To Prague and beyond: NATO's future in a changed world
Govor ambasadorja Burnsa na Defence College v Rimu, 8. februar 2002
by Ambassador R. Nicholas Burns, United States Permanent
Representative to NATO The NATO Defense College, Rome February 8, 2002
Lieutenant General Olboeter, Dean Berry, Commodore Owen, Group
Captain Wildman, faculty and students. Thank you for inviting me to be
with you this morning in this historic city as you celebrate
graduation from the NATO Defense College.
As diplomats, defense ministry officials and officers, you have
earned this degree through hard work, and I hope this experience will
inspire in each of you a core commitment to NATO and its mission in
the new century.
I understand that another graduation of sorts will occur in a few
weeks when General Olboeter concludes his tour of duty as
commandant. On behalf of the United States government, I want to thank
him for his service to the alliance and wish him all best for the
future.
Let me also salute my fellow American, Dean John Berry, who has
done such excellent and creative work for this school. With the
incoming commandant, General Raffenne of France, we are confident that
the NATO Defense College has a bright future.
NATO has changed immeasurably since its creation in 1949 as your
class profile so aptly demonstrates. You represent seventeen NATO
countries, from founding nations to our newest members. You also come
from eight partner nations, some of which are seeking NATO
membership. In your national and geographic diversity, you are a
picture of the new NATO and its commitment to democracy, to peace and
to the collective defense of Europe and North America.
NATO is the most successful security alliance in history, and it
stands as one of the proudest accomplishments in two centuries of
partnership between the old world and the new. NATO was the critical
line of defense during the Cold War. Without NATO, the history of
Europe between 1949 and 1991 would have been far less peaceful and
democratic.
In the years following the fall of the Berlin Wall, the Warsaw Pact
and the Soviet Union, critics on both sides of the Atlantic questioned
whether NATO still had a real job to do. The unparalleled prosperity
of the 1990s and the absence of a visible enemy led some to believe
that we might even have reached the "end of history"an era
of permanent peace.
That powerful illusion was shattered by the four Balkan wars, when
NATO proved to the skeptics that it is an irreplaceable pillar of
European peace and stability.
NATO had a great decade in the nineties. In fact, as the Wall
Street Journal said recently, if security were a marketable product,
it would be hard to think of a better "brand" than
NATO. After others had failed, NATO stopped the war in Bosnia in 1995,
and has kept the peace there for six years. When Slobodan Milosevic
launched the bloodiest massacres in Europe since 1945, NATO stopped
the killing of innocent civilians, and won a quick and decisive war
that led to the dictator's fall and the emergence of a democratic
order in Yugoslavia. When civil war appeared likely in Macedonia just
last summer, NATO forces arrived at the request of both sides to help
keep the peace.
Beyond the Balkans, NATO reached out to embrace three new members
from Central Europe, developed a unique partnership with Russia and
Ukraine, and established links with new partners from Tirana to
Tajikistan. NATO was fully occupied in the 1990s on the most vital
issues of the day. We produced a record of real achievements, of which
all NATO allies can be proud.
We meet today in Rome, however, at another critical juncture in
history when the critics are again questioning NATO's future. It is a
time when the foundations of peace have been shaken by the vicious
terrorist attacks which claimed over three thousand lives in my
country.
Our new adversaries realize that they cannot challenge our nuclear
or conventional forces and thus are challenging us asymmetricallyby
seeking to pierce our vulnerabilities as open societies. They may
target our information networks, our military bases and our civilian
populations. We must prepare for that threat through building an
effective missile defense, better civil defense and advanced
counter-cyber warfare.
We Americans understand a fundamental lesson of September 11th: we
need our friends more than ever in an increasingly dangerous
world. That is why we are committed to work with our European and
Canadian allies to ensure that NATO remains strong and vital and
united to meet the new security challenges of our new century.
With that paramount goal in mind, let me chart for you the five key
challenges that we must address at the NATO summit in Prague this
November. Our success or failure in meeting each of these challenges
will define NATO's agenda in 2002 and its future for many years ahead.
NATO's first and most important challenge is to build the advanced
military capabilities necessary for the new missions we must undertake
together to win the war on terrorism.
NATO's credibility depends critically on its military strength. To
ensure the alliance can deal with both the new and more conventional
threats in the decades ahead, NATO must become more flexible to
counter surprise attacks, and swifter in our capacity to respond with
an effective counter-terrorist capability. A key goal for the Prague
summit should therefore be to launch a fundamental transformation of
NATO's fighting forces.
This will give NATO a greater capability in the fight against those
who are preparing a toxic mix of terrorism and weapons of mass
destruction. These terrorists view chemical, biological, and even
nuclear devices as weapons - not of last resort, but of first choice.
