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NATO Enlargement post-1989: Successful Adaptation or Decline?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 August 2009

ANDREW A. MICHTA
ANDREW A. MICHTA*
Affiliation:
George C. Marshall European Center for Security Studies, Gernackerstrasse 2, 82467 Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany; [email protected].
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Abstract

NATO enlargement after the cold war contributed to the democratic transformation of post-communist states. It failed, however, to generate a larger consensus on the shared mission and to provide the requisite military capabilities. Today, notwithstanding the rhetoric of unity after the 2008 Bucharest summit, NATO struggles to reconcile the out-of-area experience of the Balkan wars with its post-9/11 tasks and the renewed territorial defense concerns raised by the 2008 Russo-Georgian war. Paradoxically, the more NATO has expanded to foster the military–political security of the new democratic states of eastern and south-eastern Europe, the less it seems capable of dealing with real security threats such as Afghanistan. Facing the possible strategic failure of its ISAF mission, NATO needs to re-evaluate the policy track chosen post-1989.

L'élargissement de l'otan après 1989: adaptation réussie ou déclin?

L'élargissement de l'OTAN après la Guerre froide a contribué à la transformation démocratique des états postcommunistes. Cependant, il n'a pas réussi à créer un consensus plus large sur la mission commune, ni à fournir les capacités militaires nécessaires. Aujourd'hui, en dépit de l'unité rhétorique après le sommet de Bucarest de 2008, l'OTAN lutte pour réconcilier l'expérience des guerres balkaniques menées en dehors de son périmètre traditionnel avec ses tâches de l'après 11 septembre et les problèmes de sa défense territoriale, qui ont refait surface après la Guerre russo-géorgienne en 2008. Paradoxalement, plus que l'OTAN s'est élargie pour renforcer la sécurité politique et militaire des nouveaux états démocratiques en Europe de l'est et du sud-est, moins elle paraît être capable de gérer les véritables menaces sécuritaires comme l'Afghanistan. Face à un éventuel échec stratégique de la mission FIAS, l'OTAN doit réévaluer la politique qu'elle a choisie après 1989.

Die erweiterung der nato nach 1989: erfolgreiche anpassung oder niedergang?

Die Erweiterung der NATO nach dem Kalten Krieg trug zum demokratischen Wandel postkommunistischer Staaten bei. Sie konnten jedoch keinen breit abgestützten Konsens über die gemeinsame Mission hervorbringen und die notwendigen militärischen Mittel bereitstellen. Heute, trotz der rhetorischen Einheit nach dem Gipfeltreffen in Bukarest 2008, ringt die NATO darum ihre Erfahrung außerhalb ihres traditionellen Einsatzgebietes in den Balkankriegen mit den Aufgaben nach dem 11. September und den erneuten Sorgen um die Territorialverteidigung nach dem Russisch-Georgischen Krieg 2008 in Einklang zu bringen. Paradoxerweise, je weiter die NATO expandiert hat um die militärische und politische Sicherheit der neuen demokratischen Staaten Ost- und Südosteuropas zu stärken, desto weniger scheint sie fähig zu sein mit ernsten Sicherheitsgefahren wie Afghanistan umzugehen. Angesichts eines möglichen Scheiterns der ISAF-Mission muss die NATO ihre Politik nach 1989 neu beurteilen.

Type
Articles
Information
Contemporary European History , Volume 18 , Issue 3: Revisiting 1989: Causes, Course and Consequences , August 2009 , pp. 363 - 376
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2009

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References

1 For a discussion of residual regional security issues see Spero, Joshua B., Bridging the European Divide: Middle Power Politics and Regional Security Dilemmas (Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2004)Google Scholar.

2 On 25–26 January 1990, President Vaclav Havel of Czechoslovakia called for Poland, Hungary and Czechoslovakia to work together for a ‘return to Europe’. The idea was viewed as an affirmation of pan-European identity, but not as a call to political action.

3 Until the first round of enlargement in 1999, the Russians insisted that Mikhail Gorbachev be given a specific promise by US Secretary of State James A. Baker that, if Moscow agreed to the unification of Germany, NATO would not expand to the east – a claim Baker has vigorously disputed. For his views on what transpired during his negotiations with Gorbachev, see Michael R. Gordon, ‘The Anatomy of Misunderstanding’, New York Times, 25 March 1997.

4 André Liebich, ‘East Central Europe: The Unbearable Tightness of Being’, in Kurt R. Spillmann and Andreas Wenger, eds., Towards the 21st Century: Trends in Post-Cold War International Security Policy, Studies in Contemporary History and Security Policy 4 (1) (Bern: Peter Lang, and Zurich: Center for Security Studies, 1999).

5 Goldgeier, James M., Not Whether but When: The US Decision to Enlarge NATO (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press, 1999), 45Google Scholar.

6 Simon, Jeffrey, Poland and NATO: A Study in Civil–Military Relations (Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2004)Google Scholar.

7 One last effort to delay the final decision was embodied in the Partnership for Peace formula, formally initiated by the January 1994 Brussels NATO summit, with its declaration of commitment to future enlargement.

8 Bozo, Frederic, ‘Continuity or Change? The View from Europe’, in Papacosma, S. Victor, Kay, Sean and Rubin, Mark R., eds., NATO after Fifty Years (Willmington, DE: Scholarly Resources Books, 2001), 63Google Scholar.

9 White House, ‘President Bush Speaks to Faculty and Students of Warsaw University’, Warsaw, Poland, 15 June 2001.

10 David M. Abshire, ‘Don't Muster Out NATO Yet: Its Job Is Far from Done’, Wall Street Journal, 1 Dec. 1989.

11 Supreme Council for National Defence, The National Security Strategy of Romania, Bucharest, 2007, 12.

12 Author's conversations with Baltic and central European representatives to NATO, Brussels, February 2003.

13 That sense of urgency was conveyed by the secretary of defence, Robert Gates, in a letter to the allies on the eve of the Munich Security Conference in February 2008. The message was reinforced in round-table discussion.

14 A senior US military officer involved in the planning of the Afghanistan campaign compared the failure of the Bush administration to make Operation Enduring Freedom NATO's war to our inability to ‘unwrap a great political gift that was offered to us’. Conversation with the author, 6 April 2007.

15 See, for example, Ronald D. Asmus, ‘Europe's Eastern Promise: Rethinking NATO and EU Enlargement’, Foreign Affairs, January–February 2008; or Ilana Bet-El and Rupert Smith, ‘The Bell Tolls for NATO’, National Interest, January–February 2008.

16 The NATO training centre for the Iraqi forces in Al Rustamiya has been one of the few bright spots in NATO assistance in Iraq.