Moscow 30 October 2003

Does Russia need NATO, and if so, what kind of NATO? Speech by NATO Secretary General, Lord Robertson Ladies and Gentlemen, Far be it for a Scot to talk to a Russian audience about revolutions. Especially in October. But that is what we have seen in the relationship between NATO and Russia in the past two years or so. I am proud of the part I played in that revolution. So should the others who worked so hard to end once and for all the suspicion and competition which characterised the Cold War and became its sterile legacy in the 1990s. My presence here is evidence of how far things have changed. When I became NATO Secretary General four years ago, I had clear objectives: to help stabilise the Balkans; to modernise NATO’s armed forces; to hold open NATO’s door to new democracies. In all of these areas, I was confident that progress could be made. But I had another priority about which, frankly, I was much less confident of success. I was determined to build a fundamentally new relationship between NATO and Russia. With hindsight, my lack of optimism was realistic. Just remember how difficult thing were in 1999. NATO and Russia were emerging from the Kosovo crisis, about which we had disagreed deeply. Although we had had a formal relationship since 1997, it was a nervous partnership at best. We cooperated, in the Balkans and elsewhere, but that cooperation was too often grudging, reluctant and fragile. I pressed ahead because it was clear to me that transforming the NATO-Russia relationship was an essential precondition to real common security in the 21st century. But the relationship improved only slowly, even as memories of Kosovo receded. For most of the time, we continued to scrutinise nervously each other’s actions and to query sceptically each other’s motives. Then came 9/11. September 11, 2001 showed how fundamentally our world had changed. In the ruins of New York and Washington, we saw – in Russia and throughout NATO – that World War III would never happen. Instead, we all confronted a new generation of threats and challenges, a new security environment in which old adversaries shared values and interests, and faced a common, clear and present danger to them. It was not that terrorism was new to Russia or to many NATO countries. But 9/11 was a new, apocalyptic brand of terrorism, fuelled by extremism, mounted from safe havens and with growing links to other emerging risks, from weapons of mass destruction and the instability created by failed and rogue states. For once, the international community shared a common analysis of the threat and acted decisively to defeat it. NATO countries and Russia stood shoulder to shoulder in the war against terrorism, and began to cooperate in ways which previously would have seemed inconceivable. My experience is that in international relations things often work well in practice before they work at all in theory. That was the case with NATO-EU cooperation in averting civil war in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia(1). It was certainly the case in the NATO-Russia relationship. But as cooperation against terrorism increased on the ground, decision makers in capitals began to recognise that, for NATO, any solution to the security threats of the 21st century that did not include Russia as an active partner was no solution at all. Moreover, this was not a one-way street. In Moscow, your decision makers saw that Russia faced the same threats and could no more defend against them alone than could any other country. So 9/11 demonstrated to even the most sceptical that to remain mired in traditional rivalry was unsustainable on both sides of the old Cold War divide. President Vladimir Putin was at the forefront of those advocating a reappraisal of Russia’s relations with the West. I know because we spoke regularly about his plans, and I congratulate him for his vision and courage. He has not shied away from telling the Russian people the truth: that Russia faces grave threats to her security; that the new NATO is no longer in any way an opponent; and that the only way to ensure an effective defence against the security threats of the 21st century is through true and trusting partnership between Russia and the West. President Putin has charted a new course for Russia, which fulfils her European destiny. It is a path which I firmly believe Russia must follow – for her own benefit, and for the benefit of the Euro-Atlantic community. And an essential part of that European destiny is a transformed relationship between NATO and Russia. But President Putin was not the only leader to show vision at that time. I pay equal tribute to those NATO Presidents and Prime Ministers who took the initiative to turn practical cooperation with Russia into a new, formal but practical working relationship of equals. They say that a second marriage is a triumph of hope over experience. In this case, however, the second phase of the NATO-Russia relationship was a triumph of new realism over old rhetoric. When NATO Allies and Russia came together in Rome, in Spring 2002, to create a new NATO-Russia Council, we started afresh. With a new approach. A new way of doing business. And yes, new hope as well. The NATO-Russia Council, or NRC, was nothing less than a revolution in Euro-Atlantic security. The idea – a very simple one – was to create a body where the 19 NATO member states and Russia could meet around one table as equal partners to discuss and develop areas of common interests, assuming the same rights and the same responsibilities for the implementation of collectively