BASIC RESEARCH REPORT

A Risk Reduction Strategy for NATO

I. The New Strategic Concept

Will NATO's core functions change to include "out of area" missions, and if so, on what terms? Will NATO accept the authority of the UN? How will the nuclear strategy be reviewed?

NATO's existing strategy was agreed in November 1991 at a time when Dubrovnik was being shelled and the Soviet Union had but a month of existence left to it. The member states who agreed to the strategy of 1991 agreed that:

NATO's essential purpose, set out in the Washington Treaty and reiterated in the London Declaration, is to safeguard the freedom and security of all its members by political and military means in accordance with the United Nations Charter. Based on common values of democracy, human rights and the rule of law, the Alliance has worked since its inception for the establishment of a just and lasting peaceful order in Europe. This Alliance objective remains unchanged.⁶

Despite this stated policy, it was four years before nations found the political will to end the violence in Bosnia. There has been no serious effort to realize even a short term solution to the spread of the war to Kosovo. The acid test of the value of the new NATO Strategic Concept for the security of Europe will be twofold: first, whether the Balkan conflicts are fully extinguished and other European conflicts do not occur; and second, whether relations with those nations around the periphery of the continent can be managed in an atmosphere of cooperation, not one of military deterrence. It may be argued that this is too high a test for governments. But, just as a lasting peace has been built between France and Germany, any security policy for the rest of Europe should aim no lower.

Following a period when nations submitted various concept and ideas papers, serious negotiation on the content of the new Strategic Concept got underway at NATO in September 1998. At the end of that month, the International Staff's draft was sent to member states just before the informal defense ministers meeting at Faro, Portugal. In discussions with officials, this draft was widely categorized as radically different from the 1991 Strategic Concept, and for most of the member states, too ambitious in scope. The details, however, are not public.

During this period a general understanding emerged that NATO would take the middle route to the new Concept, neither sticking closely to the old paper with only minor revisions, nor striking out boldly on a completely new one. In essence, the old paper will be updated and some new sections added. However, the review will not be the root and branch examination of the purpose of the Alliance which is demanded by the enormous changes that have occurred in European security during the 1990s.

Redefining the Core Tasks
At the Rome Summit in November 1991, the core functions of the Alliance were agreed in the New Strategic Concept:

"to provide one of the indispensable foundations of security in Europe, based on the growth of democratic institutions and commitment to the peaceful resolutions of disputes."
"to serve in accordance with Article IV as a transatlantic forum for Allied consultations."
"to deter and defend against any threat of aggression against the territory of any NATO member state..."
"to preserve the military balance within Europe."⁷

The importance of territorial defense has greatly diminished in the late 1990s, and the military balance is overwhelmingly in NATO's favor. The importance both of its institutional role in Europe and of Article IV operations have increased. There are distinctly different views both between and within Alliance member states as to how NATO should develop these two core functions in the future. The main debate focuses on the reduced need for the emphasis on defending Alliance territory and the increase in missions that the Alliance might undertake beyond its borders under Article IV of the North Atlantic Treaty. These missions include security engagement with states in the Euro-Atlantic region through the PfP and EAPC, and participation in peace support operations in the Eastern Adriatic region.

The Alliance has remained reluctant to review all aspects of its strategy. A NATO official said that this would amount to "opening a can of worms." Recognizing this, some European member states tried to take the lead by laying out their positions early and stating their interest in adapting the Concept to enable NATO to address the current security environment in Europe more appropriately. France was reported to have been particularly active in submitting papers and ideas into the initial phases of the process, but without US input the process had been considerably stalled. The UK proposed reviewing Alliance force structures and abolishing the three-tier structure of reaction forces, augmentation forces and main defense forces. This plan would remove the rationale for the large conscript armies that still exist in Europe, and would likely lead to their replacement with smaller, professional forces. These forces could be deployed quickly for "out of area missions" (beyond the territorial area of NATO member states) in Europe or elsewhere in the world at short notice. Other proposals from European nations, however, were few and far between. As late as October 1998, several NATO nation diplomats, speaking on the condition of anonymity, stated that no further progress could be made without US input.

Up until that point, the US had seemed content with a "business as usual" approach. This conservative approach was evident in the Resolution to Ratification of NATO enlargement, adopted by the US Senate on 30 April 1998. The Senate had resolved that other, non-territorial defense missions should be conducted "in a manner that first and foremost ensures under the North Atlantic Treaty the ability of NATO to deter and counter any significant threat to the territory of any NATO member."⁸ Making such a strong connection between Article V and non-Article V runs counter to the US Administration's desire to give NATO unconstrained license to operate "out of area."

