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| Updated: June 2004 | NATO Publications |
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NATO Transformed 1. Alliance purpose and fundamental security tasks
The essential purpose of the North Atlantic Alliance is to safeguard the freedom and security of all its members in Europe and North America in accordance with the principles of the United Nations Charter. To achieve this, the Alliance uses both its political influence and its military capacity, depending on the nature of the security challenges facing Alliance member states. As the strategic environment has changed, so too has the way in which the Alliance responds to security challenges. It continuesto preserve stability throughout the Euro-Atlantic area and is evolving to meet new threats such as terrorism and other security challenges beyond its traditional area of responsibility. The North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) is one of the key structures through which Alliance members implement their security goals. It is an intergovernmental organisation in which member countries retain their full sovereignty and independence, and serves as a forum in which they consult together and take decisions on matters affecting their security. NATO's structures facilitate continuous consultation, coordination and cooperation between members on political, military, economic and other aspects of security, as well as cooperation in non-military fields such as science, information, the environment and disaster relief. After five rounds of enlargement, NATO's 12 founding members - Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, the United Kingdom and the United States - have been joined by Greece and Turkey (1952), Germany (1955), Spain (1982), the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland (1999) and, in the most recent round of enlargement, Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia (2004). Collective defence The Alliance works on the principle that the security of each member country depends on the security of them all. If the security of any one is threatened, all are affected. In signing the Washington Treaty, NATO's founding charter, every member state makes a commitment to each other to respect this principle, sharing the risks and responsibilities as well as the advantages of collective defence. This also means that many aspects of the defence planning and preparations that each country had previously undertaken alone are undertaken together. The costs of providing the facilities needed for their military forces to train and work effectively together are also shared. Each country remains independent and free to make its own decisions, but by planning together and sharing resources, they can enjoy collectively a level of security far higher than any could achieve alone. This remains the fundamental principle of security cooperation within NATO. Transatlantic link The signing of the 1949 Washington Treaty was unprecedented in modern times. It not only diminished the risk of external aggression but also gradually brought together major European countries that had often gone to war against each other in the past, ensuring that there could no longer be any risk of military conflict between them. In fact, they would become dependent on each other and by sharing in each other's security, they would be able to work together effectively in many other fields to improve their prosperity. The significance of the Washington Treaty went even further. It established a security partnership between the European members of the Alliance and the United States and Canada, creating a permanent transatlantic link between Europe and North America.
NATO's transformation When the Alliance was founded in 1949, the Soviet Union was seen as the main threat to the freedom and independence of Western Europe. Communist ideology, political aims and methods and military capacity meant that, whatever the Soviet Union's real intentions may have been, no Western government could afford to ignore the possibility of conflict. As a result, from 1949 to the end of the 1980s - the period known as the Cold War - the Alliance's main task was to maintain sufficient military capabilities to defend its members against any form of aggression by the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact. The stability provided by NATO during this period helped Western Europe as a whole to rebuild its prosperity after the Second World War, creating the confidence and predictability that are essential for economic growth. The policies agreed by NATO member countries have evolved continuously in the light of the changing strategic environment. Since the end of the Cold War, Alliance policies and structures have been fundamentally transformed to reflect the sea change in Europe's political and military environment and the emergence of new security threats. In addition, the concept of defence has been broadened to include dialogue and practical cooperation with other countries outside the Alliance as the best means of reinforcing Euro-Atlantic security. Today, NATO is much more than a defensive Alliance. Indeed, it has reached out to former adversaries and is now working to build and preserve peace and security throughout the Euro-Atlantic area. To achieve this, the Alliance is taking on an ever-greater number of tasks and adopting increasingly flexible, innovative and pragmatic approaches to resolve what are inevitably complex