|
| Updated: 26-Jun-2003 | Opinions |
|
NATO HQ June 2003 |
Security
in the 21st Century: Paper
by Chris Donnelly,
The Changing Nature of Conflict A study of history shows us that approximately every fifty years the world experiences a revolutionary change – a paradigm shift – in the nature of armed conflict, provoked by sociological, technological or other external factors. Examples from the past two centuries would be: the development of effective mass conscript armies during the Napoleonic wars [c 1800]; the introduction of rapid-firing rifled weapons in the mid-19th Century; the industrialization of military production and relevant infrastructure that preceded WWI; and, the development of nuclear weapons and their global delivery systems during and immediately after at the end of WWII. It seems to me that we are now in the midst of just such a ‘revolutionary’ change, ushered in by the dramatic developments of the last decade and brought into sharp focus on 11 September 2001. The major factors underlying this change, which is still ongoing, I would tentatively identify as follows:
|
|
|
As far as Europe and North America are concerned, the specific elements of the above factors which have the greatest impact on the current security scene are:
As a result we are faced today with the need to reassess what constitutes security, what are the threats to security, and what should be our responses to those threats, including the particular threat of terrorism. As is so often the case, it is not a single cause but the combination of new factors which creates the new security conditions and which will generate new security threats. Take, for instance, the issue of technology proliferation mentioned above. Technological advantage in warfare is always transient. It would be unwise to assume that ‘Western’ technological superiority will in all cases translate into overwhelming military superiority. Today, the rapid proliferation of technology means that even small developing countries – especially those run by strong dictatorial regimes – can, by focussing their efforts, acquire weapons and delivery means which can pose a real threat to major powers. When this is coupled with fanaticism the threat is even more evident. Furthermore, the nature of modern weaponry means that, unless the technology gap is truly enormous [as it was between the US and the Taliban], a determined and competent defender today could make a ‘forced entry’ too costly for any country to contemplate. Forces that can be projected and maintained overseas can be ten times more expensive than conscript forces for national defence. Compare for example, the firepower that Canada and Israel can deploy for roughly the same defence expenditure. The West’s capacity for military intervention may be a lot less than is sometimes supposed. The growing gap between rich and poor countries poses a potential security problem in many ways, not just when combined with the problem of proliferation of technology. This gap is most dramatically evident if we compare the statistics for population growth and per capita income for the countries of North Africa and the Middle East with those of Europe, and project these over the next ten years. It is wrong to blame this growing wealth gap on ‘Western’ countries just as it is wrong to conclude that poverty alone produces, or even justifies, terrorism. In fact, in what is now becoming known as the ‘arc of instability’ stretching from North Africa to Central Asia, incompetent government, social injustice and lack of democracy are by far the greatest causes of discontent. But the discontent and desperation generate such serious security problems as illegal migration and drug smuggling and create the breeding grounds for fanaticism that can in turn produce regional instability and terrorism. This is a worsening problem and one that will have to be dealt with on its home ground by proactive measures [which may be military, political or economic] as well as by protective or defensive measures in our countries. This, too, has important implications for our security policy. The information revolution is the third general factor that has so changed the security environment. This has several aspects. It is one of the factors which contributes to the proliferation of technology. It can accentuate the ‘poverty gap’ by making it more evident. In democracies it has two major implications. Firstly, reliance on information technology can render a society very vulnerable to certain forms of terrorist attack. Secondly, democracies can no longer exert any control over the flow of information and therefore over the media. Yet dictatorships can, if they are sufficiently efficient, manipulate the media to a certain degree and thereby have a considerable influence on public opinion, including in democracies with which they may be in conflict. Governmental information and even military intelligence can no longer compete with the media for speed of information transit. As a result, every action which a democracy takes in pursuance of its security, be it a military operation or not, will in future be played out in a new environment – that of intrusive media attention. Media attention will also have uneven consequences. If we intervene in countries outside Europe, regional onlookers will see what they want to see. Even the televized ruins of the World Trade Center have not served as evidence to justify subsequent American actions. Furthermore, in the future it will be widely understood that all televized imagery [hitherto the basis of international proof] can be faked with computer-generated pictures. Whatever we explain or show about ‘just cause’ or ‘proportionate military response’ to our own publics, we should not expect those among whom we intervene to believe passionately in anything except demonstrated conspiracy, aggression and arrogant use of force. If we do not take account of this and prepare accordingly, then even the best led military operation will suffer severely, and may prove counter-productive. Added to these general trends we have seen, in the past decade or so, the welcome collapse of the Cold War confrontation and with it, the bipolar security system. It is this which precipitated the sudden and dramatic shift in the security environment. We have gone, in a very short time, from Cold War to Hot Peace. We have witnessed a significant change in what constitutes security. |
|
|
