The new NATO Strategic Concept: news and priorities

The new NATO Strategic Concept provides a clear set of guidelines for the Alliance in the medium term. Adopted on June 29 in Madrid, the Concept outlines a series of priorities derived from the war of Russia against Ukraine, but it also presents relevant novelties in relation to China and the Indo-Pacific

During the NATO Summit in Madridthe members of the alliance affirmed that Russia can no longer be considered as a partner, in fact internalizing the geopolitical earthquake that the Return of a great conventional and multi-domain war on European soil. The Strategic Concept also identifies deterrence and defense as the number one priority of the Alliance, compared to other fundamental tasks such as crisis prevention and management and cooperative security.

The military posture NATO has been adjusted accordingly, moving from a reinforced presence to an advanced defense. This implies a much stronger pre-deployment of US, Canadian and Western European military capabilities throughout the eastern flank of NATO, including command and control structures, personnel, and equipment. The current multinational battalions stationed in eight allied countries in Eastern Europe go rise to brigade level.

“NATO Defense Plans Will Increasingly Focus On ‘High-Intensity, Multi-Domain Fighting Against Nuclear-Armed Competitors'”

A military posture so transformed involves the assignment of tens of thousands of allied military units to NATO, a level not seen since the end of the cold war. An important part of these capacities will remain stationed in Western European bases, ready for combat against a possible Russian attack. Therefore, it will be very difficult to use them for operations other than those planned on the eastern flank of NATO.

Consequently, the defense plans of the NATO they will increasingly focus on “high-intensity, multi-domain fighting against nuclear-armed competitors,” while less attention is paid to crisis management, counter-insurgency, or stability operations. This, in turn, will significantly influence allies’ capacity building and acquisitions in collective defense and conventional conflict, in line with what is already happening in Germany from March 2022.

New types of threats

scopes space Y cybernetic they are fully integrated into NATO’s new defense and deterrence posture. Indeed, “a single or cumulative set of malicious cyber activities or hostile operations to, from or within space could rise to the level of armed attack and could lead the North Atlantic Council to invoke the Article 5 of the Washington Treaty” on collective defense. This provision it’s not totally new, since it reflects declarations from previous allied summits. However, its inclusion is extremely important because it provides a more stable and high-level mandate to the structures of the NATO and to allied militaries to develop doctrines and capabilities for cyber and space operations.

The Strategic Concept also considers the tactics hybrids through the lens of collective defense: “Hybrid operations against allies could rise to the level of armed attack and lead the North Atlantic Council to invoke Article 5.” Considering this combined focus on space, cyber and hybrid warfare, the message being sent to an increasingly risk-prone Russian leadership is clear: don’t challenge NATO because we will react the same way.

NATO allies are also aware of the risk of losing their military advantage due to China’s massive and widespread investments in new technologies and Russia’s specialized capabilities in hypersonic weapons, for instance. That is why the Strategic Concept commits to “promote innovation and increase our investments in emerging and disruptive technologies to maintain our interoperability and military advantage”, placing this objective as a central task of collective defense.

The reference to interoperability is important here because American innovation is advancing rapidly while Europeans lag behind due to fragmentation of efforts. That is why, for Europeans, NATO’s emphasis on interoperability and military advantage means first and foremost cooperation, coordination and integration of decisions and industrial development. This is the only way to deal with the Russian threat and at the same time develop and produce relevant European technologies for national and collective defence.

strategic change

Interestingly, compared to the 2010 Strategic Concept, the Madrid document shifts arms control, disarmament and non-proliferation from the core task of cooperative security to that of collective defence. The underlying idea is that strategic stability rests on two pillars. On the one hand, deterrence and defense. On the other, the “meaningful and reciprocal political dialogue” with adversaries on arms control, non-proliferation and disarmament, aimed at “reducing risk and improving security, transparency, verification and compliance.” The first pillar has already been reinforced by the decisions adopted in Madrid, while the second will require a political, diplomatic and military effort on the part of the allies, first of all the United States, but also the Europeans who are part of the distribution agreements NATO nuclear.