To defeat them, we'll need a leaner, more streamlined, more cost
efficient - and above all, more flexible NATO command and force
structure. We hope allies will commit to make these changes at Prague.
We also need to make another key change, from threat-based to
capabilities-based defense policy. During the Cold War, NATO sized and
shaped its forces against specific geographic threats. The only
Article 5 attack in NATO's history, however, came on September 11 from
an unexpected source, in an unexpected form. What this tells us is
that many of our old assumptions, old plans, and old capabilities are
out-of-date.
Rather than trying to guess which enemy the alliance will confront
years from now, or where wars in the world may occur, we need to focus
on what capabilities adversaries could use against us, on shoring up
our own vulnerabilities, and on exploiting the most modern new
technologies to extend our own military advantages. This is the
essence of capabilities-based defense planning. Secretary of Defense
Rumsfeld committed the U.S. military to this new approach in his
landmark speech at the U.S. National Defense University last week. We
believe NATO needs to make the same choice.
But as we say in the U.S., "It's not enough to talk the
talk. We now have to walk the walk." In other words, NATO's
members must have the high-tech weaponry that is critical to winning
modern wars. In this respect, we face an old but increasingly
worrisome trend in the alliance: the widening gap in capabilities
between the U.S. and all of its NATO allies.
As students of modern war, I know all of you have witnessed the
extraordinary technological leap in the quality of American weapons
from the Gulf War to Bosnia, and from Kosovo to the Afghan
campaign. Unfortunately, our allies have not kept pace with us, and we
risk an alliance that is so unbalanced that we may no longer have the
ability to fight effectively together in the future.
President Bush is doing his part by asking Congress to raise
defense spending this year to more than $370 billion Š$370,000
millionĆ -- the highest level in our history. The $48 billion Š$48,000
millionĆ spending increase this year alone is far larger than the
total annual defense budget of our next biggest ally, and is also
greater than the combined annual defense budgets of twelve NATO
nations.
Now, I do not expect allies to match U.S. defense spending dollar
for dollar. But it is vitally important that we all accept the need
for increased spending to produce the capabilities necessary to deal
with the threats at hand.
We realize that raising defense budgets requires difficult
political choices for many allies. And the United States certainly
appreciates the very real and absolutely essential resources allies
bring to our common operationsin the Balkans and in Afghanistan. The
way forward is to agree to narrow our priority list of new
technologies to the few that are truly essential to meet the new
challenges. This has the advantage of being a more practical approach
for our allies. But without dramatic action to close the capabilities
gap, we face the real prospect of a future two-tiered alliance.
Such a division of labor is not in NATO's interest. It breaks the
fundamental commitment to both shared risk and shared responsibility
for NATO actions that is critical to the alliance's cohesiveness. For
that reason, we need to make Prague the place where we make a down
payment on closing the capabilities gap.
NATO's second challenge is to make the next round of enlargement as
successful as the last. President Bush strongly supports taking in new
members at Prague so that we can expand the community of democracies
and security in Europe. Adding Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic
to NATO in 1999 reinforced stability in Central Europe and
strengthened the alliance. Their dedication to NATO is in itself a
persuasive argument for further enlargement.
But with NATO membership comes major responsibilities. New members
must not only be consume
rs of security, but producers as well. They must demonstrate the
military capabilities to be effective allies. Their inclusion must be
based on two fundamental assumptionsthat they would add value to the
alliance, and that their commitment to democracy is lasting and
assured.
The United States has not yet decided which countries to support
for membership and neither has the alliance as a whole. I expect NATO
to reach a decision shortly before the Prague summit. In the meantime,
our advice to the aspirants is to continue the military and political
reforms which are essential for membership, and make every effort to
conform to NATO standards in every dimension.
NATO's third challenge in 2002 is to make a major effort to improve
our ties to Russia, Ukraine and the other states of the former Soviet
Union. Secretary of State Colin Powell has said that out of every
tragedy arise opportunities to make the world safer and more
peaceful. We must grasp those opportunities with Russia to change our
relationship for the better, and to work together to build a permanent
peace in Europe.
Since September 11, President Bush and President Putin have worked
to create a lasting friendship between our two great countries. One of
the cornerstones of this effort is to create a new NATO-Russia Council
to identify and pursue opportunities for joint action "at
20."
In other words, Russia would sit side by side with the NATO allies
around our conference table in Brussels to identify how we can work
together to limit conflict and to resolve the great problems that
challenge peace in Europe. This will be a historic change in the way
we do business with Russia, a move toward more genuine partnership and
collaboration on the truly important issues of our time. As NATO moves
ahead with this new venture, it will maintain its prerogative of
independent decision and action at 19 on all issues consistent with
its obligations and responsibilities. By the time of the Reykjavik
foreign ministers meeting in May, we hope the NATO-Russia Council will
be up and running in a new and promising spirit.
