Lord Robertson: NATO is the only credible vehicle for peace
Lord Robertson, the Secretary-General of NATO has a piece in yesterday's Tribune. He praises NATO, for its past work, and for its continuing role in current operations. He also expresses a vision of NATO in the future. All very interesting stuff.
He brings us through three major criticisms of NATO, and deals with them. The second is crucial I believe:
There is a second criticism, that NATO is doomed because Europe is militarily puny, with no will to invest in modern capabilities. Until recently, I was the chief critic of the lamentable European performance on capabilities. Yet 2002 represented a watershed, a convergence of realistic aspirations with a determination to provide the tools to do the job. And Iraq demonstrated that the priorities we set at Prague were right: precision weapons, ground surveillance, chemical/biological defense, air tankers and heavy airlift.
This is changing, and the new EU-NATO 'close-relationship' will mean that the EU, once further integration and expansion has taken place, will present a formidable fighting force. Given that the US believes that its doctrine of small but well trained divisions, being used in theaters such as Afghanistan and Iraq, and by small I mean in comparison to WWII - we will likely see the EU copying this idea. And low and behold they are - the EU Rapid Reaction Force (RRF), and NATO's Rapid Response Force...
I have no doubt that the EU has huge military ambitions, and NATO will serve as a useful organisation to achieve an EU military entity.
11:42:33 PM 
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