MICHAEL MANDELBAUM The first and most important thing to know about NATO expansion is that there is no reason to do it. I have made this point at length in my pamphlet NATO Expansion: A Bridge to the Nineteenth Century.
In his State of the Union address, President Clinton associated NATO membership for Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic with democracy. Perhaps he meant that NATO membership is necessary to make these countries democratic, but that's not true. Democracy is not in question in any of them. Where it is in question, namely Russia and Ukraine, NATO membership has not been offered. Alternatively, he might have meant that NATO membership is a reward for already being democratic.
But this raises the question of why these countries need a reward, and if they do, why it is up to the United States to offer it, and why NATO membership is an appropriate reward. Every American president from George Washington to George Bush believed that democracy was its own reward, and if thugs and tyrants could be moved aside, people would govern themselves democratically. Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic have proved them right.
Many who agree that NATO expansion brings no benefits nonetheless believe that going forward will do no harm, and that stopping expansion now would have terrible consequences. Neither of these propositions is true.
We are already paying a price for the prospect of NATO expansion in our relations with Russia. The crisis over Iraq demonstrates this. Seven years ago, when the United States went to war with Iraq, Russia, then the Soviet Union, was on our side, which was an enormous strategic asset. Now President Boris Yeltsin has publicly opposed the use of force against Iraq. He has done so because that segment of Russian opinion that cares about foreign affairs, the Russian foreign policy elite, has become reflexively anti-American, in part because of NATO expansion.
NATO expansion is likely to affect our relations with Russia adversely and needlessly. Administration officials and supporters of NATO expansion argue that Russia doesn't really care about NATO expansion or that Russian opinion is divided. To the contrary, Russian elite opinion is strongly and unanimously opposed to NATO expansion.
Another cost of expansion that lies down the road is embodied in the so-called Baltic Charter. This is an extraordinary document--extraordinary not only for what it says and doesn't say but for the fact that it has received almost no discussion in the United States.
The United States has pledged to try to get NATO membership for the Baltic states of Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia, which Russia adamantly opposes. How are we going to do this? How hard are we going to try? When? And what will we do if we fail? Do we already have a commitment to defend the Baltic states? And if the charter isn't a commitment, if it means nothing, why such pomp and ceremony on January 16 when it was signed by the president of the United States?
In fact, the Baltic Charter is a purely political document intended to send different messages to different audiences. The Balts are being told that they are going to be in NATO. The Russians are being told that the Balts will not be in NATO. The Western Europeans, who have no enthusiasm for either NATO expansion in general or Baltic membership in particular, are being told that they will never have to face the issue. And the American public is being told that it is doing something nice for the Balts at no cost. In other words, the Baltic Charter is the security equivalent of a Korean bank loan. It's fine until somebody demands payment, then it falls apart. And the working presumption of this administration is that nobody will ever demand payment. But what if somebody does? What is Plan B? How are we going to back up this rhetoric and these promises? No one has said. Extravagant promises with no visible means of support are not, to say the least, a good basis for American policy in Europe.
The argument that stopping now would be disastrous is obsolete. It had powerful resonance during the cold war because it was at least plausible then. The United States was engaged in a global conflict with a determined, militarized adversary. It was plausible to believe that showing weakness or irresolution in one theater of the conflict would encourage aggression elsewhere. It was precisely this fear that underlay the American decision to fight in Korea in 1950 and in Vietnam in 1965, and to hold firm in West Berlin throughout the 1950s and 1960s. But the circumstances that made the credibility argument plausible have entirely disappeared. There is no global conflict. The cold war is over. There is no militarized adversary. There is no Soviet Union. And its successor state, Russia, according to the very same administration that invokes this argument, is now our friend.
What would be the adverse consequences of delaying NATO expansion or deciding on a better course? There would be none. Would the Europeans be shattered? Would our Western European allies, the NATO countries that matter most, leave the alliance? One measure of their interest in and commitment to this project is how much they are willing to pay for NATO expansion. They have told us, unequivocally, how much they are willing to pay: nothing.
Four final points on alternatives to the present course. First, there's no rush to do anything. The administration itself asserts that there is no threat in Europe. Second, the country needs more information about this project. What are our plans for, and our obligations to, the Balts? What will be the cost of NATO expansion if there is a threat? And who will pay these costs?
Third, we now have the opportunity to do what former Senator Sam Nunn suggested several years ago: combine the extension of Western security commitments eastward with European Union expansion. Membership in the European Union is far more relevant to the needs of the former Communist countries of Central Europe than NATO membership, and polls in these countries show that the Central Europeans are much more interested in the European Union than in NATO. NATO expansion was first proposed when it looked as if the European Union would not open its doors any time soon to the former Communist countries. Now there is a schedule and a timetable for the expansion of the European Union. There is no reason not to make the extension of security commitments coterminous with that.
