The NATO Summit in Riga nearly two months ago was the first of a series of summits to be held at short intervals over the coming years. The next one will be held as early as in the first half of 2008, and will probably be dedicated to enlargement and partnership. The third summit of the series will be held in the spring of 2009, and will mark the 60th anniversary of NATO’s founding. We should save our tributes for that occasion, but there can hardly be any doubt that NATO is the strongest and most significant defence alliance the world has seen.
This is due not least to the fact that the Alliance has shown itself to be, and continues to be, capable of adapting to a changing security policy environment It is said from time to time that NATO is “an alliance searching for new tasks”. This may have been an accurate description in the period immediately after the fall of the Berlin Wall and the end of the Cold War. Today the problem is practically the reverse: there is a huge backlog of tasks that must be addressed. The main challenge is to make do with the available resources and avoid spreading ourselves too thinly.
The tasks are highly varied, to put it mildly. Who would have thought a few years ago that NATO would not only go out of area, but would also take on responsibility for the stability and security of a war-torn Asian country twice the size of Norway and with a population five times as large? Who would have thought that NATO would provide extensive humanitarian assistance, not only to Afghanistan’s neighbour Pakistan in connection with the earthquake disaster one and a half years ago, but also to its largest member country, the USA, when the hurricane Katrina wreaked havoc along the Gulf coast the same autumn? And who would have thought that NATO would assist the African Union’s operation in Darfur?
A long time has passed since NATO was on the lookout for Soviet tanks on the plains of northern Germany. But the services of the Alliance are more in demand than ever. If they are to continue to be so, and if NATO is to continue to be a useful international crisis management tool, the Alliance will have to keep on adapting to changing circumstances and challenges. And this transformation process must have firm political backing and be driven forward at the political level.
This is also why originally the Riga Summit was to focus on change and development. But in the course of the autumn, attention shifted more and more to Afghanistan as fighting in the southern part of the country increased in scope and intensity. It was to be in Riga that the Alliance’s efforts in Afghanistan would be evaluated. Beyond that, expectations were relatively modest before the Summit. In retrospect it can be said with good reason that the outcome of the Riga Summit is a good example of how results can exceed modest expectations.
Afghanistan was naturally the dominating theme at the Summit, but it led to other important results as well.
First of all, Riga confirmed the need for and will to continue the political and military transformation of NATO. The heads of state and government adopted specific decisions that set the course for further restructuring. The single most important result in this field was that the NATO Response Force (NRF) was declared fully operative. However, it is true that this decision did not come easy, something I will return to later.
Second, three of the Balkan countries — Albania, Croatia and Macedonia — were given to expect that they would be invited to join NATO as early as at the summit in 2008, whereas the three others — Bosnia-Herzegovina, Montenegro and Serbia — were invited to participate in NATO’s Partnership for Peace. All six countries have thus taken important steps towards the Alliance and on the way towards full integration in Euro-Atlantic institutions. This is a significant contribution to security and stability in our part of the world.
Third, it was agreed that guidelines should be drawn up for NATO’s cooperation with other international actors in connection with future peace operations. Experience gained in the Balkans and Afghanistan has shown that there is a pressing need for improved coordination and cooperation in both the preparation and the implementation phases.
Fourth, the foundation was laid for further development of NATO’s cooperation with third countries in and outside Europe, the latter group including countries such as Japan, South Korea, Australia, New Zealand and countries in the Middle East and Persian Gulf region.
Considered as a whole, the results of the Riga Summit provide a good basis for the further work of the Alliance, which went through a tricky period before the Summit. Washington’s decision to bypass NATO in the fight against international terrorism following the attacks on 11 September 2001 and the disagreement on the issue of Iraq in 2003 weakened the transatlantic ties for quite some time. There can be no doubt that the past few years have been among the most difficult in the history of the Alliance.
