NATO: Still Relevant After All These Years?
Abstract
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) has served the United States Europe and the world extremely well since its creation in 1949. It has been instrumental in maintaining the peace and deterring aggression in Europe during this time. However some believe NATO's time has passed that there are no longer any compelling reasons for it to remain intact. NATO's role has evolved over the past fifty six years from a purely defensive alliance to one that is increasingly offensive. Member nations have deployed military forces to Bosnia Kosovo Iraq and Afghanistan and the Global War on Terror (GWOT) portends no end in sight to these types of commitments. Since its inception in 1949 NATO has expanded five times and grown from its original 12 members to today's 26. The latest expansion occurred in 2004 and there is little reason to believe that this will be the last as NATO continues to look to the east and south for prospective new partners. Despite these enlargements however the emergence of the European Union (EU) coupled with growing disenchantment across much of Europe with military solutions to modern challenges makes NATOs future far from certain. The purpose of this paper is to assess whether NATO is still a relevant alliance given the dissolution of the Soviet Union and rise in prominence of the EU and to provide a logical and appropriate course of action for the United States to adopt for its future NATO policy: continue to expand contract or dissolve the alliance.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Mar 18, 2005
- Accession Number
- ADA432660
Entities
People
- Gregory C. Kraak
Organizations
- United States Army War College