#10
Wall Street Journal
March 28, 2002
Editorial
A New Alliance

Big changes are afoot at the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, and about time. After looking dazed and confused in the weeks after September 11, the military alliance may be seeing a little more clearly where it is going next. The vision isn't 20-20, but we're getting there.

The key to the success of the transition to a new era will be American leadership. And in recent days, Washington has taken a renewed interest in NATO, after sidelining the institution in Afghanistan and generally paying it little heed.

This week, with winks and nods, the U.S. tipped its hat toward putting seven countries -- as opposed to two or five -- on the short list for membership. The new additions are Bulgaria and Romania, long shots before the war on terrorism started. We also hear the U.S. seems more committed to overhauling NATO's internal structures, in the face of opposition from some Europeans. And all the while, the alliance is working out a new kind of relationship with Russia .

The tricky part in the months before the crucial Prague summit this November will be to get all these reforms right. Hasty decisions will have lasting consequences for the institution and America's relationship with Europe. Ultimately, the aim must be to keep NATO at the heart of the trans-Atlantic relationship, and relevant to the security needs of today.

Enlargement is one important step forward. In an important speech last summer in Warsaw, President George W. Bush committed the U.S. to an ambitious expansion of NATO, possibly to include Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Thanks in part to the clear message sent by Washington, the Baltics aren't even contentious anymore. Russia , eager for a deal of its own with NATO, sounds resigned to the Baltic states coming in. September 11 has further rubbed away old Cold War fault lines.

By putting its sights on Bulgaria and Romania, however, the U.S. backs a push by NATO into the truly vulnerable flank of the continent, Southeastern Europe. The threat in the Balkans isn't conventional war, but organized crime, lawlessness, drugs and weapons running, and minor ethnic wars. These weak states may easily become havens for terrorism, too; a cell was recently uncovered in Bosnia.

If NATO wants to look relevant to the problems at hand, it should take the Black Sea basin and the Balkans even more seriously. That means possible membership for Romania and Bulgaria, assuming they meet appropriate criteria; and as important, ever closer security ties with Ukraine, the western Balkans and the Caucasus region.

Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage sent a clear message by spending two days in Bucharest earlier in the week. Attending a summit of the nine aspirants for NATO membership, he passed on a written message from President Bush that the U.S. was committed to remove "the remaining divisions of Europe." European NATO members were, once again, conspicuous by their absence from these discussions.

In growing eastward and closer to Russia , the alliance must beware not to undermine NATO's great strength, its cohesion and military backbone. While the candidates will be joining a different kind of alliance, a larger NATO must not be another talk shop; there are plenty in Europe already. Membership, and the pledge of mutual defense, must be taken as seriously as before. We don't know when the alliance might be forced to go into battle, but the candidates should be accepted only if they deserve to be members and contribute to the alliance, not weaken it.

As for Russia , NATO has reason to tread carefully. The U.S., NATO and Russia share many common interests; President Vladimir Putin sees good reasons for Russia to cooperate with NATO. But any deal can't be a sop, real or perceived, to Moscow for abiding enlargement, or a green light to meddle with its former colonies beyond NATO frontiers.

The final piece of the puzzle is internal reform. In his Bucharest message, Mr. Bush said: "We will move to adapt NATO structures and improve its capabilities so that our societies and our citizens are better protected against new threats wherever they emerge." This sounds like a clear mandate for real change at an institution with too much baggage left over from the Cold War.

George Robertson, the secretary-general, wants NATO forces better prepared for chemical and biological threats and the alliance to take part in civil emergency planning. Too often, such initiatives get caught up in needless intramural squabbling. His efforts to get Europe to spend more on defense have also yielded little so far.

While the alliance may not have the preeminent role it had during the Cold War, NATO still matters for Europe and the U.S. It keeps peace in the Balkans and pools the military resources of the world's greatest democracies. Few other institutions have served America's or Europe's common interests so well for so long.

Sure, the alliance needs a makeover. The U.S. pushed NATO to redefine its role in the 1990s by intervening in the Balkans and warming up to Russia and Central Asia. It must show the way forward again. If it doesn't, no one else will.