But at the same time, there has been growing recognition on both sides of the Atlantic of the need for a strong NATO, a common recognition that solidarity and a strong and vital Alliance are essential if we are to meet the huge challenges NATO is facing, for instance in Afghanistan and Kosovo.
During the first four years of the Bush administration, US policy was characterised by unilateralism and ad hoc coalitions, but during his second term — and following the massive problems in Iraq — the US is again according NATO and multilateral solutions more importance.
The fact that the US is again choosing to make use of NATO is of course a most welcome development. It ties the Americans — and the remaining 25 member countries — into a consensus process that gives all the allies a chance to have their say. This is particularly in the interest of small and medium-sized member countries.
But the improved political atmosphere in NATO does not mean that the Alliance is now in a state of perfect harmony. The scars inflicted by the disagreement over Iraq have not disappeared completely. Washington and the European allies still have differing opinions on how the security policy challenges can best be met. And there are still diverging visions regarding the future role of NATO.
But this is perfectly normal. And it is a clear sign of progress that these differences of opinion can once again be dealt with within an established consensus-based decision-making structure.
The Alliance’s main challenge in the years ahead will undoubtedly be Afghanistan. During the entire Cold War, NATO didn’t fire a single shot, but in Afghanistan allied soldiers have for the first time been engaged in regular fighting on the ground, and have lost a considerable number of soldiers in combat. Canada and the UK have each lost about 45 soldiers in the intense fighting in southern Afghanistan.
Last week our Foreign Minister visited southern Afghanistan. I myself visited Canadian soldiers in the Kandahar area and British soldiers in Helmand province last autumn. The journey made a deep impression. Many of the soldiers had lost close friends and fellow soldiers in combat.
Both in NATO and in the individual member countries, a lot of attention has been focused on the Alliance’s inability to provide the agreed numbers of troops, particularly in southern Afghanistan. This is less a question of the number of personnel than of important capabilities. Also national limitations on where troops can operate and what they can do — known as caveats — have been an issue of discussion. The Canadians in particular have been under severe strain in the Kandahar area, and in the Canadian public debate there have been calls for more allied support, and questions have been raised about the solidarity among allies.
But although ISAF has been under strain during some periods, there was never any real risk of NATO “losing” the battles in the Kandahar area. ISAF has, and continues to have, military control, and is well prepared for the expected Taliban spring offensive, even though it may be more intense and extensive than in previous years. The biggest challenge today is not the military situation, although it is demanding, but rather how to accelerate the reconstruction and development efforts. This in not primarily the Alliance’s responsibility, but unless the Afghan Government and the international community are more successful in this area, NATO will not be able to fulfil its task in Afghanistan.
Norway is contributing heavily in Afghanistan, both militarily and in terms of development assistance. Norwegian soldiers have a good reputation, and there is every reason to be proud of the work they are doing. As in the south, there are great challenges in northern Afghanistan, which is where the Norwegian soldiers are stationed. This was clearly demonstrated by the events in Meymaneh a little less than a year ago. They also showed how vulnerable ISAF’s Provincial Reconstruction Teams, or PRTs, are.
It is important that we help to consolidate the stability that has been achieved in the north. The Norwegian forces have therefore been concentrated in northern Afghanistan. The Government has, however, expressed that the size and form of Norway’s force contribution in Afghanistan are subject to ongoing assessment.
ISAF and the international community in general have achieved, and are achieving, results in Afghanistan. And here I am not referring to statistics on the number of Taliban fighters that have been killed. If anything, body counts undermine NATO’s standing, most of all in Afghanistan, but also within the Alliance. It is far more important to communicate that more young girls now have the opportunity to attend school, that more villages have got a clean water supply, that internally displaced persons can return to their homes and that hospitals are being upgraded and are receiving necessary medical equipment.
It is obviously important that there is support for the operation in allied countries. But it is even more important that the Afghan authorities and ISAF enjoy the support of the Afghan people. It must feel that the international military presence is contributing positively to their security and future. Only then will the security situation really improve. When the Afghan people turn their back on the Taliban and other rebel groups, they will lose their basis for existence.
