Military

SHAPE News Summary & Analysis

13 August 2003

ISAF

Commentators continue to hail NATO’s takeover of ISAF as a sign that the Alliance is transforming and adapting to the post-Cold War situation.

“NATO is back in business,” says a Financial Times editorial, stressing that “taking command of (ISAF) this week amounts to a dramatic change in role for the military alliance that won the Cold War.” The article adds: “NATO has accumulated considerable experience of peacekeeping in the Balkans…. That can be put to good use in Afghanistan. But the job requires far more than that. Gen. Jones … sees the defense alliance being transformed to provide both security and nation-building. ‘You cannot do one without the other,’ he rightly says.” Observing, however, that NATO was never designed for nation-building, the newspaper opines that “if NATO is to help, it will need a whole new template. In Afghanistan, it will be a case of learning by doing.”

An editorial in Oslo’s Aftenposten remarks that NATO’s takeover of ISAF shows in practice how far the security-political thinking has come since the time of the Cold War. “NATO’s new command demonstrates that defense is something far more and more extensive than large forces based on one’s own territory or that of the closest allies,” stresses the newspaper.

“What happened at noon on Monday, in the desert sand of Kabul, with no emotion and no parade, was nothing less than historic: the new NATO showed its face for the first time,” wrote Die Welt, Aug. 12. The article noted: The changing of the guard in Kabul begins the third part of the chronology of a NATO torn apart by many identity crises: the first was the classic NATO, which during the Cold War built a protective wall against the Red hordes from the east with massive tank and troop formations in Western Europe. Then, beginning in 1995, came the phase of intervention and peacekeeping missions in the Balkans…. Sept. 11 catapulted the Alliance into a political coma and simultaneously was the hour of the birth of the new NATO, which wants to be prepared to take action anywhere and anytime: terrorism and civil wars, famine and natural disasters, freeing of hostages, and expeditionary operations—it wants to intervene ‘wherever necessary.’ The operation in Afghanistan is the debut of the new NATO.”

“NATO is officially moving beyond its territory for the very first time. It is high time it did so,” wrote Warsaw’s Gazeta Wyborcza, Aug. 12. Suggesting that Kabul might be a test, “a full dress rehearsal in an authentic setting for NATO’s usefulness elsewhere, for example in Iraq,” the article concluded: “Something has clearly budged. NATO is seriously preparing to deal with the challenges of the 21st century, which is evidenced by the scope of reforms that are just as necessary as they are risky.”

Under the title, “NATO’s new role,” the Christian Science Monitor writes that the Alliance made history Monday when it took command of ISAF. According to the newspaper, the move represents an important revitalization and redefinition of the expanded alliance. “NATO’s assumption of command and long-term commitment to Afghanistan provide an important boost to both the struggling government of President Karzai and the war on terrorism,” adds the newspaper.
Paris’ Les Echos, Aug. 12, speculated that Afghanistan will not be the only mission outside Europe for NATO. “The Alliance must also lend a hand to Poland in Iraq to set up a peacekeeping force. And the question of its broader involvement in Iraq is still open,” the daily noted and continued: “The Alliance … is preparing to expand to seven other countries to become a security space stretching from the Atlantic to the Baltic. Yet, since Sept. 11, 2001, it has had only a limited military role in the fight against President Bush’s ‘axis of evil.’ The operation in Kosovo in 1999 remains its only—and unique—real military success….. The project of a European defense as outlined by France, Germany and Belgium worried Washington. The designation of a successor to Lord Robertson as head of NATO is proving to be a difficult exercise. But these disputes are not all. Since 2001, the United States has argued for an a la carte organization that serves when there is a need for it. Neither in Afghanistan nor in Iraq has the United States really counted on the Alliance to topple the regimes in place in these countries. To fully play a new role in the world of the 21st century, the Alliance must above all reduce the divisions among its members. That assumes a political will, which is still far away.”

PORTUGAL-FIRES-RUSSIA

• According to AFP, a NATO official said in Brussels Tuesday that Russia has offered four aircraft to help Portugal battle forest fires. The Russian offer comprises two water-dropping planes and two helicopters, the official, who requested anonymity, reportedly said, adding that “negotiations between Portugal and Russia are underway.” The source is further quoted saying Germany, Morocco and Spain have also offered to help Portugal fight the fires, while Britain, Belgium, Switzerland and the United States “have offered other types of assistance,” notably financial aid. The dispatch recalls that the Portuguese government last week asked NATO to provide up to six Canadair water-dropping aircraft along with three heavy-duty helicopters and crews. The Portuguese request was channeled through a NATO emergency center which coordinates aid for member states to combat natural disasters, the dispatch notes.