NATO: The
Next Decade
Speech
by NATO Secretary General, Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, at the
SDA
Brussels, 3 June
2008
Ministers,
Excellencies,
Ladies and Gentlemen,
It is a great pleasure to
be here. Once again, I must
congratulate Giles Merritt and the Security and Defence
Agenda not only for the stellar cast they have managed to assemble here today,
but also for asking a very simple but intriguing question: How will NATO develop over the next
decade?
Now, of course, this gets us into the realm of prediction – and that can
be a dangerous business. An
American local newspaper once had to apologise to its readers for cancelling the
horoscope section “due to unforeseen circumstances”. And the Old Criminal Code of New York
even considered prediction to be a criminal offence, liable to a fine of $300 or
3 months in jail.
The dollar being where it is today I might consider paying up, but I
certainly wouldn’t want to spend time in jail. Yet I fully agree with the SDA that it
is useful and instructive to occasionally think about the future – because it
helps to sharpen our focus on what we want to
achieve.
So what will the next decade look like? And how should NATO evolve? In security terms, I believe that a few
characteristics clearly stand out.
First, state
failure. The current “failed state
index” of the US journal
“Foreign Policy” lists no less than 32 countries. Even if that number turns out to be too
high, and even if not every failing state becomes a massive security problem for
the rest of the world, the message is clear: The problem of ungoverned spaces –
that is, of areas that can be safe havens for terrorism, organised crime, and
all sorts of other illicit and unwelcome activities – is not going to go away in the next
decade. And at least in some cases,
outside intervention will be necessary to avert greater damage.
Second, the growing
power of non-state actors.
Globalisation brings incredible opportunities, yet it also has its dark
spots. One is that it empowers
fanatical individuals, by giving them access to enormously destructive
means. I am not thinking of a
nuclear “9/11”, but a terrorist attack with a radiological weapon certainly can
no longer be considered “science fiction”.
And last year’s cyber attack against
Estonia demonstrated
that an attack against another country does not necessarily have to entail the
use of military force. For
non-state actors in particular, there are other options available.
Third, the proliferation of Weapons of Mass Destruction and their
delivery means. Clearly, much will
depend on how we resolve the two critical cases of
North
Korea and
Iran. But even if we find a satisfactory
solution in these two cases, the spread of technology and knowledge is going to
continue. It is, after all, part
and parcel of globalisation.
Moreover, the scarcity of fossil fuels is already leading to a
renaissance of civilian nuclear energy – and this poses its very own
proliferation problems.
This brings me to my
fourth point: the growing demand for energy. The next decade will see continuously
rising energy prices and a scramble for energy resources. At a time when the price of oil is
higher than ever before, this is perhaps an easy prediction to make. But I believe this trend will become
even more distinct in the coming decade, when the dynamic economies of
China and
India will need to
import ever increasing amounts of oil and gas. This will put a premium on energy
security. And it will also put a
premium on the political stability of the world’s major oil and gas producing
countries.
Finally: climate
change. I do not want to engage in
a scientific discussion here. But
changes in the global climate are already visible today, notably in the High
North. They are widely expected to
become more pronounced and visible elsewhere. And that will have security
implications. It will sharpen the
competition over resources, notably water; it will increase the risks to coastal
regions; it will provoke disputes over territory and farming land; it will spur
migration; and it will make fragile states even more fragile. Simply put, climate change could
confront us with a whole range of unpleasant developments – developments which
no single nation-state has the power to contain.
These, in a nutshell, are some of the key characteristics that I believe
will be shaping the security environment in the next decade. Which brings us to the key question: How
must NATO evolve in order to offer its members both a maximum of security and a
maximum of influence over shaping this new environment?
Many here at SDA will know the first part of my answer: we must enhance
our political dialogue. Since I
took office, I have been arguing that we must complement NATO’s military
transformation with a broader strategic debate. Clearly, for an organisation that is
engaged in several operations, it is often difficult to go beyond operational
day-to-day management issues. But
looking ahead to the next decade, I see no choice but to scan the strategic
horizon much more thoroughly.
In fact, over the past few years we have introduced changes at NATO that
make it a much more suitable framework for such a forward-looking
discussion. The North Atlantic
Council now spends more time debating a wider range of issues, including in less
formal settings. And themes that
were considered taboo just a few years ago can now be addressed openly and
frankly. Energy security being one of them. In short, we have come to realise that
discussions in NATO should not be confined to subjects of immediate military
relevance, but that they can, and indeed must, include issues of broader
political interest as well.
Of course, debate is not an end in itself. It is a means to an end – which is the
adaptation of NATO’s policy and capabilities to meet the evolving security
challenges. As far as that is
concerned, NATO already has more to offer than meets the eye. And if we take the right decisions,
including at our 60th Anniversary Summit in
Strasbourg and Kehl next
year, I am convinced that the Alliance can offer
even more in the years ahead.
First, we need to
continue to enhance the Alliance’s
military-operational effectiveness.
I cannot accurately predict where we will be operating in ten years from
now, but I am convinced that we will be at least as busy as we are today. NATO will continue to be defined by its
operations – operations that are likely to include the full spectrum, from
peacekeeping all the way to combat.
And so we must ensure that we can deliver in all possible
circumstances.