The Norwegian forces, together with forces from Finland and Latvia, are doing an excellent job in Meymaneh. They enjoy great respect among the local population, and are fulfilling their task in an impeccable manner. Norwegian aid organisations are also present, and are doing a very good job. Schools have been rebuilt, and internally displaced persons have been helped back to work. Norwegian doctors attached to the PRT assist daily at the local hospital.
This assistance is important. The local population sees that the Norwegian presence is producing positive results. Norway’s engagement is reinforcing the Afghan authorities’ efforts and is strengthening their authority in the provinces. We are thus helping to build a sense of Afghan ownership and involvement. This is one of the overriding goals of the international efforts. This is precisely why NATO and the international community must support the development of Afghan institutions and capacity, and this is an important priority in Norwegian development assistance.
From NATO’s point of view it is particularly important that more effort is put into training the Afghan National Army (ANA) and the Afghan National Police (ANP). In Riga there was full agreement that an all-out effort is now needed in this area. This will be an important issue when NATO’s foreign ministers meet in Brussels at the end of the week.
Norway is also very intent on strengthening Afghanistan’s public administration, particularly in the 32 provinces.
One of the main problems continues to be that the central Government’s authority and control is limited outside Kabul, although progress has been made in this area.
Here we must not forget that the Karzai Government and its international supporters basically have a strong position. According to a poll conducted by ABC News and the BBC last autumn, 88% of the population support the authorities and the Government. Only 3% would prefer to see the Taliban back in power. Nearly 90% consider it to be a good thing that foreign forces toppled the Taliban regime, and nearly 80% are in favour of the international military presence.
It is important that we do not squander this strong support among the Afghan people. This may prove difficult. In 2005 as many as 77% of those asked were of the opinion that the situation in the country was improving.
However, by autumn 2006 this figure had decreased to 55%. There is a growing gap between the people’s expectations and the Government’s and the international community’s ability to deliver. If it continues to grow, there may be increasing resentment against the Government and the international presence. An intensification of the efforts in the civil sector are therefore necessary both for the Karzai Government and for the international community. It is perhaps NATO’s military leaders who see this most clearly. The commander of ISAF (COMISAF), General Richards of the UK, put it this way: “More roads are more important than more soldiers.”
In order to reap the maximum benefit of the international community’s support to Afghanistan, it is necessary to apply a comprehensive civil-military approach and to achieve far better coordination than we have seen so far. For this reason, Foreign Minister Støre presented a number of proposals last autumn with a view to strengthening the coherence of the international engagement. One of the things Norway stressed was that the UN should take the lead in coordinating the international efforts in Afghanistan. We also underlined the need to strengthen cooperation and dialogue between the capitals and the headquarters of international organisations. The Norwegian ideas received broad support and are well reflected in the Riga Declaration.
It was decided at the Summit that in the course of spring concrete proposals will be developed for how NATO’s military and political planning procedures can be improved with a view to ensuring close cooperation and the early involvement of local authorities and other civil actors in the planning and implementation of international peace operations. This will be a key topic at the NATO foreign ministers’ spring meeting in Oslo at the end of April.
Afghanistan is, and will continue to be, NATO’s most important and demanding challenge. When the NATO foreign ministers meet in Brussels in four days, their discussion will to a large extent focus on the implementation of the decisions adopted in Riga, in both the military and the civil sphere. Ahead of the informal meeting of NATO defence ministers in Seville in three weeks, the new Supreme Allied Commander Europe (SACEUR), General Craddock, will present his assessment of whether the Alliance has at its disposal the forces and capacity it needs to fulfil its task in Afghanistan. It cannot be ruled out that he may conclude that an increase is required.
NATO’s other main challenge is Kosovo, where currently 16 000 allied soldiers are deployed, as opposed to 30 000 in Afghanistan.