Finally, rather than expand NATO, we could take steps that would actually improve Europe's security. These include expanding and deepening the Partnership for Peace and expanding and deepening the remarkable arms control agreements that have gone much further toward demilitarizing Europe than anyone dreamed possible 10 years ago. Unlike NATO expansion, these measures would actually serve the national interests of the United States and contribute to a more secure Europe.
SUSAN EISENHOWER There are many commitments that are going to come with NATO expansion, and I am concerned that the American people are not prepared for what these commitments entail. I am reminded of the captain of the Titanic, boring full speed ahead, even though many of us have been warning that there are icebergs everywhere.
One of those icebergs is the lack of a consensus on NATO's mission. You have the administration's viewpoint that the "new" NATO will be an organization primarily responsible for stability and democratization in Europe. You have Senator Jesse Helms's approach, which holds that expansion has nothing to do with democratization; it is really about containing Russia. Then you have Senator Joseph Biden's view that expansion offers a useful vehicle for peacekeeping, something that Senator Helms doesn't think it should be doing at all. And finally, you have what I would call the Christopher-Perry idea of a global NATO.
Without a specific concept of what the new NATO will be we could find ourselves entering turbulent, even dangerous waters.
The biggest question is: Who is going to be in and who is going to be out? One of the things that concerns me most about this issue is what is said publicly and what is said privately. The elite in Washington say NATO expansion is a mistake, a bad idea whose time has come, but that's all right, since we're going to close the door after the first three members join. Yet NATO is committed to more than one round and we are going to have to deal with who enters in round two and round three. If the United States is not willing to go beyond the first three countries, we will have created a new dividing line in Europe. And yet that open-door policy brings another set of problems.
The Baltic question is perhaps the biggest iceberg. You know the tip is out there in the distance, but in fact the dangers lie much closer to our ship. The Baltic nations are an issue Russia has warned us about repeatedly. During the negotiations on Germany's reunification, Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev was given verbal assurances that NATO would not expand eastward. At the same time, the countries of Eastern Europe assured the Soviet Union that they were not leaving the Warsaw Pact to join NATO; the Baltic republics also declared their intention to remain neutral.
This is not exactly the basis for forming a new post-cold war relationship. Russia will go into the twenty-first century with its enemy from World War I and World War II, its cold war nemesis, and some or perhaps most of its former allies and former republics joined in a military alliance on its borders. Gorbachev believed that the West would not take advantage of the Soviet Union's weakened position, and the country's democrats believed it as well. We have undermined their ability to make the case for cooperating with the West.
It is better not to expand NATO at all. Looking at all the icebergs out there, nobody would have criticized the captain of the Titanic for slowing down and changing course.
JACK MENDELSOHN The main problem with NATO expansion is that we have a policy without a strategy. Nobody knows where this policy will lead and nobody knows how to get there since "there's no there there."
In considering NATO expansion, there are three questions to bear in mind--what I call the three "m"s: What is the NATO mission? What is NATO membership likely to be? And where is the money coming from?
Let's start with the mission. The administration has no idea or, better said, has many ideas about what NATO's mission is going to be in the wake of expansion. Is NATO expansion needed as protection from Russia? The administration itself admits there is no Russian threat. If there is no Russian threat, is it NATO's mission to make Europe whole? If so, why isn't Russia invited to join?
Is expansion meant to guard against so-called nontraditional threats? Most nontraditional threats, and the administration understands this, are not going to be generated in Europe and are not likely to be the kind of threats best responded to by a military alliance. If you are talking about terrorism or substate actors, then military alliances are not the traditional or even a good way to handle these challenges.
Is expansion useful for gaining support for out-of-area activities? It will not be easier to gain support for such activities as NATO expands. Decisions to go out-of-area are not made in NATO; they are made in national capitals. Expanding NATO is not going to make it easier--and it might make it harder--to get a decision to act out-of-area, which will remain a national political decision. The Europeans have been extraordinarily reluctant to undertake significant out-of-area military activities as opposed to peacekeeping; and NATO expansion is not going to change that.
The question remains: What will NATO's mission be in the future? I believe that question needs to be looked at carefully by the Senate, and the administration needs to give a coherent rationale for what the mission of an expanded and expanding NATO--for this is an expanding universe, at least from the administration's perspective--is supposed to be.
What about the membership issue? Again, this is an expanding universe and NATO--and United States--policy is that there is an "open door" for new members as they become eligible. But the chances of our being able to extend membership to the Baltics are practically zero. This is evident from the way we handled the Baltic Charter. You can see it in the reaction of our European allies. They have no real interest in moving NATO farther east after the first installment of entrants, although there are some countries, Austria, Slovenia, Slovakia, and perhaps Romania, although that could be more difficult, that our European allies might consider reasonable future options.
