The adjective that occurs most frequently for an International event of a certain magnitude is “historic”. There is never a meeting in which the results are not presented as worthy of being burned into future memory by the history books. Naturally, if the event is seen from the inside, any decision is destined to have an impact on the history – the one with a small “h” – of the Organization to which it refers, perhaps only to certify that things are going for the best and that it is only necessary to continue along the path already mapped out (after all, no news is good news”). If, instead, the observer is on the outside, there are really very few official events able to influence History – the one with the capital “H” – which could modify its course. Does the NATO summit at Lisbon, held last November, merit the capital “H” or the small “h”?




Lisbon has been one of the Summits with the most packed schedule of recent years, with a menu which included various entrées and substantial political and organizational plats d’accompagnement. Among the “plats de résistance” the “New Strategic Concept” figured prominently.
Since the fall of the Wall, the development of “Concepts” which inspire the action of the Alliance and are redefined the “mission” has become usual routine for NATO. For three times after 1989, at regular intervals, the Organization has found itself in the deep study of methods, structures and objectives. A not entirely painless process, which has often forced the Alliance to go through profound identity crises. The difference, this time, is that the “Concept” of Lisbon is not created by epochal upheavals (as in 1991, after the fall of the Soviet Union) or by war dramas (as in 1999, following the massacre in the former Yugoslavia). Lisbon was a cold dish that comes from far away.
Based on the report of the ‘Committee of the Wise men’, chaired by Madeleine Albright (1) "Lisbon has been one of the Summits with the most packed schedule of recent years, with a menu which included various entrées and substantial political and organizational plats d’accompagnement. Among the “plats de résistance” the “New Strategic Concept” figured prominently.
Since the fall of the Wall, the development of “Concepts” which inspire the action of the Alliance and are redefined the “mission” has become usual routine for NATO. For three times after 1989, at regular intervals, the Organization has found itself in the deep study of methods, structures and objectives. A not entirely painless process, which has often forced the Alliance to go through profound identity crises. The difference, this time, is that the “Concept” of Lisbon is not created by epochal upheavals (as in 1991, after the fall of the Soviet Union) or by war dramas (as in 1999, following the massacre in the former Yugoslavia). Lisbon was a cold dish that comes from far away.
Based on the report of the ‘Committee of the Wise men’, chaired by Madeleine Albright (2)" .
An ungenerous opinion? However, one must take into account the identikit of the Alliance that emerges from the “Concept”. The portrait of a political-military colossus hovering between the past and the future, in which the “core tasks”, not too dissimilar from those listed more than ten years ago, co-exist along with guidelines calibrated on the emerging risks of an unpredictable world. A world in which old and new actors move in scenarios of accelerated times and where globalization has made it, more than in the past, sensitive to the “butterfly effect” (3) " . And in this hazy context also the formulations of the “Concept” inspired by the historic culture of NATO acquire a new meaning, as fruit of suffered mediations between the contrasting needs of the single Allies.
The mixture between the past and the future stands out clearly in the part dedicated to the management of the crises, a subject that embraces the regional and global profile of the Alliance and the disputes on its geopolitical perimeter.
On the vocation of NATO as instrument to ensure the undivided common defence and security of its Members, just as on the “firm and binding” character of Art.5 (the real founding principle of the Alliance) the “Concept” is adamant. But the perspective is now broader: The Alliance must be able to prevent, manage and stabilize any crisis that represents a potential threat to the security of the Members of NATO as such. And, to these purposes, <i>“support contemporaneously joint operations of major or minor impact … including those at strategic distance”</i>.
Also in this case an acquired principle: the “expeditionary operations” have come, for some time, to be a part of the physiology of the Alliance and not even the most orthodox “regionalists”, today, could object to the necessity that the NATO face the challenges to the security “from wherever they come” (4).