The process of determining the future status of Kosovo is nearing its conclusion. Getting the parties to agree to a negotiated solution will be a huge and difficult — indeed maybe impossible — challenge. There is a real risk that some groups in Kosovo may turn to violence if they are not satisfied with UN Special Envoy Martti Ahtisaari’s proposals, which he will present in a few weeks time. Much attention has lately been focused on the Serbian-dominated areas north of the river Ibar. But half of the Serbs in Kosovo live in scattered enclaves in the south. Ensuring their safety will be crucial in order to create an atmosphere that is conducive to the implementation of a final status agreement. The same applies to the protection of cultural and religious monuments.
This means that continued NATO presence will be required to secure stability. The success of KFOR is witnessed by the fact that this seems to be the only thing all parties agree about. Kosovo Albanians, Kosovo Serbs, Serbs, countries in the region, Russia, the UN and the EU alike: they all realise that continued NATO involvement is necessary for the time being. Only NATO is able to guarantee the peace and stability that are essential in the delicate transitional phase Kosovo is now moving into.
It is therefore not on the cards that KFOR will be reduced in the near future, although some allied countries might wish this were possible, both for financial reasons and in light of the situation in Iraq and Afghanistan. But the duration and other important aspects of NATO’s future role in Kosovo are at present unclear. What will the Alliance’s tasks in Kosovo be, besides maintaining peace and stability in a transitional phase? Should the Alliance get involved in security sector reform? Should it take on responsibility for training a new security force? And what should the division of labour be between NATO and the EU, which will be responsible for the operation of the police and the judiciary? These will all be important issues when the foreign ministers meet in Brussels on Friday, and also at the foreign ministers’ meeting in Oslo this spring. By that time we should also have a clearer picture of developments in Kosovo following the adoption of the final status solution.
In Norway’s view, it would be natural for NATO to gradually shift its focus to capacity-building and security sector reform. We are prepared to contribute substantially in this area, where we have considerable experience from other parts of the Balkans, particularly from Serbia.
Let me now move on to NATO’s third main challenge. To be able to respond effectively to current and future challenges, NATO must at all time have the appropriate military means at its disposal. The military transformation of NATO is thus a continuous process, and experience from ongoing operations such as Afghanistan and Kosovo is important input to the efforts to transform the capacities of the Alliance.
In Riga important decisions were made in this area. The achievement of full operational capacity (FOC) for the NATO Response Force (NRF) was one of the most visible results. The problem ahead of the meeting was primarily how to get members to commit a sufficient number of troops to make it possisble for SACEUR, on the basis of sound military criteria, to justify declaring the NRF operative. This proved to be a demanding process. The fact that Norway committed parts of Telemark Battalion to NRF8 was an important contribution and was instrumental in making it possible to declare the NRF operative. The Secretary General was so pleased that he jokingly rewarded us with: ”la Norvège – dix points”.
Considering the difficulties in achieving FOC for the NRF ahead of the Riga Summit and the persistent challenges maintaining FOC in the future will entail, it is on the cards that the NRF concept will again be subject to discussion, and that questions such as the size of the force and the level of ambition applied to its tasks will be key issues.
Originally, NATO envisaged a force of about 17 000 soldiers. However, the present concept is based on a force of 25 000 rotating on a half-yearly basis. In practice, the personnel requirement for each rotation approaches 100 000 if preparatory and follow-up work is taken into account. There are many who consider that it is meaningless to keep such a large force stand-by without being used. They fear that the NRF will become obsolete, and that the catch phrase “use it or lose it” applies here. Norway agrees that there is a need for reviewing the concept, and looks forward to an initial exchange of views on this subject at the informal meeting of NATO defence ministers in February.