In November 1998, US officials laid out the Administration's position following a lengthy interagency process. What surfaced turned out to be one of the most dramatic proposals concerning NATO's core missions. The US suggested that the Alliance agree to undertake operations in support of Alliance "interests" outside of NATO territory on a case by case basis.⁹

US Support for "Out of Area" Missions
In remarks to the NATO Defense College, US Ambassador to NATO Alexander Vershbow first looked at the situation in Kosovo, compared it with what had taken place in Bosnia, and then went on to draw lessons for NATO's future. In the Administration's view, while the political role of the Alliance is important, it should be seen in a military framework, and military aspects of security will continue to have primacy. Vershbow laid out the US position in some detail:

A serious threat to stability in the Euro-Atlantic area demands that NATO demonstrate the highest degree of cohesion and transatlantic solidarity. When confronted with instability and external armed forces, political will is not enough if Allied military force is not there to back it up.

Threats to the Alliance are most likely to emanate from outside NATO territory. This bears out the strategic rationale for enlargement - increasing the secure space in Europe and extending stability still further beyond NATO's borders. While a UN Security Council Resolution is often a desirable basis for military intervention, NATO can and will act without such a resolution if there is a consensus among its members that there are legitimate grounds to do so.

Russia continues to be a key factor in the way we handle virtually all European security issues, but it does not have a veto over NATO action. Russia threatened to boycott the Permanent Joint Council if NATO approved the ACTORD,¹⁰ but NATO still went forward with its decisions. Now Russia is interested in participating in the verification missions, and the Alliance and OSCE are working out modalities to make this a reality.

How does this fit into the bigger picture? The way we handled Kosovo, and the lessons we can draw from it, demonstrate clearly the direction we must take to ensure that NATO is as useful at the beginning of the next century as it was for the end of this one.

NATO must continue to enlarge and project stability still further.

NATO must prepare, both politically and militarily, to act out of area. Most crises will not likely occur on NATO territory; NATO must be equipped to go to the crisis.

NATO must prepare to work more closely with partners and with Russia.

NATO must continue to be the vanguard of our efforts to promote Western values of freedom, democracy, human rights, the rule of law across the continent.

NATO must remain the cornerstone of Allies' efforts to ensure security in the Euro-Atlantic area. The OSCE, EU, and UN will all have roles to play, but they will be hard-pressed to act effectively in the security field without NATO.¹¹

The Administration's vision is one where NATO is clearly the supreme European security body, and indeed also the body which the US would prefer to be paramount in a wider geographical area. The UN Charter, which the North Atlantic Treaty recognizes as the source of authority for NATO's existence, is now relegated to a source of desirable but not indispensable support. The US anticipates asking Allies to forego working to build international political support, which many states regard as crucial to genuine security and stability, and to act independently. Russia is thus put firmly in its place. It will be consulted, and even offered cooperation, but only as long as it agrees with NATO policy. Finally, NATO will be the cornerstone of security in Europe. The OSCE, the only fully inclusive European security body, will be relegated to a subordinate role. Statements similar to Vershbow's have been issued by the State Department and the National Security Council (NSC). For example, the Secretary of State has described her vision of NATO's future "as a force for peace from the Middle East to Central Africa."¹²

France, Belgium, Denmark, Norway and Italy, among other states, oppose such an extension of NATO's role, especially without a UN mandate. They wish to defend the primacy of the UN, and in the case of Norway and Turkey, the territorial defense role of the Alliance. France reluctantly agreed that the Alliance should legitimately undertake peace support missions in 1995. It also supported the implementation of the Dayton Accords later that year. However, France and other Europeans, including the new German government, have different ideas from the US concerning the necessity of a UN and/or OSCE mandate for such operations. President Chirac, for example, has been quite explicit in rejecting the idea that NATO might act unilaterally beyond its borders. "[France] wishes to strengthen the role of the United Nations. Only the UN has the legitimacy to speak and act on behalf of everyone."¹³