The external missions have allowed the over sixty-year-old NATO to remain as a “major player” on the International scene, denying those (and there are many, also from the other side of the Atlantic (5) who continue to doubt its relevance after the fall of the Wall. And also on the domestic front, the “out of area” operations have carried out a positive function of catalyst to accelerate the integration of new Members (who joined the military effort with greater enthusiasm than the original Members), and of impetus to the revision of the structures and organizational criteria. Last, but not least, merit goes to the “expeditionary operations” for having renewed the attention of the United States with regard to the NATO and to have convinced them to bring back the emphasis on the multilateral framework, renouncing – at least, for now – the “coalitions of the willing”.
If anything, the need remains (6), to examine closely the problem in its political and organizational aspects. The axiom of the “multiple fronts” has been severely shaken by the contextualization of operations which have submitted the Allied Armed Forces to an effort to the limits of sustainability. As regards to external ties, the principal obstacle to an indiscriminate globalization is constituted by the public opinion of the allied Countries, which observes, with growing impatience, operations in distant and little known Countries – operations which do not always have clearly delineated objectives – and which impose a heavy toll among the fighting troops and civil populations.
It is in defining the changed context of the International security and the emerging threats, instead, that the “Concept” goes forward in the changed world realities.
Proliferation, terrorism, cyber warfare, bankrupt States, attacks on the freedom of transport and the availability of water and Energy resources, technological risks, natural catastrophes, and even environmental protection is added (and in part, is substituted) by the traditional military threat, imposing a transformation of the methods and the structures of the NATO. A multiform panorama to which must be affixed a “multi-layered” defence on which the “Concept” applies the strokes on a broad and ambitious fresco, which authorizes the Alliance an extremely extended gamma, qualitatively and quantitively, of interventions aimed at heterogeneous situations. Perhaps too ambitious (7) for a structure, the physiognomy of which remains essentially military: before dispersing its limited resources in tasks for which it is not prepared, the Alliance must evaluate, case by case, the marginal utility of the single initiatives compared to the overall strategy, avoiding risks of “overstretching”. Or, better still, explore thoroughly all the possibilities of sharing the realization of the interventions with Organizations better equipped in certain specific sectors, <i>in primis</i> the European Union (constant stone guest of the NATO Summits) But this – as a well-known television journalist would say – is another story). Indirect very perplexing information came from within NATO itself, with the controversial debate which preceded Lisbon on the opportunity for the Alliance to equip itself with a real “civil” force to interface with other entities during the course of crises which imply help to populations and reconstruction interventions. And the actual spaces of the NATO in the task of assuring energy and water security still remains very obscure.
Where the image of the colossus in between two eras stands out with greater force is in the military-strategic arrangements agreed upon at Lisbon.
On the one side, the nuclear posture of the Alliance. The presence in Europe of a nuclear arsenal has had, for ten years, a duel function: that of central component of the deterrent force of the NATO and that of the tangible testimony of the United States commitment to the defence of Europe up to (and beyond) the nuclear threshold.
In reality, after the fall of the Wall, the nuclear stocks accumulated during the years of the Cold War have been drastically reduced and, from the military point of view, the operative validity of the warheads still deployed in Europe is very low.
Mounted on airplanes – like the Tornados – the obsolete bomb tactics are part of a strategy aimed at close targets and would give a poor contribution in defence of the Alliance in the case of crisis. However, their significance in supporting the credibility of the American nuclear guarantee remains in tact.
As certain scholars noted (8) during the entire period of the contrasts with the Soviet Union, the necessity of being credible implied, for Washington, not only the possession of adequate means to deter the principal enemy, but also the need to “reassure” the Allies of the actual will to use them in a conflict. Still in 2001, the “reassurance” was defined by the United States itself (Quadrennial Defence Review) as <i>“function of the perceived capacity of deterrence”</i>. Capacity based, on the one side, of the punishment that could be inflicted on the adversary and pushed to its total defeat. On the other side, on the ability to impede or deny the use of its means of defence.