Redefining Security: New Threats and Responses Only a decade ago, ‘national security’ was synonymous with ‘defence’. East and West faced the threat of WWIII, characterized in Europe by the threat of invasion which was feared, with whatever justification, by both East and West. The threat was common, as was the response – mass armies based, in continental countries, on mass mobilization and conscript military service. Deterrence was by conventional defence backed up by the threat of nuclear weapons. ‘Security’ was measured largely in military strength. Today ‘security’ means much more than just military might. In as far as ‘security’ retains its military significance, ‘deterrence’ is by guarantee of effective counter-attack [the difficulties and cost of which put a premium on crisis and conflict prevention]. Otherwise, security has become a much broader issue. For most European/Euro-Atlantic countries, security today is primarily measured in non-military terms and threats to security are non-military in nature. These threats include – incompetent government, corruption, organized crime, insecure borders, smuggling [weapons, drugs, contraband, people], illegal migration, ethnic and religious conflict, proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, shortage of natural resources [eg, water] and; of course, terrorism. All developed nations face these threats. But they face them in different measure, and therefore they will require a different response. This is in marked contrast to Cold War days, where threat and response were more or less the same everywhere. The need for differentiated response is the factor which today most complicates the evolution of security alliances [NATO and EU ESDP]. If it is to be worthwhile, an alliance must offer each and every member a clear and unequivocal security advantage. It must repay their financial and political cost. Today, this means that an alliance must meet the now different security needs of each member rather than the common need of the Cold War. The biggest gap is between the perceived new security needs of the USA and those of Europe. But even within Europe there are serious differences which have significant impact. It is very easy for UK and Spain to accept that there is no longer any need for investment in conventional territorial defence, and to reform their defence establishments accordingly. It is not so easy to persuade Poles or Estonians that this is so, and it is not realistic to expect such countries, whose geography and recent history still dominate their security thinking, to abandon traditional military concepts of defence and security in favour of these new ideas. As security is no longer just a military concern, it is no longer just the preserve of MODs and Ministries of Foreign Affairs [MFA] which have to date been the main ministries involved in security cooperation. It is no longer possible to draw a clear distinction between external security and internal security. Security henceforth requires the coordination of the ‘external’ ministries [ie, MOD and MFA] and their agencies [armed forces, intelligence services] with those of the ‘interior’ ministries: internal affairs; education; finance; overseas development; transport; environment; health; etc., with their agencies [policing forces, security services, disaster relief agencies, etc.]. Security today takes in social development and it demands the involvement of all elements of society in a way which security in the Cold War days did not. Meeting these new security requirements demands fundamental reform of national structures, patterns of investment, systems of government. Likewise it demands the evolution of international institutions on a truly radical scale. As this process develops, national historical and cultural attitudes to the use of force are likely to emerge. Most mainland European countries have, within living memory, had ample proof that it is not wise to rely on military force as the main basis for national security. US and UK have not suffered this historical lesson. This is likely to make for very divergent responses and profound debate over when and how to use force in, for example, prosecuting the War on Terrorism. The difference of opinion in the run up to the recent Iraq operation, at least in some measure, appeared to reflect this factor. |
|
|
Military Implications of New Threats to Security Security, therefore, is now a much broader concept. But despite the foregoing, all acknowledge that ‘security’ must still contain a major military element. However, a security threat today is likely to require a very different military response than in the past. No longer can the threat to the defender be dealt with simply by passive defence or protective measures. These remain essential, but have changed in nature. Armies today may have to be deployed in support of domestic police operations. In addition, our armed forces will have to go out to deal with the threat in the countries from which it is generated. Forces today must expect to be projected – ie, sent abroad – sustained there [perhaps over long periods] and used. This will not be passive peacekeeping or, as in the cold war, deterrence by simply waiting. Troops must expect to fight. This faces armed forces with completely different demands than was the case a decade ago. Most countries in Europe maintained large, mainly static, armed forces which deterred just by their existence. The West never really expected to have to fight a sustained conventional operation at short notice. Consequently, in the face of increasingly costly weapons and manpower, most NATO nations maintained large national military structures but very low reserves of expensive munitions - an unrealistic balance. Most countries could mobilize forces only in the event of total war. The problems European countries had in deploying forces for the Gulf War and the structural reorganization needed [for example in the British Army] to make a division viable in the field bear witness to this fact. [Warsaw Pact armies, it must be said, maintained a much higher degree of military capability – but in doing so ruined their economies.] When we deployed troops for peacekeeping we did not expect them to have to fight – merely to patrol in blue helmets and white vehicles. Today, the truth is that we are much more likely to have to deploy troops actually to fight than was ever the case during the Cold War. As a result, the kind of forces a country needs to project, maintain and use military power abroad faces most European countries with the need for a total reform of their military systems. Very few of Europe’s current