The Alliance's founding treaty, the Washington Treaty of 1949, is studded with references to the primacy of the UN Charter and the authority of the UN Security Council. It clearly obligates allied nations to "refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force in any manner inconsistent with the purposes of the United Nations."¹⁴ The UN Charter allows military intervention only "should the Security Council consider that [less forceful measures] would be inadequate or have been proven inadequate."¹⁵ Finally, NATO's 1991 Strategic Concept states that NATO's purpose is to "safeguard the freedom and security of all its members... in accordance with the principles of the United Nations Charter."¹⁶ Despite these formal and well established ties to the UN Security Council, the US clearly wishes a minimal role for the UN. For example, both the Clinton Administration and the Senate majority are pursuing a policy of seeking to act militarily without a UN mandate. As Madeleine Albright told NATO Ministers in December: "NATO will - in all cases - act in accordance with the principles of the UN Charter, while continuing to address this issue on a case-by-case basis."¹⁷

One US argument for acting without a UN mandate is that the Alliance should not be subject to the veto of Russia and China in the UN Security Council. But would the Alliance accept a similar argument from other states carrying out military actions outside their own borders? This issue of legal authority for military intervention goes to the heart of global security in the next century. The impression given by US officials is that the Security Council can and should be ignored if necessary, in a manner that was not carried out during the Cold War. The victors of World War II designed the Security Council to protect the vital interests of the most powerful states through the option of veto. Indeed the veto provides a bulwark for the interests of the Permanent Five in the face of an often critical majority of states in both the Security Council and the General Assembly.

Admittedly, supporting the primacy of the UN becomes difficult in the face of a humanitarian catastrophe (such as the Rwandan genocide). Should the international community stand by and fail to act when the UN Security Council is blocked for political reasons? Clearly, states should act. But the possibility of similar extreme situations arising, and how a state or group of states could acquire the necessary legitimacy to act, are questions that deserve very careful examination. In addition, policy makers should do more to heed the numerous early warnings that usually proceed such scenarios. The Rwanda genocide, like virtually all other humanitarian catastrophes, was not something that surfaced without due warning. The UN, NATO, and other security organizations should be preparing for likely scenarios and work to achieve political support from the international community when they wish to act. NATO should be cautioned against acting as though authority for a peace support operation has been denied before any crisis has even arisen, thereby circumventing the UN from the beginning. Powerful nations cannot just pick and choose the causes they support. Firm criteria for action, which must be applied in every case, should be drawn up.

While the US is seeking to free itself from UN authority in the pursuit of its interests and values, it is becoming clear that the US does not automatically accept the primacy of international law. Rather, it often seeks to extend extraterritoriality of its own national law. Such a tendency can sour relations with even the closest US allies, as the example of the Helms-Burton Act of 1996 demonstrates. This legislation allows US citizens to sue foreign companies profiting from investments in property seized from them by the Cuban Government. Opposition has come most vociferously from the European Union and Canada. Canada's Foreign Affairs Minister, Lloyd Axworthy, stated that the Act, "by its unacceptable extraterritoriality, undermines the most basic premises of international law, upon which all of our international obligations and agreements are based."¹⁸ Legislation of this kind can only alienate these most valuable partners of the US, and hamper the search for a consensus in international affairs.

The US also has occasionally sought to use the value of its role in Europe to European states in order to undermine international support for measures which many other states regard as essential for the improvement of international security. Two recent examples were the International Criminal Court and the Land Mines Convention. Over the International Criminal Court, the US explicitly threatened to withdraw its forces from Europe if the Allies did not exempt US forces from the remit of the court.¹⁹ Such actions by the United States have created a concern amongst its allies that they might be brought to support actions in, for example, Iraq, where the legal validity of recent US/UK military action has been questioned.

The US and UK unilateral decision to bomb Iraq in December 1998 sharpened the debate over out of area activity without a UN mandate and heightened concerns about US motives throughout NATO Europe. The week before the bombings Secretary Albright laid out US ideas for the Alliance participating in such missions, which was re-iterated by Senior US officials after the Defense Planning Committee on December 17-18, 1998: "[W]ith respect to the relationship between the situation in Kosovo and the situation in Iraq, I think - if anything that the situation in Iraq demonstrates that if it were deemed appropriate by the Alliance to use its military capabilities, it would."²⁰

The Alliance as a whole, however, remained silent on Iraq, even though individual states were sympathetic to the US/UK action. German Defense Minister Rudolf Scharping indicated that this sentiment was due to a consensus that the Alliance per se would not undertake such missions and that the US had dropped the idea. However, if some countries were sympathetic, others - notably Italy - condemned the intervention outright. Despite such divisions, there is pressure on NATO to formally authorize certain types of "out of area" operations at the Washington Summit. Tension and bloodshed in the Eastern Adriatic and Iraq only serve to continue and increase this dynamic. Resolution of this issue will be difficult given the reluctance of some members to lend their backing to controversial operations.

