INSS

NATO FROM BERLIN TO BOSNIA
S. Nelson Drew

NATO CONFRONTS THE "TEST CASE FROM HELL"

NATO's struggle to reconcile the vision of trans-Atlantic security put forward in Rome with what can only be described as the "test case from hell" posed by the breakup of the former Yugoslavia has exposed all of the potential fault lines associated with the harsh reality of the post-Cold War security environment. These have included the gap between the desire for European unity (and a common foreign and security policy) and the reality of the post-Maastricht state of affairs in Europe; the associated tension between NATO and the WEU as vehicles to implement trans-Atlantic and European security decisions; the continuing reluctance of the French government to accept the usefulness of the NATO integrated military command structure for crisis management and peacekeeping operations; the tension between a desire to continue American leadership and domestic pressures to reduce American commitments abroad; and the difficulty of moving a consensus-based organization such as NATO from an essentially reactive posture (collective response to a Warsaw Pact attack) to a "pro-active" one (in which consensus is required to act in "gray areas" to prevent a conflict from erupting or spreading).

While the word "peacekeeping" did not appear in either the new Strategic Concept or the Rome Declaration, it was difficult to envision a means by which NATO or the NACC could make good on their commitment to stability and peace throughout the trans-Atlantic community without consideration of an Alliance role in peacekeeping activities. There was little agreement, however, on what such a role should be. Some allies favored a direct NATO role, in which the Alliance could develop its own peacekeeping forces and plans to be used as required for peace support operations where ever Allied security interests were threatened. Others sought a far more limited role, with peacekeeping based on national contributions which might simply be coordinated through the Alliance before being placed under UN control. Some rejected an Alliance role altogether, preferring to see an expanded CSCE role in this field, perhaps in concert with the new European mechanisms for a common foreign and security policy as called for in Maastricht.[footnote #11] As a result of these differences, it was only at the eleventh hour that Allies were able to agree on language in the June 1992 Oslo NAC ministerial communique stating that the Alliance was "prepared to support, on a case-by-case basis, in accordance with our own procedures, peacekeeping activities under the responsibility of the CSCE" and to address "the practical options and modalities by which such support might be provided.[footnote #12]

The ink was hardly dry on the Oslo Communique when the UN, responding to the 1992 CSCE Helsinki declaration identifying CSCE as a regional organization under Article VIII of the UN Charter, called upon the CSCE for assistance in Bosnia. Acknowledging the NATO declaration in Oslo, a copy of the UN request was sent to the office of NATO Secretary General Manfred Wörner, where it touched off a fierce debate among the Allies over whether or not NATO had to await a formal request from the CSCE before it could begin planning (a problem, since the relevant CSCE bodies were not in session at the time). As a result of the delays in developing a coherent response to the UN request occasioned by this debate, the Allies were persuaded to adopt a new statement on NATO peacekeeping as part of the next NAC ministerial communique in December 1992, confirming NATO's preparedness to support peacekeeping operations directly under the authority of the UN Security Council. At the same time the Alliance declared its readiness to "respond positively to initiatives that the UN Secretary General might take to seek Alliance assistance in the implementation of UN Security Council Resolutions."[footnote #13] For the United States, where pressure had been building for NATO to "go out of area or out of business,"[footnote #14] this was a critical step for the Alliance.

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