U.S. wants NATO to go 'global'

[Soldier4Christ]

U.S. wants NATO to go 'global'
But acknowledges some European allies have misgivings


The United States set out an ambitious agenda on Monday for transforming NATO into a global security organization at a summit next month but acknowledged that some European allies have misgivings.

U.S. NATO ambassador Victoria Nuland said the 26-nation alliance had gone beyond debates about whether to act outside its Euro-Atlantic area, deploying forces on four continents in the last 18 months, most importantly in Afghanistan.

NATO is already performing missions in practice for which it has yet to adapt its theory, she said, forecasting tough drafting debates before the November 28-29 summit in Riga, Latvia.

"We want NATO to be able to demonstrate when our heads meet four weeks from now that we have an alliance that is taking on global responsibilities, that it increasingly has the global capabilities to meet those responsibilities, and that it is doing it with global partners," Nuland said in a speech to the Center for European Policy Studies think-tank.

The alliance is fighting Taliban guerrillas in Afghanistan, supporting African Union peacekeepers in Darfur, patrolling former Yugoslav battlefields in Kosovo and has flown relief supplies to earthquake victims in Pakistan.

"For the next four weeks, allies are going to spend a lot of time arm-wrestling and mud-wrestling about the words that we use in our NATO documents ... to reflect today's reality.

"It's going to be a tense conversation as we head toward Riga," she said without identifying which allies objected to stating such global ambitions in the summit documents.

"But today, I would argue that the reality of what's going on in NATO is outstripping our ability to encapsulate it in NATO doctrine in theory here in NATO headquarters," Nuland added. 

Diplomats said France was most reticent about accepting a global role for the U.S.-led alliance, of which it has been a prickly, semi-detached member since General Charles de Gaulle pulled French forces out of allied military command in 1966.

Germany, Belgium, Luxembourg and Spain also had reservations about appearing to rebrand NATO as a world policeman, they said.

Nuland said European allies were coming to realize in Afghanistan that they needed to spend more on defense and develop long-range airlift and more special commando forces to cope with 21st century security challenges.

Many European allies were spending less than NATO's unofficial minimum of 2 percent of gross domestic product.

The NATO Reaction Force, designed for rapid deployment to high-intensity combat situations, will not be fully operational in time for the Riga summit because of the strain on national defense resources, Nuland acknowledged.

"We are not all the way yet but we are making progress," she said.

But the summit will see progress on strategic airlift, with 14 allies and non-NATO Sweden signing a joint deal to acquire long-range C-17 heavy lift aircraft, and on joint training and communications for special forces.

Politically, Nuland said the NATO council was now discussing global issues far beyond the Euro-Atlantic area, such as the nuclear programs of Iran and North Korea.