Broad extension of the mandate for Alliance action outside of NATO territory in the absence of UN or OSCE authority and in support of Alliance members' interests could undermine the international system. International relations since the Treaty of Westphalia in 1648 have rested upon non-intervention in the internal affairs of other states. Three hundred and fifty years ago, states intervened militarily in each others' territory with disastrous consequences. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the subsequent emergence of a body of human rights and humanitarian law has brought about a welcome erosion of the national sovereignty principal in favor of a higher set of supra-national and universal principles. However, problems arise if these principles are applied partially or as a veneer for national interests, or for the interests of one group of states over another.

This subjective application of international principles is exactly what the US is proposing through NATO. Even the best friend of the US could easily misunderstand US motives when an influential figure such as Zbigniew Brzezinski can write of US aims in Eurasian geostrategy that "to put it in a terminology that hearkens back to the more brutal age of ancient empires, the three imperatives of imperial geostrategy are to prevent collusion and maintain security dependence among the vassals, to keep the tributaries pliant and protected, and to keep the barbarians from coming together."²¹

Recommendations
The selective interpretation by the Alliance of the values of the UN system - democracy, human rights and the rule of law - will seriously undermine the Alliance goal of preserving and projecting justice, freedom democracy and stability throughout the Euro-Atlantic region. A clear mandate from the UN or the OSCE should accompany any NATO mission, including specific UN Security Council approval for any military action going beyond territorial defense. This stipulation squares more closely with the predominantly western European supported notion of "coalitions of the willing" that would approach NATO peace support missions under a mandate from the UN or the OSCE on a case-by-case basis.

The Alliance's new role in peace operations on behalf of the international community should be clearly defined and developed in conjunction with other security organizations. In 1992 the NATO Defense Planning Committee "concluded that support for UN and CSCE [now the OSCE] peacekeeping should be included among the missions of NATO forces and headquarters. We believe that planning and preparations in this area should be undertaken as far as possible with the close involvement of all Allies." NATO must reassess its role.

But how will it maintain a commitment to its purpose as a defensive Alliance with solemn guarantees based on the notion that an attack on member of the Alliance will be considered an attack against all? This Article V guarantee was developed as a response to the onset of the Cold War fifty years ago. As Rob de Wijk, former Dutch Defense Ministry official, explains, NATO faces a dilemma in that "the greatest political commitment exists for the least probable threat which will face the Alliance. The future of NATO will largely be determined by the ability of the member countries to solve this dilemma. The adaptation of the Alliance Strategic Concept must supply the answer to do this."²² The proposals set out in this paper are designed to allow fuller adaptation to be achieved.

Redefining the Nuclear Tasks
Since the end of the Cold War, NATO's conventional wisdom holds that the Alliance's continued possession of nuclear weapons affects neither proliferation nor non-proliferation. The questionable nature of this 'wisdom' is increasingly apparent, highlighted by the 1998 nuclear tests by India and Pakistan, and the continuing saga in Iraq. Besides internal concerns, the political value of nuclear weapons to those who already possess them encourages proliferators to gain nuclear weapon state status. Non-proliferation coalitions are undermined when non-nuclear weapon states observe how determined the nuclear weapon states are to retain their nuclear weapons. India and Pakistan have both entered a security dialogue with the US (and other P5 states) as a direct result of their nuclear tests. The message to potential proliferators elsewhere is clear.

Pressure for change in NATO's nuclear policy has been building. At the 1998 NPT Preparatory Committee (PrepCom) meeting, the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) formally opposed NATO's nuclear sharing policies. In a paper issued at the PrepCom, the NAM called on nuclear-weapon states to "refrain from, among themselves, with non-nuclear weapons states, and with States not party to the Treaty, nuclear sharing for military purposes under any kind of security arrangements."²³ Currently, the 1999 PrepCom is scheduled to end on the first day of the Summit, although it may be moved to immediately after. In either case, NATO's nuclear sharing arrangements are almost certain to re-emerge at the PrepCom, and close attention will be paid to what, if any, steps the Alliance takes.

