A lot would depend on what specifically the "new" NATO would
entail. The old NATO was an alliance for mutual defense. Do we
really want to be obligated to intervene if Pakistan attacked
India? How sustainable would such a commitment be in light of our
current military overstretch? Or would the new NATO be more of a
mutual defense from terrorism pact, something different from the
original concept?
A problem with the current structure is that our European allies
have military budgets that are just a fraction of the United
States'. But that's true of Japan, Singapore, and Australia as
well, even though Howard's government has pursued a defense
buildup. Would their addition to NATO really add that much?
As for anti-terrorism cooperation, after 9/11 we were more
successful in persuading countries that weren't NATO member states
to go along with the war in Afghanistan than we were in getting our
NATO allies to back the war in Iraq. That had a lot to do with the
international political climate in 2001 versus 2003 plus the
effectiveness (or lack thereof) of our diplomacy. But it isn't
clear that a NATO-like structure including Singapore would have
made our tasks any easier. Similarly, it's not clear how the NATO
expansion after the Cold War -- to which I was initially
sympathetic -- has enhanced our security.
My biggest problem with the proposal is that rather than
representing bold new thinking about international cooperation in
combating the terrorist threat, I'm afraid it may just be another
effort to fit the war on terror seamlessly into the Cold War
paradigm, leaving us constantly looking for new Soviet Unions. The
Cold War may be a better analogy for dealing with terror inspired
by radical Islam than "World War IV," but I'm still not sure it is
the most useful model.
There certainly is a need to update our international
organizations and alliances to accommodate the threats we actually
face today rather than those of the last generation. Maybe
Giuliani's proposal satisfies this need -- or maybe we need to make
a cleaner break from outdated international institutions and form
new ones.
topics:
Islam, Military, Iraq, Pakistan, NATO, Unions