After the fall of the Wall, the objective of the defeat – for which the nuclear arms covered a primary role – disappeared from the NATO strategy and, as is indicated also by the “strategic Concept” of 1999: <i>“the nuclear powers of the NATO are no longer directed against certain specific Countries”</i>.
The progressive attenuation of the nuclear option in the strategy of deterrence has, however, created a net division within the Alliance, between “enlightened disarmists” – guided by Germany – favourable, for reasons of internal politics and of detente with Russia, to the prospect of a denuclearization within the NATO area, and the “hardened nuclearists” – like the major part of the Countries of East Europe and Turkey – for which the arsenal tactic constitutes an indispensable guarantee against the threat from the East and which would be only too happy to host or increase the stock of bombs on their own territory (ignoring the risk of provoking new alarming reactions from Moscow (9) . And in this intricate mosaic, a separate fragment is represented by the European Countries which dispose of their own nuclear arsenals, in particular France – ferociously contrary to seeing its privileged role – which gives it its “force de frappe” – affected in any way. Not by chance the most heated disputes in the pre-Lisbon debates were tied to the contrasts between Paris and Berlin.
It is not surprising, therefore, that the “Concept” privileged the traditional approach resorting to Solomonic formulas. <i>“The deterrence based on an appropriate mixture of nuclear and conventional capacity remains the fulcrum of our overall strategy. The circumstances in which the use of nuclear weapons could be contemplated are extremely remote. While the nuclear weapons exist, the NATO will remain a nuclear Alliance. With a single concession to the “disarmists”, we have dramatically reduced the number of nuclear weapons based in Europe and the role of nuclear arms in NATO strategy and we shall try to create the conditions for further reductions in the future”</i> (10) .
A tepid language, which perhaps President Obama himself judges, at heart, to be excessively cautious. The new Democratic Administration has made of denuclearization, at all levels, one of its most important banners and aims for further negotiations with Russia on the atomic weapons tactics (including those of Europe). Naturally, however, it has not been able to ignore the strong resistance from the Republicans and to compromise a little, the maintaining of the nuclear option of the NATO (together with the commitments on the modernization of the American nuclear arsenal and missile defence ) has become a part of the package which facilitated the ratification of the NEW START.
With regard to the “Forces de frappe”, the “Concept” limits itself to confirm that: <i>“The supreme guarantee of security for the Allies is assured by the strategic nuclear forces of the Alliance, in particular, those of the United States; the independent strategic nuclear forces of the United Kingdom and France – which have a real role in deterrence – contribute to the overall deterrence of the security of the Allies”</i>.
Until now nothing really “Historic” therefore. Nevertheless. Lisbon will be remembered for great news, a moment in which the vision of the future took the upper hand: the start-up of the missile defence plan.
Already at the Bucharest Summit in 2008, the Bush Administration proposal was endorses for the realization of a European “Third Site”, which would complete the American defence system. A hypothesis which, however, as everyone will remember, had aroused the furious reactions of the Russians, and to some extent, the perplexity of the Allies themselves, remaining in the end on “stand-by”. What has changed?
The plan that the Obama Administration presented to the partners of the NATO in September 2009, (in advance of the “Ballistic Missile Defense Review – BMDR” published in the following February) is profoundly different from the Bush proposal: in the architecture, the objectives, the times, the perimeter of coverage, the costs and in the administration.
In concrete, the opposed “Third Site” constituted a further pillar of the American ground-based system, intended for long-range missiles and already partially implemented by the United States in Alaska and California, of which only Washington would have firmly held the reins. Not only: the coverage of the “shield” would not have reached any part of south-east Europe, which would have remained undefended against any attacks from whatever source.
It does not surprise, therefore, that the Bush plan aroused such discontent. From Russia, primarily, which – right or wrong – saw in the super-radar to be installed in the Czech Republic and in the battery of interceptors provided for in Poland – a danger for its deterrent apparatus and an unfavourable modification to its global strategic balance.
