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Security through Partnership A true Euro-Atlantic security culture Contents 1. Foreword 2. Origins and evolution of Partnership 3. Essential mechanisms 4. Security dialogue and cooperation 5. Map of NATO and Partner countries 6. Peace-support operations 7. Defence reform 8. Disaster-preparedness and response 9. Security, science and the environment 10 A true Euro-Atlantic security culture Editorial Note   Editorial Note Other Formats English PDF (~3900Kb) Printable version with colour illustrations Other format The Alliance’s evolving Partnership approach has been enormously successful in helping to alter the strategic environment in the Euro-Atlantic area. By promoting political dialogue and military interoperability, Partnership is helping create a true Euro-Atlantic security culture – a strong determination to work together in tackling critical security challenges within and beyond the Euro-Atlantic community of nations. Thanks to practical cooperation focused on preparing the military forces of Allies and Partners to work together, soldiers from NATO and Partner countries are serving shoulder-to-shoulder in the Balkans and in Afghanistan. And Partnership is providing the framework for Allies and Partners to respond together to the threat of terrorism and to address key issues such as proliferation. By stimulating and supporting defence reform in many Partner countries, Partnership is also contributing to democratic transformation. It is helping to build more modern, effective and democratically responsible armed forces and other defence institutions. Moreover, it is assisting countries to manage the social and material consequences of such reforms. Direct benefits to citizens of NATO member and Partner countries alike are also being generated by practical cooperation in a wide range of other areas, including disaster-preparedness and scientific and environmental cooperation. The Partnership has already helped prepare ten countries for the responsibilities of NATO membership, and NATO’s door remains open to new members. But Partnership also provides a unique framework for Western European non-aligned countries, which are not seeking membership, to contribute to Euro-Atlantic security without compromising the principles of their foreign and security policies. The challenges to Euro-Atlantic security are changing. The evolving threats, including terrorism and failed states, have domestic and external sources and a transnational nature. While threats to stability remain in the strategically important region of the Balkans, events in Afghanistan have demonstrated that new threats to our common security come from the periphery of the Euro-Atlantic area. In this environment, international stability and security will increasingly depend on domestic reform on the one hand, and wide international cooperation on the other. Effective security cooperation is impossible without fundamentally democratic basic doctrines and institutions. The Euro-Atlantic Partnership has a key role to play in both respects. As Allies and Partners continue to grow together, they will increase their ability to meet shared challenges with common responses, building security for future generations based on understanding and cooperation. “As we greet this ten-year mark, we can look back at a record of success. The Euro-Atlantic Partnership has been a catalyst of domestic transformation and of international security cooperation on a historically unprecedented scale. NATO has always been at the core of this endeavour. Partnership has also been moving towards the core of NATO’s business. It has served Allies. It has served Partners. It has served democracy and peace.” NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer marks the 10th anniversary of the Partnership for Peace in an address to the Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council on 14 January 2004.

© NATO - OTAN 2005 -	NATO Public Diplomacy Division, 1110 Brussels, Belgium - E-mail: natodoc@hq.nato.int