two million men and women under arms can be reckoned useable in this respect. Put bluntly, much of Europe’s defence budgets is spent on maintaining the wrong kind of armed forces for today’s threats. In a war on terrorism, most of Europe’s troops can be used only for certain limited tasks. It is also becoming clear that, for many countries [eg, Nordic countries, Germany] reform of their defence systems means a serious change in the civil-military relationship. Fundamental defence and security sector reform will therefore, be impossible without accompanying social reform, often on a large scale. When the armed forces are incorporated into society on the basis of total mobilization [for example, the Norwegian ‘people and defence’ philosophy], military service becomes an essential part of building and maintaining the social structure. Defence and security infrastructure becomes an important part of national infrastructure. Furthermore, over the last 50 years, in most Western countries defence expenditure has gradually shifted from being prioritized on national security requirements towards prioritization on social security requirements. This is a particular problem for countries with universal mobilization systems, but it is true at least in part in all countries - note the influence of the US Congress on weapons procurement decisions based on their domestic political impact; when a major arms manufacturer in UK recently protested about MOD procurement cuts its public case was based not on the impact this would have on UK national security, but on lost jobs. Most European countries, therefore, not just C&EE countries, face the difficult challenge of military reform on a massive scale. Armed forces need to be more capable and flexible. This means that they will be more expensive. Therefore, unless defence expenditure is to increase dramatically, they will be smaller. For small countries this means that they will no longer be able to field balanced national armed forces capable of conducting all the functions needed in an all-arms military conflict. This implies role prioritization which in turn implies that an alliance approach will be essential. In this respect, NATO and EU ESDP requirements are identical. ESDP cannot in the foreseeable future provide an alternative to NATO because most EU members have not reformed their armed forces to provide credible expeditionary capability. In addition, for independent actions, EU will have to develop C3, intelligence and logistics capabilities it does not currently have. It is here, too, that the ‘Transatlantic Security Gap’ also
becomes an issue. Because of the current disparity between
US and European force projection capabilities it will be very
difficult for the foreseeable future to consider any significant
force projection against a contested target without US participation.
But if the US is already capable and ready to act, and the
technological and training gap is as wide as it is, there is
little incentive for many European countries even to try to
catch up. The very valuable idea of countries developing small ‘niche’ capabilities
could in some cases become an excuse for avoiding the very
difficult fundamental military reform that is really needed.
One of our most important priorities today is, therefore, to
develop reasons and incentives for smaller countries not to ‘pass
the security buck’. We also need to think hard about
what the results will be if European countries do not grasp
this problem and fail to implement real defence reform. |
|
|
I have attempted to paint this new security environment in some detail so as to put Terrorism in its proper context. Terrorism is only one of the threats to security today, and it is considered a much greater threat in some countries than in others, for obvious reasons. Terrorism has many manifestations. It has been with us for a long time. There are different definitions of the terms, and to counter it requires actions on many different fronts. When we speak of the ‘War on Terrorism’ we should remind ourselves that terrorism is a tactic, a means. Whilst we seek to prevent it, our real target is not the tactic but the perpetrator. Our enemy is those groups and movements which seek to overthrow our social order and which use terrorism and many other tactics [eg, information warfare] to that end. 11 September brought this into focus. The clear distinction between ‘war’ and ‘non-war’ is now blurred. So, therefore, is the distinction between the role of armies and policing forces also blurred. If we liken this new form of attack on our societies, which includes terrorism, as a disease – say lung cancer - then as we attempt to treat the disease, we can draw on several sources of help. The armed forces are the surgeons. The security forces [police, gendarmerie] are the doctors, dispensing medicine, chemotherapy, etc. The overseas aid and crisis prevention agencies are the health workers who try to stop us smoking and help us avoid the causes of the disease. The intelligence and security services are the diagnosticians who should give us early warning of our health problem. Just as in medicine, all these agencies have indispensable roles to play. Just as in medicine, no one agency on its own will be effective – best effects are achieved when they all collaborate. Military power has an important role to play in the defeat of terrorism. But military force alone cannot defeat a terrorist threat. Military force can at least buy a breathing space. For example, it can deny terrorist groups a safe haven in space or time, as in Afghanistan, without which they cannot easily function. But this breathing space must then be used to tackle the problem at its source, or the military action may come to be ineffective or even counter-productive. Likewise, domestic protection can no longer be assured by passive defensive measures alone. There will be occasions when security can only be achieved by taking the war into the enemy’s camp. The problem facing much of Europe, of course, is that it does not have the military option to do that. It does not have the armed forces it needs to pursue the War on Terrorism by force. The challenge, therefore, is a manifold one:
The armed and security forces themselves need to agree in concert a framework for tackling the new security threats which breaks down old barriers to collaboration. The most widely used framework is a good place to start. This divides the tasks into ‘anti-terrorism actions’, ‘counter-terrorism actions’ and ‘consequence management’.