Another important step taken in Riga was the approval by the heads of state and government of the Comprehensive Political Guidance document (CPG) and its publication. The CPG, which springs directly out of the Alliance’s Strategic Concept of 1999, provides political guidelines for further transformation and capacity-building efforts in the Alliance during the coming years. At the same time, it is worth noting that an increasing number of people are questioning whether it isn’t now time to develop a new strategic concept that better reflects the changed framework conditions and challenges. Many are of the opinion that a new strategic concept should be ready before the jubilee summit in 2009. This could prove to be an extremely difficult and time-consuming process involving a number of sensitive issues, including that of nuclear weapons.
Kosovo is the Alliance’s greatest challenge in the Balkans, but not the only one. Norway has for some time maintained that NATO must take an integrated approach to the Balkans as a region. Some six months ago Norway presented an outline of such an integrated regional strategy. One of the proposals it contained was that the decision should be made at the Riga Summit to include Serbia, Bosnia-Herzegovina and Montenegro in NATO’s Partnership for Peace. The reasoning was that the best way for NATO to improve security and stability is through an inclusive regional approach, not through the isolation of individual countries.
The Norwegian proposal was well received by many of the allies, but not by all. Opposition to the proposal was primarily due to Serbia’s and Montenegro’s unsatisfactory cooperation with the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY). The main objection was that the two wanted war criminals Mladić and Karadžić have not yet been extradited to The Hague. This is, of course, a matter Norway also takes most seriously. But at the same time we believe that the goal of full cooperation with the ICTY can best be reached through cooperation and dialog. We considered it important to avoid that the people of Serbia and Bosnia-Herzegovina get the feeling that Europe had turned its back on them. It was our assessment that this would be more likely to nurture nationalist and radical forces, rather than increase the chances of the war criminals being extradited to the ICTY.
The decision to admit the three Balkan countries into NATO’s Partnership for Peace was one of the biggest surprises in Riga. But naturally, it does not imply that NATO has dropped its demand of full cooperation with the ICTY. The Riga Declaration places clear demands on Serbia and Bosnia-Herzegovina on this point. Norway fully supports these demands. As an advocate of taking Serbia and Bosnia-Herzegovina on board, we bear a particular responsibility for maintaining pressure on both countries and for ensuring that the extradition issue remains on the agenda until it is resolved. And that will not be until Mladić and Karadžić are in safe custody in The Hague.
The inclusion of the three countries in Partnership for Peace programme is an example of how, by way of focused efforts, we can succeed in having Norwegian positions adopted by NATO, even on issues where there is substantial initial opposition. Of course it helps having a good case and solid arguments.
NATO membership is the goal for all six Balkan countries. The Balkans will therefore continue to be an important region for the Alliance. The focus will, however, gradually shift towards training, capacity-building and support for reform. Our experience from the Balkans has enabled us to provide valuable input to NATO’s efforts in these areas, and particularly related to security sector reform. We intend to continue to provide such input.
Any overview of NATO’s challenges must also include the issue of further enlargement. As a general principle, NATO’s door is open to all countries that wish to join, and that through active reform efforts demonstrate in action that they share the value basis on which the Alliance is founded.
Since 1997, NATO has acquired ten new members. There will be still more in the years ahead. The Membership Action Plan (MAP) countries Croatia, Albania and Macedonia are first in line. In Riga they were given to expect that they will be invited to join as early as at the summit in spring 2008, provided they fulfil the requirements.
Ahead of the Riga Summit, Norway proposed a mentor scheme, under which individual member countries would assist individual MAP countries with membership preparation in the period leading up to 2008. A similar scheme was successfully applied to the seven new members that joined in 2004. We are now in the process of fleshing out the mentor scheme for the three Balkan MAP countries. These plans have sparked great interest, both in the region and in allied countries.
Formally, the enlargement discussion only concerns the three mentioned countries. However, Georgia and Ukraine have also been mentioned in this discussion. In Georgia there is broad support for the Government’s efforts to move the country towards NATO membership. The country has carried out important reforms in key areas, but a lot still remains to be done. To encourage further reform, cooperation between NATO and Georgia was stepped up in September last year. However, the so-called frozen conflicts in South Ossetia and Abkhazia complicate Georgia’s relations with NATO. Many are of the opinion that membership is ruled out for countries with unresolved territorial conflicts.
