Nato After Thirty Years

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The survival of NATO as a viable alliance is currently challenged by a shift in the strategic balance of power, as well as by global events and contingencies that extend far beyond NATO's boundaries. In the face of these challenges, existing institutional mechanisms are proving inadequate to respond effectively. The distinguished contributors to this volume draw on their vast political and diplomatic experience to identify and analyze the problems confronting NATO for the remainder of the twentieth century. They make clear the need for a trans-Atlantic communication network among policymakers, scholars, and others-a network that will allow an ongoing process of analysis and assessment of NATO's strategic, economic, and political problems, along with the identification of appropriate reactions.

Since the foundation of the Atlantic Alliance after World War II, the face of world politics, and consequently of NATO, has changed dramatically. NATO after Fifty Years examines, from a wide range of perspectives, the past, present, and future of the alliance, now in the throes of its most uncertain period. The contributors to this volume bring a diversity and breadth of perspectives that will make this book an invaluable teaching tool for courses relating to U.S. defense policy, arms control and the military in politics, international organizations, war and peace, international conflict, and government and politics in Europe.

This book analyses the expansion of The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) into the post-Soviet space after the end of the Cold War. Based on an extensive analysis of the literature and government documents, including doctrines, statements and speeches by the most influential decision-makers and other actors, it sheds new light on the geopolitical and geostrategic context of the expansion of the military alliance, and assesses its impact on international security relations in Europe. The first chapter introduces readers to the neo-realist approach and develops the methodological basis of the book. The following chapters provide a historical overview of the causes and consequences of two waves of eastward NATO enlargement. Special attention is paid to the annexation of the Crimea and to Russian hybrid-asymmetric warfare. Finally, thirty years after the end of the Cold War, the book notes a disturbing return to militarization in international security relations. To counter this process, the author calls for a reduction of current international tensions and a new policy of détente.

This book analyses the expansion of The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) into the post-Soviet space after the end of the Cold War. Based on an extensive analysis of the literature and government documents, including doctrines, statements and speeches by the most influential decision-makers and other actors, it sheds new light on the geopolitical and geostrategic context of the expansion of the military alliance, and assesses its impact on international security relations in Europe. The first chapter introduces readers to the neo-realist approach and develops the methodological basis of the book. The following chapters provide a historical overview of the causes and consequences of two waves of eastward NATO enlargement. Special attention is paid to the annexation of the Crimea and to Russian hybrid-asymmetric warfare. Finally, thirty years after the end of the Cold War, the book notes a disturbing return to militarization in international security relations. To counter this process, the author calls for a reduction of current international tensions and a new policy of détente.

This book discusses and assesses the War Powers Resolution, its application since enactment in 1973, providing detailed background on a variety of cases where it was utilised, or issues of its applicability were raised. In the post-Cold War world, Presidents have continued to commit US Armed Forces into potential hostilities, sometimes without a specific authorisation from Congress. Thus the War Powers Resolution and its purposes continues to be a potential subject of controversy. On 7 June 1995 the House defeated, by a vote of 217-201, an amendment to repeal the central features of the War Powers Resolution that have been deemed unconstitutional by every President since the law's enactment in 1973. In 1999, after the President committed US military forces to action in Yugoslavia without congressional authorisation, Rep Tom Campbell used expedited procedures under the Resolution to force a debate and votes on US military action in Yugoslavia, and later sought, unsuccessfully, through a federal court suit to enforce Presidential compliance with the terms of the War Powers Resolution. The War Powers Resolution (P.L. 93-148) was passed over the veto of President Nixon on November 7, 1973, to provide procedures for Congress and the President to participate in decisions to send US Armed Forces into hostilities. Section 4(a)(1) requires the President to report to Congress any introduction of U.S. forces into hostilities or imminent hostilities. When such a report is submitted, or is required to be submitted, section 5(b) requires that the use of forces must be terminated within 60 to 90 days unless Congress authorises such use or extends the time period. Section 3 requires that the "President in every possible instance shall consult with Congress before introducing" US Armed Forces into hostilities or imminent hostilities. From 1975 through 2003, Presidents have submitted 111 reports as the result of the War Powers Resolution, but only one, the 1975 Mayaguez seizure, cited section 4(a)(1) which triggers the time limit, and in this case the military action was completed and US armed forces had disengaged from the area of conflict when the report was made. The reports submitted by the President since enactment of the War Powers Resolution cover a range of military activities from embassy evacuations to full scale combat military operations, such as the Persian Gulf conflict, and the 2003 war with Iraq, the intervention in Kosovo and the anti-terrorism actions in Afghanistan. In some instances U.S. Armed Forces have been used in hostile situations without formal reports to Congress under the War Powers Resolution. On one occasion, Congress exercised its authority to determine that the requirements of section 4(a)(1) became operative on August 29, 1983, through passage of the Multinational Force in Lebanon Resolution (P.L. 98-119). In 1991 and 2002, Congress authorised, by law, the use of military force against Iraq. In several instances neither the President, Congress, nor the courts have been willing to trigger the War Powers Resolution mechanism.

Despite momentous change, NATO remains a crucial safeguard of security and peace. Today’s North Atlantic Treaty Organization, with nearly thirty members and a global reach, differs strikingly from the alliance of twelve created in 1949 to “keep the Americans in, the Russians out, and the Germans down.” These differences are not simply the result of the Cold War’s end, 9/11, or recent twenty-first-century developments but represent a more general pattern of adaptability first seen in the incorporation of Germany as a full member of the alliance in the early 1950s. Unlike other enduring post–World War II institutions that continue to reflect the international politics of their founding era, NATO stands out for the boldness and frequency of its transformations over the past seventy years. In this compelling book, Seth A. Johnston presents readers with a detailed examination of how NATO adapts. Nearly every aspect of NATO—including its missions, functional scope, size, and membership—is profoundly different than at the organization’s founding. Using a theoretical framework of “critical junctures” to explain changes in NATO’s organization and strategy throughout its history, Johnston argues that the alliance’s own bureaucratic actors played important and often overlooked roles in these adaptations. Touching on renewed confrontation between Russia and the West, which has reignited the debate about NATO’s relevance, as well as a quarter century of post–Cold War rapprochement and more than a decade of expeditionary effort in Afghanistan, How NATO Adapts explores how crises from Ukraine to Syria have again made NATO’s capacity for adaptation a defining aspect of European and international security. Students, scholars, and policy practitioners will find this a useful resource for understanding NATO, transatlantic relations, and security in Europe and North America, as well as theories about change in international institutions.