In the last decade we have become used to a wide variety of ways to put together military forces for operations beyond the NATO area for operations in support of the requirements of the international community. It may be that Kosovo will prove to be a unique occasion - or at most once per 50 years - in which the formal NATO mechanisms, with the whole of the Alliance, and its partners, engaged. The circumstances were special - there was a direct effect on many of the Euopean NATO nations - and the experience is one that may make it less likely that we shall adopt such an approach to international problems repeated further afield than the Balkans.
None of this means that NATO lacks relevance. Indeed the spirit of NATO will be there in most operations outside of Europe. The sub questions that we are addressing are about the mechanisms for European engagement with the US beyond Europe. We have plenty of precedent in this decade to see the kinds of operation that we are talking about. The Gulf War of 91 and the various Iraq related operations that continued since are examples of some of Europe engaged with the US in operations beyond Europe. The mix of nations involved has been different at different times. One vast ad hoc coalition in 1991 decreasing to the UK and US in 1998 for Desert Fox and the subsequent operations that have been going on all this year.
We could run through all the other humanitarian operations that have had some European involvement, the latest of which is East Timor. In this, 3 European nations are taking part and the US is there in support. The lead nation, Australia, is neither NATO nor European, but is using NATO procedures and doctrine. In each case the common factor is the requirement for military forces from more than one nation being able to operate sensibly together. Currently we have only one organisation that can provide the necessary training, doctrine and standards to put together efficiently multinational forces at short notice. Even when operations are not NATO sponsored, it is NATO standardisation and NATO experience which makes it easy for them to operate. In East Timor, systems for agreeing rules of engagement are just as important as in Kosovo. So we need NATO, with the added value of the partnership arrangements, for putting together forces for a much wider range of contingencies.
For the particular case of Europeans, which I will define as members of the EU, there is little early prospect of operations under an EU banner until there has been much greater development in the field of common foreign and security policy.. While NATO provides the framework for Europeans to undertake a range of operations, we still continue to provide that capability and political will on an individual nation basis. In both cases this makes for inefficiencies. The idea of a second ARRC, equipped by the Europeans is a good one, although it opens up a new set of questions about achieving mechanisms within the EU to make rapid consensus achievable for deployment. Certainly Europe could be achieving much greater capability for its defence expenditure, if the nations were prepared to pool resources and eliminate duplication of HQ, logistic support and training. Strategic air lift is an easy example for early making of a real European increase in capability. On a parallel model to NATO AWACS, the EU could put together a strategic air lift capability which could work either with the US in a formal NATO operation, or by itself in other UN sponsored operations, and would be able to operate even if not all contributing nations wished to be involved.
NATO has an essential role in setting standards so that coalition military operations can work. It also has an important role in encouraging European nations to make better provision for military operations. The Defence Capabilities Initiative is important in this respect, but it is not the first such initiative in NATO's history. Some European nations are going to want to be involved in operations outside Europe. For the more challenging scenarios, they are likely, but not necessarily, going to be operating with the United States. Whether they are or not, they will need to field forces with modern capabilities. So NATO's desire to keep its European members up to the mark, is important whether or not we see NATO as some sort of world policeman. The EU in GDP terms is as rich as the US, it certainly has worldwide economic interests. It needs to work harder at shouldering its international security responsibilities. Such a move would not undermine NATO: it would provide NATO with more effective capability when it needed it, and Europe with more options when NATO was not the appropriate agent for action.
Mr Solana, as he takes up his new role, might like to look at how the EU can be moved towards rectifying the key European shortfalls that he identified in his last post. in NATO. While defence outputs are the key, it would be a start if EU nations agreed not to cut their defence budgets in real terms for the next 3 years. The time could be used to develop a number of important capabilities for use in Europe or beyond, within NATO or without, and in alliance with the US or with others.