Transforming NATO Transformation - a Challenge of Leadership in Transatlantic Relations
By Sabrina Schulz

NATO has been undergoing a process of transformation since the end of the Cold War, but the post-9/11 era demands an unprecedented degree of strategic awareness and political leadership for success. The new security environment requires security institutions and armed forces that are capable of dealing with a great deal of complexity. NATO needs the capacity to conduct humanitarian relief operations, such as in Pakistan, alongside stabilization and reconstruction missions, such as in Afghanistan, and high-intensity military operations in defense of allied territory - the very mission the alliance was once founded for.

Against this background, military transformation has become an issue of mindsets and culture. It encompasses political, organizational, and military-technological dimensions, to name just a few. All of these dimensions are interconnected and require some fundamental strategic choices on the part of NATO's member-states. For instance, those European allies who are simultaneously members of the EU need to make sure that NATO and the EU become compatible partners rather than rival international security actors. Although consent seems to be emerging on the need to revitalize the Alliance after the "rift" in 2002/03 and to adapt to the post-9/11 security environment, a common strategic vision is still lacking.

The United States has taken a leadership position in the process of adapting NATO and individual allies to the new security environment. For instance, the U.S. is committed to a bundle of national initiatives aiming at force transformation outside the heavy bureaucratic structures of NATO's force planning processes. A prominent example is the Multinational Experiment 4 (MNE 4). It is to be conducted in February and March 2006 and aims at improving multi-national and multi-agency approaches in common military operations.

U.S. initiatives in NATO, such as the launch of the expeditionary NATO Response Force (NRF) and the establishment of an Allied Command Transformation (ACT) at Norfolk, Virginia, in 2002 further demonstrate the U.S. commitment to adapting NATO to the security challenges of the 21 st century. However, major adjustments are necessary in the approach taken here. The focus of U.S. policies is still very much on the transatlantic capabilities and technology gaps. It is frequently argued that the unity of the Alliance can only be guaranteed if the U.S. and other allies are compatible in military terms and able to fight alongside each other.

This argument misses the point, however. As the cases of Iraq and Afghanistan clearly demonstrate, the security environment of the twenty-first century is characterized by non-linear conflicts. This means that while armed forces are engaged in fighting, reconstruction, stabilization, and relief efforts have to be conducted simultaneously. This leads to ever-increasing interdependency between highly diverse actors, such as national governments and armed forces, international organizations, NGOs, and Private Military Companies (PMC).

Transformational efforts therefore need to go beyond the military sphere and incorporate civilian elements and multiple agencies. The challenge of coordinating increasing numbers of actors in conflict means that the primary challenge of transformation has become politics rather than military hardware. More often than not, national and institutional rivalries, for instance between France and the U.S. or the EU and NATO, are major obstacles to the success of transformational efforts.

Interoperability between allies has therefore become a question of matching mindsets rather than matching capabilities. The only way to address this challenge is through an open and constructive dialogue that respects the diversity of national attitudes to the use of force in international relations. Nevertheless, interoperability is also a question of capabilities and technology. In the contemporary security environment, NATO countries are almost exclusively engaged in military operations that are out-of-area and expeditionary in nature. This requires, first and foremost, expeditionary capabilities, and in particular strategic lift capabilities, to project force into the theatres of conflict. A major financial effort on the part of the members of the EU and the European members of NATO seems to be inevitable if they want to be serious international security actors.

A further requirement for coalition operations concerns the technical interoperability of the respective forces. The need to develop plug-and-play architectures for coalition operations has long been recognized, but there has been little success in this area. NATO's standardization procedures are complicated and protracted. Furthermore, the U.S., as the militarily most advanced nation in the Alliance, is reluctant to relax its policies of intelligence-sharing and technology transfer. This needs to change if the U.S. wants to convince the Allies of its approach to military transformation and take them on board.

At the same time it is vital for the U.S. to recognize that Europeans are not "backwards" in their own transformational efforts. Rather, their political priorities, doctrinal traditions, and, most importantly, their financial possibilities are different, and it would be to the advantage of all to capitalize on these differences. This approach seems to be best in order to deal with the complex security challenges that the U.S. and Europe have to face in the twenty-first century.

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This essay is the result of Ms. Schulz's research stay at AICGS as a DAAD/AICGS Fellow in October-November 2005.
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This essay appeared in the December 16, 2005 AICGS Advisor.