Ukraine too still has a long way to go. Relations with NATO have been given lower priority during the past year. The President and the Prime Minister have widely differing views on the issue. Ukraine also has a long way to go when it comes to defence sector reform.
However, this does of course not mean that the two countries will not be important partners for the Alliance in the years to come. The question of membership for Georgia and Ukraine could easily become a key issue ahead of the summits in 2008 and 2009. In Norway’s view, it is important to see this issue in a broader context, one that includes relations between NATO and Russia, although it is our firm position that Russia should not, and cannot, have a de facto veto on issues related to further NATO enlargement.
NATO’s cooperation with Russia takes place within the framework of the NATO-Russia Council (NRC), under which NATO countries and Russia cooperate as equal partners on a broad range of security and defence policy issues. This cooperation has both a practical and a political dimension. Seen from a Norwegian point of view, the NRC is an important, but at the same time very demanding, arena. There is no reason to hide that neither the political dialogue nor the practical cooperation has evolved to the degree many were hoping for when the NRC was established nearly five years ago.
Some allies whose historical references are different from Norway’s have a more reserved attitude to this cooperation. On the other hand, we could at times wish for greater involvement on the part of the Russians. The work of the NRC is currently characterised by routine and a lack of dynamism. Norway is intent on doing something about that. It is a well-known fact that the Government attaches great importance to our cooperation with Russia. Furthermore, the points of contact between NATO and Russia are constantly increasing in number. Energy security is one obvious example. In Riga the heads of state and government tasked the North Atlantic Council with exploring what the Alliance can contribute in this area, as a supplement to the efforts undertaken by other international organisations and by the member countries themselves, and which focus, among other things, on the protection of critical infrastructure.
Let me conclude by saying a few words about the development of NATO’s cooperation with third countries, or partner countries. This is another important challenge for the Alliance. Cooperation enables both NATO and its partner countries to more effectively address the security challenges they are following. Apart from the political dialogue that is a part of the partnership scheme, the cooperation includes support for necessary security sector reform and measures aimed at strengthening partner countries’ ability to participate in international operations. A number of partner countries now have forces that are fully interoperable with NATO forces, and this has paved the way for more extensive and significant partner participation in allied operations. Currently 18 partner countries are contributing forces to NATO operations, 10 to ISAF, and 12 to KFOR.
Generally speaking, there is broad support for this development. However, it is clear that there are differing opinions about how far it should go. Ahead of the Riga Summit, this was reflected in a pretty intense discussion about what framework should be applied to NATO’s relations with countries that do not belong to established partnership structures, but that wish to cooperate with the Alliance, for example Australia, New Zealand, South Korea and Japan.
The US was particularly active in advocating the establishment of new structures as a framework for cooperation with these four, which are known as contact countries, whereas France was more sceptical. In the end it was agreed that the cooperation will be further developed in a flexible manner, without the establishment of new structures. The contact countries will, however, have access to a number of mechanisms and instruments for practical cooperation, and the political dialogue based on common interests will be intensified. There is an important difference between a globalised NATO and a NATO with global partners. Today’s NATO does need global partners, but it does not need to become a global alliance.
I would like to add one final comment. The transformation of NATO and the Alliance’s engagement in remote parts of the world have led to increased debate about the future role of the Alliance, both in the North Atlantic Council — which is where I encounter it on an almost daily basis — and in the various member countries. This is a good thing. The transformation of the Alliance can only be successful if it is understood and supported by the people of the member countries. This also constitutes a major challenge, both for the Alliance and for the individual member countries. And it is not necessarily the simplest of the many challenges NATO is facing following the Riga Summit.
Thank you.