Values, not just interests…

Brussels, the capital of the European Union, has been under the spotlight last week because of the NATO Heads of State meeting. The meeting was not fully an official NATO summit in real terms but has nevertheless been an important episode in the history of the Alliance. The main purpose of the meeting was to bring together Donald Trump, the newly-elected president of the United States, with his European colleagues. From this point of view, the aim was achieved.

Although the end of the Cold War created the question on whether the Alliance had lost its sense of mission after 1991, NATO has been tremendously successful in adapting itself to the post-Cold War risks and challenges emerging in the world. This was the time when the concepts of "clash of civilizations" as well as "the end of history" came into discussions. NATO responded to Samuel Huntington and Francis Fukuyama first by extending its hand to the former Warsaw Pact countries through the North Atlantic Cooperation Council. Afterwards, Partnership for Peace, NATO-Russia Founding Act and the subsequent NATO-Russia Council, Mediterranean Dialogue and several other initiatives followed. This has shown how NATO was still needed as a strong and reliable political and military organization in Europe.

Since 1991, the last 25 years have caused NATO to introduce its "non-Article V" missions, namely those operations beyond the NATO territory. As a collective defense organization, NATO's mechanism to stand together against an aggression toward any of its members is depicted in Article V of the Washington Treaty of 1949. After the Cold War, however, NATO has taken over missions beyond its collective defense obligations. The war in former Yugoslavia and the intervention in Afghanistan are cases in point....