Both military and security forces will need new capabilities for intelligence and new weapons and equipment as well as a much higher degree of collaboration and training to fulfil these new tasks. |
|
|
So, how should we begin to address the issue of change – of rethinking our approach to security? A good point would be to readdress the fundamentals of alliance membership in the perspective of new security threats. To be a good member of an alliance [be that NATO or a future EU ESDP] a country should be able to do the following:
|
|
|
Self-protection no longer means simply self-defence. Some nations do still face a potential external military threat and will feel the need to keep traditional defences in place. For others, classic defence of this sort is not a requirement at all. For some members, the threat of terrorism is very high, for others it is very low. In a modern alliance, there will have to be very significant differences in how members prioritize threats and allocate resources to dealing with them. Likewise the kind of help nations are likely to need from allies will also differ considerably. It will no longer just be classic military help. Interior ministries and other security agencies may now have to be prepared to open their doors to outside help in a way that they have not previously been prepared to do. The concept of what is alliance-related infrastructure will have to change. So will the understanding of which allied countries are on the ‘front line’ in facing new threats. Very important to realize is that this ‘frontline’ is no longer necessarily a geographical issue. Patterns of intra-alliance investment will have to change, as well as national investments. In providing help to others there are limited options, but much variation within them. Military options, as discussed above, will require forces capable of projection, maintenance and utilization. But armed forces will also have to be capable of being deployed in domestic situations in support of domestic security agencies. Providing forward basing and logistic support will also be very important. However, sharing the burden not only of cost but also of risk and of casualties will remain an important factor in deciding how allies will need to contribute to this function. Help, however, will not only be military. This does not offer an excuse for not making a military contribution, but is rather a recognition that [a] a response will no longer be purely military; and [b] with the best will in the world it will be some time before many European countries are in a position to make substantive contributions to a projected military force. One way that this process could be speeded up would be for members to develop specialized security capabilities to contribute to a common effort, and to ensure a collaboration by non-military security agencies which nations have hitherto been unwilling to do [as evinced by the EU’s difficulties in developing its ‘third pillar’]. And, as we noted above, collaboration between the EU and NATO will have to improve considerably. Indeed, in respect to the issue of improving collaboration we should not forget that the strategic predicament of the War on Terrorism also offers strategic opportunities. It has already brought Russia notably closer to NATO, and it helps make the prospect of a real Euro-Atlantic Security Community more likely. Engaging Russia so that War with her becomes as unimaginable as between EU states is at least as important a security priority as the more topical war-on-terror emphasis of this paper. But part of this new imperative will be to ensure that the Euro-Atlantic Community does not become perceived as an aggressive, intolerant, but still porous and increasingly detested Fortress Affluent North. An additional consideration which affects the foregoing is the impact that the source of the new threats to security will have on the evolution of strategic geography. In the Cold War the threat came from a clear direction – from East or West depending on the viewpoint. This geographical orientation created ‘frontline states’, ‘rear-area states’, ‘flanking regions’, etc., all of which had a fundamental impact not only on those nations’ national psychology but also on practical preparation for conflict. The new security environment overturns this hierarchy. Firstly, geography is no longer the sole determinant of the immediacy of a threat. Secondly, inasmuch as geography does play a role, then just as the new threats destroy the clear line between internal and external threats, so they also throw up a new Strategic Alignment with a North-South or North West-South-East alignment. It can be argued that Turkey has replaced Germany as the keystone state for European Security. NATO’s Mediterranean countries, headed by Greece, could be at greatest risk from the spill-over of a conflict in the Middle East. Those nations most willing to project military force, or to threaten to do so, into the Middle East may be the most menaced of all. Now on the one hand this will require a huge effort to avoid political polarization into a ‘North-South’ confrontation and the creation of a new political and cultural divide. On the other hand there is to a certain extent already a new geographical imperative. The old Cold War ‘threat gradient’ has been reversed. We