issues. In the process, NATO's central role in guaranteeing the security of the Euro-Atlantic area has been reinforced and many Partner countries are seeking future membership of the Alliance. Three Central and Eastern European countries - the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland - already achieved this objective in 1999. Seven more - Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia - did so in 2004. NATO's transformation during the past decade has been characterised by a series of visionary initiatives, which represent concrete, highly practical responses to the new security challenges and opportunities of the post-Cold War environment. These include the Partnership for Peace, special relations with Russia and Ukraine, a dialogue with Mediterranean countries, the Membership Action Plan to help aspiring countries meet NATO standards, and effective cooperation with the European Union, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe and the United Nations. NATO is also actively addressing evolving security challenges by leading crisis-management operations in the Balkans and committing itself to operate when and where necessary to fight terrorism and other new threats beyond the Euro-Atlantic area. Moreover, to improve its capacity to take on new missions, NATO is adapting and strengthening its capabilities. To this end, three key initiatives were launched at the Prague Summit in November 2002: the creation of a NATO Response Force; the reform of the military command structure; and the Prague Capabilities Commitment through which shortfalls in capabilities are being addressed by member countries' individual commitments and cooperative initiatives. Fundamental security tasks The Alliance's Strategic Concept, an authoritative statement of the Alliance's objectives and fundamental security tasks, provides guidance on the political and military means to be used in undertaking them. The publication of this document for the first time in 1991 marked a clear break with the past. During the Cold War, comparable sensitive strategic-planning documents had, understandably, been classified. NATO's current Strategic Concept, published in 1999, describes the security risks faced by the Alliance as "multi-directional and difficult to predict". The Alliance's fundamental security tasks are defined as: acting as a foundation of stability in the Euro-Atlantic area;
Assessing foreseeable security challenges and risks, the 1999 Strategic Concept concludes that the strategic environment is continuing to change in a generally positive way and that the Alliance, among other organisations, has played an essential part in strengthening Euro-Atlantic security since the end of the Cold War. However, although the threat of general war in Europe has virtually disappeared, Alliance members and other countries in the Euro-Atlantic region face other risks and uncertainties, including ethnic conflict, the violation of human rights, political instability and economic fragility. In addition, the proliferation of nuclear, biological and chemical weapons and their means of delivery is a matter of serious concern, and the spread of technology could result in the greater availability of sophisticated military capabilities to potential adversaries. Moreover, Alliance security has to take account of the global context and could be affected by wider risks, including acts of terrorism, sabotage, organised crime and the disruption of the flow of vital resources. Since the publication of the 1999 Strategic Concept and in the wake of the September 2001 attacks on the United States, the threat from terrorism and the risk posed by failed states are being fundamentally re-evaluated. The first invocation of Article 5 Article 5 is the core clause of the Washington Treaty, NATO's founding charter, which states that an armed attack against one Ally shall be considered an attack against them all. In response to an invocation of Article 5, each Ally determines, in consultation with other Allies, how it can best contribute to any action deemed necessary to restore and maintain the security of the North Atlantic area, including the use of armed force. Article 5 was first invoked on 12 September 2001 immediately following the 11 September terrorist attacks against the United States. The invocation was initially provisional, pending determination that the attacks were directed from abroad. This was confirmed on 2 October 2001, after US officials presented findings on investigations into the attacks to the North Atlantic Council, concluding that the al-Qaida terrorist network was responsible. On 4 October, the Allies agreed a series of measures to assist the US-led campaign against terrorism. These include enhanced intelligence sharing and cooperation, blanket over-flight clearances and access to ports and airfields for US and other Allied craft for operations against terrorism, and the deployment of part of NATO's standing naval forces to the Eastern Mediterranean and of the Alliance's airborne warning and control systems (AWACS) aircraft to the United States. In addition, individual Allies are contributing according to resources and capabilities, in response to US requests. Assistance includes military support, as well as legal and financial measures to cut the flow of revenue to terrorist organisations.
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| © NATO - OTAN 2004 - | NATO Public Diplomacy Division 1110 Brussels, Belgium - E-mail: natodoc@hq.nato.int |
