NATO’s 2010 Strategic Concept officially broadened the alliance’s mission beyond collective defense, reflecting a peaceful Europe and changes in alliance activities. NATO had become an international security facilitator, a crisis-manager even outside Europe, and a liberal democratic club as much as a mutual-defense organization. However, Russia’s re-entry into great power politics has changed NATO’s strategic calculus.
Russia’s aggressive annexation of Crimea in 2014 and its ongoing military support for Ukrainian separatists dramatically altered the strategic environment and called into question the liberal European security order. States bordering Russia, many of which are now NATO members, are worried, and the alliance is divided over assessments of Russia’s behavior. Against the backdrop of Russia’s new assertiveness, an international group of scholars examines a broad range of issues in the interest of not only explaining recent alliance developments but also making recommendations about critical choices confronting the NATO allies. While a renewed emphasis on collective defense is clearly a priority, this volume’s contributors caution against an overcorrection, which would leave the alliance too inwardly focused, play into Russia’s hand, and exacerbate regional fault lines always just below the surface at NATO. This volume places rapid-fire events in theoretical perspective and will be useful to foreign policy students, scholars, and practitioners alike.
Table of Contents
List of Illustrations
Foreword by Nicholas Burns
Acknowledgments
Abbreviations
Introduction: Alliance, Identity, and Geopolitics
Rebecca R. Moore and Damon Coletta
1. Force Posture after NATO’s Return to Europe: Too Little, Too Late
John R. Deni
2. NATO’s Return: Implications for Extended Deterrence
Schuyler Foerster
3. NATO’s Enlargement Policy to Ukraine and Beyond: Prospects and Options
Andrew T. Wolff
4. NATO’s Territorial Defense: The Global Approach and the Regional Approach
Magnus Petersson
5. Still Learning? NATO’s Afghan Lessons beyond the Ukraine Crisis
Sten Rynning
6. European Security at a Crossroads after Ukraine? Institutionalization of Partnerships and Compliance with NATO’s Security Policies
Ivan Dinev Ivanov
7. The Purpose of NATO Partnership: Sustaining Liberal Order beyond the Ukraine Crisis
Rebecca R. Moore
8. NATO- Russia Technical Cooperation: Unheralded Prospects
Damon Coletta
9. The Ukraine Crisis and Beyond: Strategic Opportunity or Strategic Dilemma for the China- Russia Strategic Partnership?
Huiyun Feng
Conclusion and Comment: NATO’s Ever- Evolving Identity
Stanley R. Sloan
List of Contributors
Index
Reviews
"Delivers a very robust and updated overview of the Alliance's current strategic situation. . . . Should be of great value and interest both for practitioners and students of transatlantic relations."—Parameters
"Rebecca Moore and Damon Coletta have edited an important and timely collection of studies on the challenges confronting NATO in the wake of Russian intervention in Ukraine. They have drawn on the expertise of seasoned NATO scholars. Their product deserves the close attention of policy makers and teachers of international relations."—Lawrence S. Kaplan, Emeritus Director of the Lyman L. Lemnitzer Center for NATO Studies, Kent State University
"Even those skeptical of NATO’s push east will find much value in this excellent compendium of essays on the contemporary challenges facing the alliance."—David Hendrickson, Colorado College
"This remarkable collection of original essays by accomplished scholars offers a timely, perceptive, and thought-provoking survey of the challenges facing NATO. Russia’s annexation of Crimea and continuing intervention in Ukraine have led the NATO Allies to renew their commitment to collective defense and deterrence and to reassess their other core tasks of crisis management and cooperative security."—David S. Yost, Naval Postgraduate School
"The North Atlantic Treaty Organization is experiencing a range of challenges which are severely testing history's most successful alliance's mission and capacity. A resurgent and irresponsible Russia and its invasion of Ukraine gave NATO new life, but also raised questions about it's capacity for credible deterrent operations while also balancing not risking escalation with Russia. Meanwhile, new pressures for NATO's to focus on collective defense raise questions about the viability of NATO's role in projecting stability outside of Europe, as it has done in Afghanistan, and engaging in the spread of liberal western values. Meanwhile, nationalistic trends in key NATO members—including with the election of Donald Trump as American president, have raised new questions about the alliance''s role and how to achieve burdensharing. In that context, NATO's Return to Europe could not arrive at a more opportune time. This volume brings together scholars with decades of expertise on the alliance while presenting a refreshing new range of emerging voices on transatlantic and European security issues. This book both offers an explanation of what NATO has done well, as well as provides an honest appraisal of the serious challenges confronting the institution and its members. Rebecca Moore and Damon Coletta have masterfully presented a vitally important resource—a must read for practitioners, scholars, and students alike—a must read resource for the study of international institutions, security, and American foreign and defense policy. Very highly recommended."—Sean Kay, Robson Professor of Politics and Government, Ohio Weslyan University
"Sometimes a book arrives at just the right moment. NATO's Return to Europe is one of those books. Rebecca R. Moore and Damon Coletta and an excellent line-up of authors offer a timely and insightful analysis of the many issues facing the Alliance in Trump's and Putin's world."—Trine Flockhart, Professor of International Relations, University of Kent
Contributors
Damon Coletta John R. Deni Huiyun Feng Schuyler Foerster Ivan D. Ivanov Rebecca R. Moore Magnus Petersson Sten Rynning Stanley Sloan Andrew T. Wolff
About the Author
Rebecca R. Moore is a professor of political science at Concordia College. She is the author of NATO’s New Mission: Projecting Stability in a Post–Cold War World and coeditor of NATO in Search of a Vision.
Damon Coletta is a professor of political science at the US Air Force Academy. He coedited American Defense Policy, 8th Edition, authored Trusted Guardian: Information Sharing and the Future of the Atlantic Alliance, and is editor of the journal Space & Defense.