must face the fact that some countries will be playing a more or a less important role in the new security environment than they were in the old. Last, but by no means least, the new security scene as it has developed over the past decade has seen a dramatic change in the ‘role’ of women in security. This is not an issue of ‘political correctness’ or of ‘gender balance’. Rather it is to note the disturbing fact that, of the estimated 4 million casualties of the ‘small wars’ since 1990, three-quarters have been women and children. If one measures victims rather than just casualties [eg, rape victims, refugees, etc.] the proportion is even higher. One can attribute this to many causes, not least being that most of these conflicts have been civil wars. But whatever the cause, this seems to me to be a sufficiently important phenomenon to address in its own right. It is also worth pointing out that, although armed forces today have to do many more tasks than just fighting – tasks which can often be done equally or even better by women than by men – many armies still find it difficult to accommodate women in their ranks. Furthermore, although no-one can deny that women will play at least an equal role in conflict prevention or post-conflict recovery and reconciliation, only a very small percentage of the staff of international institutions or NGOs involved in such programmes are women. How we address this issue is worthy of much greater attention. |
|
|
The Challenge for the ‘Security Community’ In all our countries, the current pace of events faces government departments with enormous burdens of overwork. There is no longer enough time to deal with everyday problems and find enough time for conceptual thinking. After all, the scope of change being forced upon institutions is the greatest that it has ever been in peacetime. Consequently there is a great need to generate ideas, stimulate thinking and debate on all aspects of security sector reform, to break down boundaries between different elements of the security establishment and to expand the frontiers of what is considered ‘security’. Think tanks must become the interface between the brainpower of the Academic Community on the one hand and the overworked policy community, which needs their help, on the other. There is a particular need to increase the size and strength of this ‘security community’ – the body of military and especially of civilian personnel competent in the new security issues and capable [a] of filling posts in national and international institutions; and [b] educating the population to understand the new needs of security so as to ensure their support through the democratic process. This ‘security community’ today is, it is true, moving to address the new security issues. But it is not moving rapidly enough nor profoundly enough. This is not to criticize those members of the community - particularly not those in think tanks or academic establishments – the most numerous members of the community. They are doing their best to adapt, to cast-off old approaches, to address new issues. But, many, like the author of this paper, have a lifetime of studying yesterday’s enemies and yesterday’s threats. Today’s threats require people with specializations in new areas of the world, new social phenomena. Above all, they need to be multi-disciplinary, and to encompass issues not previously considered security issues at all. We need to engage public intellectuals, political philosophers, writers and musicians [remember the case of Salman Rushdie] as well as politicians and civil servants in the new community. We need more security specialists in think tanks who are doctors. Likewise we need more doctors in our health services who are also security specialists. Not only will our new strategic community have to address new threats and responses. Because of the nature of these threats and the implications for our societies, they will need to debate and perhaps redefine the issues of nationality, national identity and perhaps the very identity of ‘Europe’ or ‘the West’ – certainly of the Euro-Atlantic Community. As a key element of the ’security community’, the intelligence, counter-intelligence and policing services do face a particular challenge. Not only do they have to recruit and develop specialists with new areas of expertise and new backgrounds, both to study and work in the countries and new environment where information is now needed. They also have to adapt to cope with domestic issues which, whilst long-standing, have now taken on a new significance. Immigration, ethnic minorities, allegedly disputed national loyalties, xenophobia and social cohesion are problems which are likely to affect most Western societies to an ever greater degree. The change in the nature of the threat today requires a degree
of collaboration between [secret] intelligence and security
services and their counterparts in [open] policing organizations.
Over the years, and for perfectly good reasons, there has developed
a very different attitude to information handling between these
organizations. This makes it very difficult now for them to
work together with the degree of interaction which is desirable.
This is not an issue of trust nor of ‘turf battles’ between
rivals seeking to protect their little ‘empires’.