Enhancing our operational performance is a matter of both “hardware” and
“software”. With respect to
hardware, we know pretty well what we need: more strategic and tactical airlift;
command and control; surveillance; missile defence; NBC defence; increased
usability of our forces; better coordination of Special Operations Forces – I
could go on. With respect to
software I am thinking of more adaptive planning; more equitable financing of
our operations; less caveats; and greater use of commonly funded assets. Although I realize common funding is not
the panacea to all our problems.
I
am not harbouring any illusions – there will never come a moment when we will be
one hundred per cent satisfied with our progress in any of these areas. But we must maintain the focus on our
military transformation. Whether
today or ten years from now, there is simply no substitute for NATO’s military
competence.
Second, in addition
to making sure that we can meet operational requirements, we also need to move
forward on missile defence, cyber defence, and energy security. Regarding missile defence, our recent
Bucharest Summit has provided us with a clear roadmap for the future. We agreed that the proliferation of
missiles is a growing threat and that the
US defence
system should be an integral part of any future NATO-wide architecture. Based on this, we are now examining
options for a comprehensive missile defence architecture, to be reviewed at our
next Summit in 2009. Regarding cyber defence, we not only
have a Cyber Policy in place now, but we have also created a Centre of
Excellence, fittingly located in Estonia’s capital,
Tallinn.
Many here will know that
I have long argued to put energy security on NATO’s agenda. Of course, NATO will not take centre
stage in this field, but the Alliance can provide
considerable added value. At the
Bucharest Summit, we defined the areas in which NATO will engage: information
and intelligence fusion and sharing; projecting stability; advancing
international and regional cooperation; supporting consequence management; and
supporting the protection of critical energy infrastructure. Needless to say, the
Alliance is also an
excellent forum for consultation on the most immediate risks that relate to
energy security. So I believe that
we are on the right track here.
Third, we need to advance our partnerships with other nations,
both regionally and globally. Our
engagement in the Balkans was the catalyst for cooperation with countries from
all over Europe,
Central
Asia and the
Middle
East. Our mission in
Afghanistan has led to
cooperation with partners from all over the world. In short, NATO acts increasingly
together with other countries, no matter where they are located on the
globe. I believe that the next
decade will show that our cooperation in
Afghanistan has not been
a singular event, but a model for the future. And so it is both legitimate, and
timely, for us to invest in these partnerships. They are essential to the way we must
operate if we are to meet global challenges. (At the same time I stress once
again that it is not NATO’s ambition to become a ‘globo-cop’, a ‘gendarme du
monde’).
Fourth, we need to implement the Comprehensive Approach. The Bucharest Summit was a resounding
demonstration of the need for the international community to sing from the same
song sheet. In meeting today’s and
tomorrow’s security challenges, success will crucially depend on close
coordination between the major international actors – the UN, the EU, the World
Bank, NGOs, to name but a few. This
means that our planning in NATO must take these other players into account. It also means that they must be better
aware of what NATO can and cannot do.
Above all, it means that we need to develop a much more structured
relationship among the key international actors. The NATO-UN Declaration, which we hope
to be able to sign very soon, will be an important step towards such a new
quality of institutional relationships.
Finally – another
constant theme in my repertoire, especially when speaking here in
Brussels – we need to
broaden the NATO-EU relationship. I
am not suggesting that we could fundamentally change this relationship
overnight; but both institutions will suffer if we cannot bring them closer
together. I would like to see the
North Atlantic Council and the Political Security Committee of
the EU meet far more often to share analyses and perspectives on the world’s
crisis areas. I would also like to
see NATO and the EU support each other’s operations much more
substantially. I would like to see
much more pooling of our capabilities, especially in areas such as transport and
helicopters, or in research and development, or in harmonising our force
structures and training methods.
Indeed, to achieve all
that, we should not have to wait until the next decade. With a healthy dose of flexibility,
pragmatism and, above all, political will, we could achieve all of this well
before the turn of this decade.
This should be our aim as the EU develops its new
Security Strategy and
NATO considers a revision of its own Strategic Concept. This revison will be
done at a later stage, following our Summit in
Strasbourg and Kehl for which we will first
prepare a Declaration on Atlantic
Security. And let me also stress
that I have high hopes for the French EU-Presidency and their willingness to put
NATO-EU relations high on their agenda, as is already demonstrated by the
seminar that will take place in Paris on the 7th of July.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
Some have been arguing
that the next decade will witness the end of the global preponderance of
North
America and
Europe. They argue that the rise of other global
players will inevitable reduce the relative power of the transatlantic
community. I will leave that for
the pundits to argue. I would
simply say that, even a decade from now, the ability of the transatlantic
community to rally others behind a common objective – and therefore to attain
that objective – will remain absolutely unique.
Even ten years from today, no other group of nations will cooperate more
closely among each other. Nor will
there be any other group that can generate a similar kind of “magnetism” in
terms of promoting political and security cooperation. And no other group of nations will have
the institutional toolkit that is essential to facilitate such cooperation – and
the best tool is NATO.
So I am not afraid of the next decade. As long as we have a solid transatlantic
community, build around a solid NATO, the opportunities will continue to
outweigh the challenges.
Thank you.