The Fuzzy Logic of NATO's Security Partnerships

Prior to NATO's May 2012 Chicago summit, Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen suggested that "NATO is now a hub for a global network of security partners." In Afghanistan, Libya and Kosovo, the Alliance has worked closely together with a motley crew of partners, ranging from Australia to the League of Arab States. Since 1998, NATO has rapidly developed the idea of so-called "Contact Countries" into a full-fledged strategy to arrive at a "more efficient and flexible partnership policy" (at the 2010 Lisbon Summit). The logic behind this approach is overwhelming. NATO's ambition to become a global security and defense actor stands in stark contrast to its modest military capabilities. Without cooperating with Pakistan, Russia and China, success in Afghanistan remains illusory. Without joining forces with the United Arab Emirates, Qatar and Morocco, success in Libya was impossible. As US Ambassador the NATO Ivo Daalder argued: "This is a demand-driven partnership."

How very hip and postmodern this new NATO approach is! Gone are the days of hierarchical, authoritative command-and-control illusions, based on old-style hegemony. NATO has made the loose governance style its own, based on inclusiveness and multilateralism. Gone are the days when European allies were shocked when US Deputy Secretary of State Paul Wolfowitz predicted (in 2002) that the US would depend on "coalitions of the willing". Europeans have become used to a new, more flexible NATO, and a US that intends to "lead from behind" (at least in Libya). Don't get me wrong: I have nothing against cooperation and partnership; I see the logic and the charm. But I still can't deny the feeling that NATO is making a virtue of necessity. Most NATO member states realize that in the coming years of financial austerity their national defense budgets will decline even further; only the US still boasts an impressive US$ 700 bn. defense budget. Since the NATO toolbox is modest, the Alliance needs all the help it can muster. It seems to forget that the new "Partnership Strategy" increasingly relies on countries with an often questionable human rights record, and security interests that only minimally overlap with NATO. Our reliance on Pakistan embodies this predicament. The messy decision-making during the Libya intervention of 2010 laid bare the shortcomings of a growing Alliance with many partners: in the end, no one knows who is in charge and who takes responsibility.

Recently, Anne-Marie Slaughter offered a possible way out: We can have our cake and eat it too! We can have a "globalized NATO", AND the good-old "core NATO", the Alliance that offers member states collective defense based on Article 5 of the Washington Treaty. We can have an Alliance that "that exists to empower - to offer assistance and partnership - as much as to overpower", AND an Alliance that "will still be primarily a 'hard security' alliance, meaning a focus on deterrence and war-fighting." Perhaps I could inform my American colleagues that if the example of European integration has shown anything, it is that this ambiguity results in a split personality, and will fail miserably. The European Union embodies the networking, partnership-oriented organization NATO aspires to copy. The EU oozes "effective multilateralism" (although one can question the effectiveness part), and has since the 1997 Amsterdam Treaty aimed at adding on a so-called "defense dimension". As we should all know by now, the EU's defense dimension is going absolutely nowhere. Why? Because the EU is an international organization based on civilian power. Its strategic culture cannot be altered, just as NATO strategic culture should not be altered. By trying to make NATO more like the EU, by adding on more civilian components to its missions, the Alliance will become enmeshed in operations it cannot handle successfully.

Perhaps there is a need for a "hub for a global network of security partners." But these hubs and networks should be ephemeral, temporary and pragmatic. In science fuzzy logic may work, since truth may be fungible. But it is risky to assume that this fuzzy logic may apply to NATO's future too. NATO can, at times, be part of these hubby networks. But we should be aware of the risk that the Alliance may itself turn into such a loose arrangement - this would be dangerously wrong.