes at a time when armed forces in all Western countries are restructuring and adjusting to the military needs of the post-Cold War period. Ten years ago, military planning focused on the European continent, and nuclear strategy was a central part of it. Today armed conflict is more likely to occur outside the European theater, and to require conventional forces rather than nuclear ones. Because such conflict could affect the interests of Western countries, mobile and highly equipped forces are needed in place of the main defense forces of the past.

Second, both processes - enlargement and restructuring - require significant financial commitments. These commitments will make governments question NATO’s mission in the absence of a direct common threat, such as the one posed by the Soviet Union in the past. How can high military spending be justified in the absence of such a threat? What is the most appropriate way to pool resources, and share the financial burden? Do Americans and Europeans still share the same objective for NATO?

While more and more American observers are advocating a mission for NATO beyond Europe’s borders, ² the primary motivation for countries in Central and Eastern Europe to apply for membership is the Alliance’s traditional Cold War role: to serve as a military guarantee against instability in Russia. Western Europeans tend to take a position between these two extremes, preferring that NATO’s responsibilities remain restricted to the old continent and closely intertwined with other European institutions, such as the European Union, the Western European Union, and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. Like NATO, these institutions, as well as, to some extent, the UN, have undergone significant change in the last few years, and should now be ready to respond to any security crisis that might confront Europe. ³

In view of the complex set of decisions to be taken concerning NATO’s future, it is wise to take a step back and look at the most dramatic failure of these institutions. ⁴ Only five years ago, the international community seemed unmoved by the most brutal genocide in Europe since World War II, and incapable of halting the conflict in Bosnia-Herzegovina. More than 200,000 people were killed, thousands assailed; the country was ethnically cleansed. The extent of the brutality and cruelty of the war was vast: people were detained in what some called concentration camps, women were sexually abused, and the elderly expelled from their homes. ⁵ The euphoria of peace that had followed the end of the Cold War was shattered; politicians and the public were shocked.

In light of this bloody portrait, one has to ask if NATO - in the field of military security the mightiest of the aforementioned institutions - can deliver peace the next time armed conflict arises, or whether it will find itself blamed again for inactivity, failure, and cynicism. This article will examine the reasons for NATO’s alleged failure and draw lessons from the Alliance’s first military engagement.

NATO’s Three Deficiencies

NATO was particularly criticized by the public for three deficiencies that, analytically, can be treated as separate yet were closely intertwined: fatally late intervention, substantial intra-alliance disputes, and subordination to, and massive rivalry with the United Nations.

The public discussion about a possible role for NATO in Bosnia started in spring 1992, shortly after the fighting began. A decisive factor in arguments favoring NATO, rather than other institutions, as an instrument for bringing peace to the Balkans was its unrivaled military power...