As we seek new relations with Russia, we must also do so with
Ukraine and the front-line states of Central Asia and the
Caucasus. These countries are vital partners and we have a unique
opportunity to seek closer and more lasting bonds with them in 2002.
Our fourth challenge this year is to take stock of our long-term
presence in the Balkans, which has been so critical to keeping the
peace in that troubled region. Our primary goal must be to help the
elected leaders of these countries build the new institutions that
will sustain freedom and the rule of law, and yield viable nation
states.
The United States remains committed to see this job through with
our allies. President Bush promised that as we went into the Balkans
together with our allies, so will we come out together. At the same
time, we must hasten the day when NATO troops are no longer needed and
when civilian officials can themselves carry the burden of
governance. With that in mind, the United States has suggested that,
by the Prague summit, we reduce our military forces in SFOR in Bosnia
by one-third, and introduce thousands of new police to train local
authorities to do the job themselves.
In nearby Kosovo, where progress toward peace and stability has
been more limited, we seek to "lighten" KFOR forces but
maintain their strength to keep the peace. We must use 2002 to
accelerate the pace of change in the Balkans and ask local leaders to
take on increasingly greater responsibility for the future.
NATO's final challenge in 2002 is to continue to work effectively
with that other great institution so critical for peace on the
continent: the European Union. NATO and the EU demonstrated in 2001
that we can work pragmatically on some of the region's toughest
problems. Together, NATO and the EU helped the Macedonian government
and peoples to avoid civil war and find a path to peace.
After September 11, we worked more effectively than ever before by
agreeing on common NATO-EU steps to combat terrorism. NATO Secretary
General Lord Robertson and the EU's High Representative, Javier
Solana, have become a striking diplomatic double act in Europe's most
troubled areas. We should expand on this partnership in 2002.
As we do so, we will need to complete work on the somewhat esoteric
but important issue of the EU's access to NATO planning assets and
capabilities where the alliance as a whole is not engaged in a
crisis. It is high time that we resolved this problem so that our
occasional disagreements on the theory of how to work together can
catch up with our proven ability to cooperate on real-world problems.
As we seek a stronger partnership with the European Union, we must
also recognize our respective comparative advantages. In NATO's case,
it remains the pre-eminent security institution on the continent, with
first responsibility for collective defense of the alliance. In this
respect, I can assure you of the strong U.S. commitment to maintaining
NATO's leading position as the only institution that has the military
power to keep the peace in Europe.
That is our agenda for NATO in 2002 -- building capabilities and
transforming our force structure to meet new threats; enlarging to
take in new members; seeking a new relationship with Russia and
expanded ties to Ukraine, the Caucasus and Central Asia; hastening
peaceful development in the Balkans; and expanding cooperation with
the European Union. It is an ambitious and demanding agenda that will
require all of the alliance's energies for success by the time our
leaders meet in Prague in November.
In closing, we Americans will travel along the road to Prague
confident of NATO's continuing vitality and purpose. Just as in the
past, some in the media and chattering classes are questioning whether
NATO is up to the challenge. And just as in the past, I am confident
that NATO's successful handling of these issues at Prague and beyond
will eloquently and definitively answer this question.
NATO will remain vital and at the very center of all the security
challenges on both sides of the Atlantic. NATO is not a global police
force and will not always be the first line of defense in distant
places like Afghanistan or the Philippines. But the alliance's core
mission of defending our western democracies remains unchanged.
Here, in a nutshell, is why I am convinced of NATO's value to
Europeans and Americans alike: first, NATO has been the single most
important bridge linking the security of North America and Europe for
half a century. NATO provides for both the conventional and nuclear
defense of all of its membersno single European country or
institution can do this. It is the vehicle for continued American
military presence on the continentwhich, in itself is a necessary
pillar of continued peace.
Second, NATO is also the only institution that will be capable in
the future of meeting the new and unforeseen threats to our security
that surely lie ahead. We live in a dangerous world, and we have
limited ability to predict where and when the next crisis might arise.
NATO is the proven insurance policy of Europe and North America to
defend us in a crisis.
Third, NATO is also the only institution capable of reaching out to
Russia, Ukraine and others to the east, to create a nexus of security
cooperation in all of Europe.
We Americans have no doubt that by the time of the Prague summit,
we will have renewed the alliance to meet all the challenges ahead.
We live in an era of both difficult security challenges and
exciting opportunities to expand the circle of free and democratic
societies. In this era, our 53-year old NATO security alliance is
still our best protection in a world of new and dangerous threats.
Thank you very much or inviting me to the NATO Defense College
today.
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