Current and former government representatives have made clear the importance of examining NATO's nuclear policies. Two days after the 1998 NAM NPT statement, during the debate in the US Senate on NATO expansion, Senator Tom Harkin noted, "The nonaligned members of the NPT have expressed great concern over NATO's nuclear-sharing programs." Senator Harkin offered an amendment to the resolution ratifying NATO expansion that would "urge examination of the compatibility of certain programs involving nuclear weapons cooperation with the obligations of the United States and other NATO members" under the NPT.²⁴

Ambassador Thomas Graham, Jr. was Special Representative of the President for Arms Control and Disarmament from 1994-97, and headed the US Government's diplomatic effort to achieve indefinite extension of the NPT. Since leaving his post, he has made clear his firm belief that NATO must do more to support the NPT. In a letter he sent to heads of NATO governments, Graham wrote:

The policy choices that NATO makes regarding the deployment and conditions of prospective use for nuclear weapons will increasingly impact the health of the NPT regime. If NATO members continue to support policies that assign a high political value to nuclear weapons, for instance as an essential bulwark of Alliance cohesion, the cost in terms of the effectiveness of global nonproliferation efforts will be significant. Presently, NATO policies favoring reliance on nuclear weapons and attaching a high political value to these weapons benefit the Alliance very little, but the cost of these policies is becoming very high in terms of the non-proliferation efforts they impede.²⁵

As a result of these developments, those states which recognize that the political role of nuclear weapons must be reduced - notably Germany and Canada - are pushing a reluctant NATO into re-examining the role of nuclear weapons in its security policy. In Germany, the coalition treaty between the Social Democrats and the Green Party which established the new government called for a "campaign to lower the alert status of [NATO's] nuclear weapons and for a renunciation of the first-use of nuclear weapons."²⁶ German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer said, "We must discuss [no-first-use] openly in the Alliance without creating the impression that Germany is going its own way now."²⁷ A recent report by the Canadian Parliament's Foreign Affairs and International Trade Committee recommended that Canada should "argue forcefully within NATO that the present re-examination and update as necessary of the Alliance Strategic Concept should include its nuclear component."²⁸ Canadian officials have confirmed that they have been following and will continue this approach. During the December NATO Ministerials, Dutch Foreign Minister Jozias van Aartsen also supported undertaking a debate on the Alliance's nuclear policy. Fischer was quoted as saying at the meeting that NATO should have "theological discussions about nuclear weapons."²⁹

Officials from NATO states supporting a reexamination of the Alliance's nuclear policy have confirmed that efforts to change first use policy will face determined opposition. As one official put it, the debate is being framed in terms of an "ultimate loyalty" test to NATO. If first use is questioned, the Alliance itself is questioned. Efforts to preclude debate are intense. For example, German Defense Minister Scharping visited Washington in November just as the story of Germany's interest in discussing NATO's first use policy broke. US Secretary of Defense William Cohen declared that he and Scharping agreed that the nuclear component of the Strategic Concept "should not be altered." However, Scharping merely stated that Germany was not going to change policy "on its own."³⁰ The clear implication is that, despite US strong opposition, Germany still wants a debate on Alliance nuclear policy. This debate opened at the NATO ministerial meetings last December, apparently led by van Aartsen and Fischer.

Despite the political and media attention to the debate over NATO's first use policy, it is only one aspect of larger discussion on nuclear strategy which the Alliance must have. NATO should develop and pursue a strategy that will create a non-nuclear security regime. As long as NATO maintains that it needs nuclear weapons for many aspects of its security - a statement belied by the Alliance's conventional supremacy - it cannot credibly criticize other countries for pursuing the same option.

NATO states must recognize that relying on nuclear weapons to handle worst case scenarios is to rely on a weak instrument. For any imagined scenario "requiring" nuclear use there is another even worse case where political issues preclude nuclear use. It is these true worst cases which provide the overriding imperative for risk reduction strategies and non-nuclear responses.

Recommendations
NATO should undertake a comprehensive review of the role of nuclear weapons in its security policy. That review should lead to a reduction in the significance of nuclear weapons for NATO security.

NATO should remove from the Strategic Concept references to nuclear weapons as the "supreme guarantee" of and "fulfilling an essential role" for Alliance security.
NATO should declare that nuclear weapons are a "last resort" for the Alliance, re-affirming the statement made at the 1990 London summit.
NATO should undertake a series of steps to diminish reliance on and reduce risks associated with nuclear weapons. Those steps are described in Missing Document 2: A Comprehensive Concept for Arms Control and Disarmament (page 43).
NATO should re-affirm commitments its members have made in related international treaties and texts. Specifically, NATO should reiterate its members commitments under the NPT and the agreements reached at the 1995 NPT Review and Extension Conference.

A Risk Reduction Strategy for NATO continued

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