By YEWON KANG
Leaders of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization agreed to continue the fight against terrorism and new threats during their Lisbon summit on November 19 and 20. However, the alliance leaders also agreed they must face another the challenge together — the need to share the burden the economic crisis is placing on their ability to provide for their common defense.
NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen released a new Strategic Concept, an 11-page document that lays out NATO’s strategy for the next 10 years.
“All allies have to cope with the serious effects of the economic crisis,” said Fogh Rasmussen, in NATO Review, the organization’s monthly publication. “That is a simple reality, and cuts are inevitable. However, we need to be aware of the potential long-term negative effects if we implement defense cuts that are too large and disproportionate.”
Over the last decade, NATO members have cut down on their defense budgets without any expectation of growth, said Sally McNamara, in a phone interview. McNamara is a senior policy analyst of European affairs at The Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank in Washington.
In 1999, at a NATO meeting in Washington, the 28-member alliance agreed to spend two percent of each nations’ gross domestic product on defense. But only five partner countries currently meet the two percent benchmark — Albania, France, Greece, the United Kingdom and the United States.
Even with the financial constraints of the economic crisis, McNamara suggested there is “room for improvement.” She said the NATO partners can strengthen security without necessarily raising their defense budgets.
One of these cost-free improvements would be to get rid of national caveats, which are the restrictions that NATO countries place on the use of their troops and equipment in Afghanistan.
“It’s not just about money, it’s sharing a burden of casualty,” McNamara said, referring to the disproportionately high number of casualties being suffered by the NATO countries that allow their troops to operate without caveats.
Another suggestion is the multinational procurement project. This is a sharing system for advanced technology weapons and equipment designed to save money.
The leaders also agreed to reform the NATO command structure, reducing staff size at several alliance headquarters and agencies in an effort to make the organization more cost effective.