made decisions. That first meeting near Rome was real history in the making and marked the death of Cold War stereo types. Twenty of the world’s most powerful Presidents and Prime Ministers gathered around one table not to carve up a continent but to reunite it. And to draw a final line under the sterile divisions of the 20th century. Even more important than this extraordinary political symbolism was the determination of the 20 that their cooperation should endure and deliver results. I am delighted to report that we have indeed delivered. In the eighteen months since we set up this Council, an enormous amount of work has been done. But it is not just the volume that is remarkable. It is the nature of our cooperation that is revolutionary. Who could have imagined, a few years ago, that NATO and Russia could have developed together joint intelligence assessments of the terrorist threat? Well, we did. We have also worked out political arrangements for future NATO-Russia peacekeeping operations. In Bosnia and then in Kosovo, we put these arrangements together on an ad-hoc basis. They worked but they were far from perfect. Now, we are laying the groundwork for what we know will happen again in future: trusting, effective NATO-Russia operations. We have also set out a roadmap towards the interoperability of theatre missile defence systems, to protect our troops working together in the field. We have worked out a framework agreement for acting together on submarine crew escape and rescue. And we have held successful civil emergency planning exercises together, so that we can help each other in the event of a major emergency. Of course, the traffic in ideas and expertise also goes two ways. We have much to learn from each other, from what not to do in Afghanistan to the mistakes to avoid in modernising our armed forces and squeezing the most out of our defence dollars, euros or roubles. This is an agenda of practical cooperation that no one would have dared dream of just a few years ago. Yet this sea-change is not just practical – it is also political. We have already seen in the Balkans how effective NATO and Russia can be when they apply their collective influence to achieve the same goal. In the 21st century, we cannot afford to squander this potential for positive change. That is why Russia and NATO are now engaged in regular consultations on the key issues of the day – from the situation in Afghanistan to the remaining challenges in our shared project to bring peace and security to the Balkans. Together, through the NRC, NATO members and Russia have marshalled their political clout to promote enhanced border security in the Balkans, and military reform in Bosnia as well. Let me tell you what might be the most remarkable progress of all. In a year where the international community has been torn apart by differences of opinion over the nature and scope of the threat caused by the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, experts in the NATO-Russia Council are nearing agreement on a common assessment of proliferation dangers. That, to my mind, illustrates what is so different, so new, and so valuable about the new NATO-Russia partnership. In the past, each and every international crisis threatened to undermine the entire relationship. Today, the partnership is judged on its own merits. And those merits are strong enough to ensure that the partnership survives, and indeed thrives, in this new and more volatile international environment. The strength of this relationship is important, because we should have no illusions: it will be tested. We will not always agree on everything. Many in Russia have questions about the accession of new democracies into the Alliance. NATO Allies remain deeply concerned about the prolonged crisis in Chechnya – in particular, its humanitarian consequences. There are recurring questions in both directions about human rights. And, as the recent Russian Ministry of Defence “White Paper” shows, we need to do a great deal more to clarify persistent misunderstandings of our respective strategies and doctrines. These issues will not be resolved overnight. But they can and must be resolved – because NATO needs the new Russia, as Russia needs the new NATO, if we are to meet the threats and challenges of the 21st century effectively. This can only be achieved through open dialogue and mutual confidence. Ladies and Gentlemen, Over the past four years, I have visited Russia more often than to any of NATO’s other partners. I have invested so much in this relationship because it is absolutely vital to our security, to NATO’s and to Russia’s. I have not done so because I am a romantic or an idealistic. I am a practical politician and I deal in the currency of what can be achieved in the real world. That is where the strength of the NATO-Russia relationship lies. It is based on the pragmatic self interest of both sides. NATO has calculated that we are safer and stronger in dealing with today’s threats if we have Russia firmly on our side. Russia has reached the same conclusion. That is why I am so confident that what we have built in the past two years will endure. So my view is that this is only the beginning. Today, I invited President Putin to participate in a Summit meeting of the NATO Russia Council in Istanbul next Spring. I will not be there. But my successor will have the rewarding task of building on our successes. I have no doubt he will spare no effort to bring NATO and Russia even closer. He will be successful. Thank you. 1. Turkey recognises the Republic of Macedonia with its constitutional name.