Exaggerated preoccupations perhaps, from the military point of view, considering that – as is noted in the Report of the NATO Parliamentary Assembly of 2008 (11) – a limited number of interceptors would not have been able to guarantee, in any way whatsoever, a defence against the thousands of intercontinental ballistic missiles, which the Russian still has at its disposal. But understandable preoccupations in that situation, if one remembers the relations which prevailed in that period with the United States, and the sensitivity of Moscow for any initiative able to affect, even only marginally, the overall balance of the deterrence. Equally fearful were the attitudes of those directly concerned (the Czech Republic and Poland), which were finally convinced only after much pressure and promises from the United States. And, above all, the American people themselves began to have doubts over the Bush Plan – Democrats in the lead – alarmed by the exorbitant costs of the programme and by uncertainty about its concrete feasibility from a technological aspect. Doubts confirmed by the already cited Report of the NATO Parliamentary Assembly, the conclusions of which were that <i>“the reliability of the system is still not demonstrated” and that, however, “the territorial antimissile system for Europe must maintain a minimum and proportionate dimension, without being transformed into a veritable Shield, reassuring the opposers of the system, in primis Russia, that it does not constitute a threat to their security interests”</i>.
So, what is the difference now? Why has Moscow assumed a conciliatory attitude, renouncing provocation like that of moving the super-radar in Azerbaidjan or installing its own missile base at Kaliningrad?
From the practical point of view, the “regional plan” of Obama has, in the first place, cut the costs drastically, (237 million dollars against the 712 million which were requested at the end of 2008 for the “Third Site”) and has lengthened the times. The “phased and adaptive” new programme proposed by the Democratic Administration will be divided in four phases, from 2011 to 2020 (12) and will be made flexible in function of the evolution of the threat. Furthermore, as the BMDR specifies, the overall architecture will be composed of regional structures which will share joint assets, aimed at the specific requirements of the region.
In other words, the concept of “ownership” is reversed: the plan will be transformed from European portions of an all-American programme into a United States contribution to the realization of a integrated capacity of the NATO itself, which will incorporate also the system “Active Layered Theatre Ballistic Missile Defence – ALTBMD” initiated in 2005 and from which will come accelerated implementation and inter-operability.
Certainly, sore points are not missing even this time. First of all, there is the problem of “burden sharing”; particularly delicate in the present juncture of economic straits, over which Italy itself has certain preoccupations (even though the ambitious programme could constitute a great occasion for our Defence Industry).
Another point was overcoming the resistance of the nuclear Countries, especially France, which insisted on the need to openly affirm the “complementarity” between missile defence and nuclear option. And, above all, the debate on the missile defence revealed overwhelmingly the role of Turkey – the real protagonist of the Lisbon Summit – which, with its attention directed to Iran and the Mid-oriental developments, sought and obtained as a condition for acceding to the American Plan, that the Countries against which the anti-missile system would be oriented should not be specified.
However, the great novelty was the conciliatory attitude of Russia – reflected by the final communiqué – which, overcoming the traditional syndrome of encirclement, accepted to examine thoroughly the NATO projects, of which it considers itself a potential partner, embracing an opportunity prospect or perhaps – more pragmatically – the philosophy of “if you can’t beat them, join them”. And that the “reset” is functioning is demonstrated also by the ‘large hand’ that the availability of Moscow gave to President Obama to obtain the ratification of the NEW START, overcoming the grim Republican resistance.
In conclusion, even if it were not a Copernican revolution, Lisbon has marked a decisive step forward towards the adaptation of the NATO strategy to the intricate variables of a multipolar world, and – who knows – to the revision, in future, of the ghosts of the “Mutual Assured Destruction”, moving the emphasis of the deterrence towards the “denial” at the expense of “punishments always more politically difficult to realize or of improbable “defeats”.
Which of the answers can be given, therefore, to the question on the historical valence (with capital H or small h) of the Summit? Perhaps the best formula was the one suggested by the American Ambassador, Ivo Daalder: <i>“I don’t know if it was an historic meeting, but it was indeed very important”</i>.