However, compared to deterrence and defense, the main task of crisis prevention and management receives little attention. Here, the Alliance’s approach is rather cautious and modest. The basic idea is to retain the ability to deploy and sustain crisis management operations, while investing in capacity building with vulnerable partners in the NATO neighborhood and beyond. Afghanistan it is barely mentioned once and only in terms of lessons learned.

“The underlying idea is that strategic stability rests on two pillars. On the one hand, deterrence and defense. On the other, the ‘significant and reciprocal political dialogue’ with the adversaries»

In recent years, the withdrawal of the US military from Middle East and the North of Africaas well as from Central Asiahas been parallel to the French withdrawal from Mali, indicating a general trend of military overload and political fatigue in the West. The Russian war in Ukraine has already shifted the allies towards collective defense. The decisions adopted in Madrid reflect this new reality within and around the Alliance.

NATO is likely to continue to lead the Kosovar Force in a permissive European environment, as well as the mission Be Guardian, a modest maritime security operation in the Mediterranean. That said, another of the Strategic Concept’s conclusions is that it confirms a decisive change for NATO: the era of large-scale Allied operations outside its area died in Kabul on August 31, 2021 and was subsequently buried in Kyiv on February 24, 2022.

Moving on to the third central task of the cooperative security, the Concept outlines two important and realistic guidelines. Firstly, as far as enlargement is concerned, it implicitly reaffirms the open door policy of NATO by rejecting any third-party interference in the decisions of the Alliance, but no further steps are taken in relation to the possible accession of Ukraine, Moldova or Georgia. While the EU has offered candidate status to a country at war with Russia, with Russian forces likely occupying parts of its territory for decades, NATO has wisely refrained from taking any steps that would bring the Alliance into direct conflict. with Moscow.

«The Strategic Concept confirms a decisive change for NATO: the era of large-scale allied operations outside its area died in Kabul on August 31, 2021»

The second important guideline concerns the European Union, confirmed by the Madrid document as NATO’s “sole and essential partner”. The Alliance is committed to strengthening the strategic partnership with the Union both in terms of political consultation and further cooperation on a number of issues. It recognizes “the value of a stronger and more capable European defense that contributes positively to transatlantic and global security and that is complementary and interoperable with NATO”. Together with the appreciation of “initiatives to increase defense spending and develop coherent and mutually reinforcing capabilities”, this statement appears to be an implicit endorsement of EU defense frameworks.

However, the Madrid document states that “the full participation of non-EU allies in the EU’s defense efforts is essential”. This position reflects the tense relations between the Union and United Kingdom Y Turkeybut in general it can be a green light for further cooperation between the EU and NATO.

China and the Indo-Pacific

A fundamental novelty coming from Madrid is the attention given to the People’s Republic of China and to Indo-Pacific, mentioned for the first time in a NATO Strategic Concept. The Allies explicitly state that “the PRC’s malicious hybrid and cyber operations and its rhetoric of confrontation and disinformation they target the Allies and harm the security of the alliance”, while accusing Beijing of striving to “subvert the rules-based international order, including in the space, cyber and maritime fields”. This accusation is accompanied by a commitment to “remain open to a constructive engagement with the PRC, including building reciprocal transparency.”

The Strategic Concept somehow achieves a balance between the different perspectives of the allies by outlining a first common assessment. The most important follow-up regarding Indo-Pacific is the enhancement of partnerships with like-minded countries such as Australia, Japan, New Zealand and South Korea, whose heads of government were present for the first time in Madrid at a NATO summit. These associations They already existed before, but today they acquire a new relevance in the face of growing concern about the rise of China.

In this context, the Strategic Concept deprioritizes the Middle East and North Africa, as well as the sahel. These regions are barely mentioned, receiving much less attention than the Indo-Pacific, while the NATO partnerships related to them, the Mediterranean Dialogue and the Istanbul Cooperation Initiative, are not even mentioned, neither in the document nor in the final communiqué of the summit. Given that the instability, crises and conflicts in Europe’s southern neighborhood are not going to go away, the question left by NATO’s new Strategic Concept is whether and how Europeans are willing and able to meet these challenges on their own.

Article originally published in English in the Web of the International Affair Institute.