Rather it is a deep philosophical and cultural difference that
will not be easy to overcome. If this issue affects national
agencies, it affects international organizations [eg, EU Justice & Home
Affairs, INTERPOL, EUROPOL] to an even greater degree. |
|
|
Implications for the Corporate Sector It is at this point that the issue becomes more than an academic one for the corporate sector. The corporate sector has always had an interest in national security, of course, but that interest was general and invested in the social and political basis of the country. Business did not usually involve itself directly except inasmuch as there was business to be done in the field of supplying the defence sector. ‘Security’ for the business world was mostly protection against competition, theft or fraud, and the occasional green ecological protestor. Very large conglomerates have always played a major role, especially in smaller countries, but the main focus was usually on economic and political issues, not security issues. The change in the nature of security, however, has created a new imperative: the need to break down the barriers not only between government agencies but between those agencies and the corporate world. As societies, under the influence of commercial competition, become ever more efficient, ever more information dependent, and ever more ‘globalized’, they also become more vulnerable to disruption, even catastrophic disruption. Business is the first and most immediate institutional victim of terror. Long before terrorism is a threat to governments or to social cohesion it will have put companies – especially small- or medium-sized companies – out of business. Other threats to security, such as organized crime, corruption, and smuggling are equally threats to society because they are first and foremost threats to the health of the business sector. Genuine business needs secure conditions to flourish. The whole concept of security as developed by NATO and the EU was based on economics. But the threat that inspired Schumann to found the basis for the EEC and ultimately the EU was the threat of hot war. Today, security needs to be applied against a much wider range of threats in which business features directly, and not at a second remove as it did in the past. More immediately, business is itself a generator of stability and prosperity and a hedge against the new threats. Therefore it is of greater interest to governments as an element of security. Business needs governmental help in order to know in which countries and in which ways the new threats to security will arise. Security becomes a major determining factor in foreign direct investment [which, for example, doubled in Poland in the year after that country joined NATO]. Today, business can provide governments with intelligence that they cannot easily get from other sources. Big business may be the actual prime target of cyber crime or terrorism pursued with a political, rather than an economic, motive. All these considerations demand a new relationship between the corporate world and the security sector. Equally, the answers to new security problems will likely lie in the hands of corporations. We need to explore new responses to security in collaboration with business. If we seek security merely by ratcheting up old procedures we risk creating such obstacles to trade and commerce that we destroy the market freedoms which form the basis of our society and ensure our prosperity. Governments and international institutions, in other words, can no longer solve their security problems without building a new partnership with business. Business can no longer ensure conditions for its secure operation without having a greater input into government policy. The need for partnership works both ways. The challenge we face in the immediate future - for this is a problem which is already with us - is to develop that partnership, to make it work, and to keep it flexible so that we can keep ahead of the threats in what will, from now, on be a rapidly evolving security environment. |
|
|
I began this paper with reference to the revolutionary change in the nature of conflict in which we now find ourselves. Like all revolutions, this one is gradual and uneven, a mix of old and new. Like all revolutions, it will be much easier for a historian of the future to see and evaluate with hindsight than it is for us who are in the middle of it to see where it is going. Our most immediate need, therefore, is to put more effort and more resources into thinking about the future course of this revolution and how to respond to its demands, and on the basis of that thinking, to change the understanding of our populations accordingly. The second most important thing we have to do is, on the basis of this new thinking, to break down the barriers between existing institutions – between governmental departments and agencies themselves; between government and non-governmental agencies [business, NGOs, academia]; and between the traditional Security Sector [military, police, customs and immigration, etc.] and the rest of society’s mechanisms for dealing with human security. This paper started with a consideration of the need for military and security sector reform. But we cannot achieve this essential reform without a corresponding reform of our societies themselves. Just consider the social changes ushered in by the French Revolution or WWI. What we will have to cope with over the next decade is nothing less of an upheaval than these two events provoked. When it comes to considering how well prepared we are to cope with this, I am reminded of my grandfather’s experience during a period of social and military change of a similar magnitude. He was a sergeant in the 6th Inniskillings, an Irish regiment of the British Army, who left the army in 1909. He had spent much of his training in the first decade of the 20th Century learning how to fight Zulus. I do hope that we are better prepared for what faces us then he was when he reenlisted in the army in 1914. This text is not a formally agreed NATO document and, therefore, does not necessarily represent the official views of individual member governments on all policy issues discussed. 
|
The Changing Nature of Conflict