NATO

Role of NATO

• Collective security alliance

Year NAT was signed

1949

4 original aims of NATO

• Collective military security alliance

1. Keep members politically aligned w/🇺🇸

2. Protect members from USSR and Warsaw Pact countries

3. Protect smaller states

4. Ensure W.🇩🇪’s military development w/out threatening W.Europe

North Atlantic Treaty

• Founded NATO

  • Backs it up in international law

NATO and 🇪🇺

• 🇸🇪 🇪🇺 member for ages but only joined NATO in 2025

NATO HQ

• Brussels (🇧🇪)

Secretary General of NATO

• Civilian

• Acts as CEO and spokesperson

• 2025 — Mark Rutte, ex-PM of 🇳🇱

Article 4 of NAT

• Triggers diplomacy and discussion

Use of Article 4

• Multiple times in 2022

  • E.European states post 🇷🇺 invasion of 🇺🇦

• Sept 2024

  • By 🇵🇱 after 🇷🇺 drones

Article 5 of NAT

• “An attack on 1 member state should be treated as an attack on all member states”

  • Triggers collective military response from all NATO members

2 aspects of Article 5

1. Acts as a detterent

2. Provides guarantee for small states

Use of Article 5

• Only used once after 9/11

  • I.e. only in support of most powerful member state

Changing role of NATO — Trump

• Believes 🇺🇸 over-contributes and others under-contribute

🇺🇸 fraction of defence spending for all NATO allies

2/3

🇫🇷+🇩🇪+🇬🇧 fraction of defence spending for all NATO allies

1/6

State equality

• NATO = reliant on small number of powerful states

Defence spending minimums and meeting

• 2006 — min 2% of GDP

  • 2015 — met by 5 states

  • 2020 — met by 10 states due to:

    • Trump pressure

    • 🇷🇺 threat in Baltic states

2 countries banned from NATO

1. 2014 — 🇷🇺

2. 2021 — 🇧🇾

Partnership for Peace

• 1994

• Bilateral cooperation between Euro-Atlantic states and NATO

• Allowed former-Warsaw Pact members to join NATO

• Includes most of non-NATO member European countries

2 advantages of PFP

1. Gives possibility for full membership, for which genuine liberal democratic credentials and no disputes with neighbours are needed, so PFP gives states an incentive to behave responsibly

2. Expanded NATO could be a beacon for lib. demo. and positive force in IR

3 disadvantages of PFP

1. Too many states = difficult decision-making (e.g. Kosovo)

2. New states → conflict, instability, more opportunity for NATO on NATO conflict

3. 🇷🇺 concerned about expansion w/out it → isolationism

🇷🇺 and NATO

• Security dilemma!

🇷🇺 and NATO — 2002

• 🇷🇺-NATO Council founded

  • 2014 — formally suspended, but still has some informal ad hoc dialogue

3 elements of 🇷🇺’s view of NATO

• Expanding national security threat due to:

1. Military activities

2. Proximity to 🇷🇺 w/member states

3. 2018 attempt at expansion to 🇺🇦 and 🇬🇪

NATO’s view of 🇷🇺

• Breaches international law

  • 2018 Salisbury attack

🇷🇺 and NATO post-2014

• Reinforcement of NATO collective defence post-Crimea

  • Increase of response force

  • Creation of ‘spearhead force’

  • HQs in Baltic and E.European states

2014 NATO increase of response force

13,000 → 40,000

‘Spearhead force’ number of troops

5,000

Year of first NATO military operation

1995

5 NATO military operations

1. 1995 — Operation Deliberate Force

2. 1999 — Operation Allied Force

3. 2001-21 — actions in 🇦🇫

4. 2011 — air strikes in 🇱🇾

5. Ongoing — counter-piracy operations off 🇸🇴 coast

1995 — Operation Deliberate Force

• Sbrenica and other 🇺🇳 safe zones to protect citizens

1999 — Operation Allied Force

• 80 days of air strikes on 🇽🇰

  • Not backed by UNSC resolution

  • Condemned by 🇷🇺

Military actions — what they show

• Post-CW NATO humanitarian crises (often caused by 🇷🇺 aggression) > protecting member states

3 areas in which NATO is facing pressure

1. Trump

2. 🇹🇷 tensions

3. 🇦🇫

…Trump (3)

• 2017

  • Criticised defence spending and divisions

• 2018

  • Criticised NATO country reliance on 🇷🇺 ⚡️ supplies

    • “🇩🇪 completely controlled by 🇷🇺”

  • Considered withdrawing according to John Bolton

• 2026

  • Threatened to invade Greenland (belongs to 🇩🇰, NATO country) and would have shattered NATO

🇹🇷 tensions

• 2019

  • Bought $2.5bn air defence system from 🇷🇺

  • 🇺🇸 sanctioned, not lifted by Biden

🇦🇫

• NATO’s longest military deployment

  • Not incredibly successful

  • 2021 — Biden’s withdrawal of troops

3 criticisms of NATO

1. Over-reliant on 🇺🇸 both militarily and economically

2. Security dilemma — rekindled 🇷🇺-W. tensions

3. Fragmenting unity — 🇺🇸-🇹🇷, Trump

Strategic importance of Greenland

• World’s biggest island

  • Would make an excellent military base

• Lots of natural resources

• More future shipping routes due to CC

Importance of 🇬🇱 to 🇺🇸

• Supposedly covered in 🇷🇺 and 🇨🇳 ships so therefore national security threat to 🇺🇸

• 🇷🇺 also has a presence in the Arctic as it’s got lots of shipping routes and very little European presence

Greenland and NATO

• Part of NATO as is 🇩🇰 colony

Greenland… 😬

• Shows tensions between 🇺🇸 national interest (wants Greenland because Trump’s greedy) and NATO principles (don’t invade other NATO countries, maintain NATO unity and ensure collective security by being peaceful)

4 reasons NATO may not have a future (😮!)

1. Was created to counter a threat that no longer exists (USSR)

2. 🇺🇸 key component but ‘pivot[ing] to the Pacific’ under Obama and Trump — only 10% of 🇺🇸 foreign-born population is European and 🇨🇳 is a big threat

3. 🇪🇺 developing its own defence forces —’Rapid Reaction Force’ — that could take over the function of European security and compete for great power status

4. 🇽🇰 demonstrates decision-making difficulty

6 reasons NATO may actually have a future

1. Collective security means can deal with and deter new threats — the reason there’s no threat is because it’s a deterrent

2. Keeps 🇺🇸 in Europe to help Europe manage its security

3. Provides forces for PK and other UNSC missions as 🇺🇳 has no military — 🇽🇰, Gulf War

4. All members tied by similar cultures and values so could counter rising Asian dominance

5. 🇪🇺 not yet effective (🇧🇦) so NATO still needed

6. NATO contains 🇩🇪

Av lifespan for a collective alliance vs NATO’s lifespan

15 years vs 75 years

3 current threats to NATO

1. 🇷🇺 who has used hard power to achieve its goals

2. 🇨🇳 who enables 🇷🇺 yet is the world’s largest manufacturer

3. Trump’s pressure on increases in defence spending, leaving NATO and invading Greenland, as well as restricting aid to 🇺🇦