Expanding NATO to include the Baltics will aggravate relations with the one country we need for out-of-area activities: Russia. Russia has made it clear that it draws the line at including the Baltics or any other former republics of the Soviet Union. The Europeans, if given a choice between expanding NATO to include the Baltics and disrupting their relations with Russia, will choose to keep relations on an even keel with Moscow. Thus, the "open-door" membership policy is not a realistic one and we are holding out false hopes for the Baltics while setting the stage for the creation of a new set of "ins" and "outs" in Central Europe.
The final issue is money. Cost estimates for NATO expansion vary from $2 billion to $120 billion. But the main issue really isn't "How much?" or "What for?"; it is that the United States assumes that somebody else will pay for expansion. In a report on NATO costs that it submitted to Congress last year, and in all its discussions on NATO expansion with Congress, the administration assumes that other countries will pick up 94 percent of the tab.
This is simply not a realistic assumption and our allies have already warned us not to expect any additional contributions from them for NATO expansion. This means that the United States will have to pay a substantial share of the expansion costs or the upgrading of new members' forces simply won't get done. And that brings us to a final, serious problem that links money and members to mission. To the degree that we underestimate the costs of expansion (to make it more acceptable), NATO will not be able to provide for the increases in military capabilities required to meet its additional security responsibilities.
By expanding NATO we will be sowing the seeds for incessant wrangling with our allies over "burden-sharing," over future membership, and over out-of-area activities. In addition, we will have increased our responsibilities without increasing our capabilities, unnecessarily complicated our relationship with Russia, and become more involved than ever in second-level issues within Europe.
JONATHAN DEAN Recent events confirm the basic assessment that NATO enlargement is expensive, risky, and unnecessary. The aspect of this enterprise that concerns me the most is its boundless, unlimited nature. There is a real risk that the whole project will get out of control.
On December 16, 1997, the NATO foreign ministers reached the foregone conclusion that they should endorse the candidacy of Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic. Together with these three, there are now twelve official candidates for NATO enlargement. In addition to the first three, five of the twelve candidates--the three Baltic states, Slovenia, and Romania--have already been invited by NATO to apply formally for membership at the Washington NATO summit in April 1999. This invitation was confirmed by the NATO foreign ministers in December. For the Baltic states it was confirmed in the Baltic Charter signed in Washington. Three European neutrals, Finland, Sweden, and Austria, are also considering applying for membership. If the Baltic States actually enter NATO, there will be great pressure on Ukraine to apply. That would give a potential total of sixteen new NATO members, doubling the present size of the alliance.
NATO enlargement on this scale means that even modest estimates of total costs for the first three candidates should be multiplied by a factor of four or five to get some idea of the costs for the whole enterprise.
The NATO Council estimated that the smallest costs, the expenses for common infrastructure, will be less than $1.5 billion. But this estimate includes neither what the candidate states will have to spend on modernizing their forces, nor what member states will have to spend for reinforcement and increased force projection to help the new members. We should bear clearly in mind that the greater the distance the new NATO members are located from present members, the more it will cost to reinforce them.
European NATO members have said they will not increase their current expenditures for NATO. All the candidate states are in difficult economic transitions. Consequently, if it is really serious about the military improvements, the United States will have to pay the largest part of these costs. And if you want to use the figure of $30 billion, the Congressional Budget Office estimate, which is the lowest, and multiply it times four or five, the United States could end up spending $75 to $100 billion for the entire enterprise.
If the United States is truly serious about force improvements, it will have to include very large increases in NATO and United States naval and air force projection capabilities to bolster the Baltic states, which are nearly indefensible. Likewise, defending Romania and Bulgaria in the south will require major NATO ground, air, and naval installations on the Black Sea, challenging Russia's traditional influence there. With United States naval forces and air forces in the Baltic and the Black Sea, Russia's heartland will be threatened by a huge military pincers movement just like the Germans tried in World War II.
This is why this next round of enlargement is so dangerous. The official Russian national security concept, adopted last December and signed by President Yeltsin, explicitly states that Russia believes NATO expansion threatens its national security. We should pay real attention to warnings like this.
But maybe the United States and the other NATO countries are not serious about real force improvements for the new member states. Maybe the armed forces of Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic will in practice be left in their dilapidated, nearly useless post-Warsaw Pact state. If this is what is going to happen, then why on earth are we going through this entire, dangerous exercise, arousing hopes and fears throughout Europe?
By any reasonable standard, the enlargement project is not only costly and risky, it is wholly unnecessary. As Michael Mandelbaum has pointed out, Eastern Europe is not threatened. Even if it were, NATO in its present form and membership provides fully adequate security insurance for the Eastern European states. And the Partnership for Peace provides a framework for practical military cooperation.
The European Union can do a much better job than NATO in bolstering the democratic structures and free market economies of the candidate states. All the NATO candidates in Eastern Europe, except Macedonia and Albania, are candidates for EU membership. Negotiations in the EU start this spring for Poland, the Czech Republic, and Hungary, as well as for Estonia and Slovenia. EU enlargement will take longer than NATO enlargement to conclude, but there is no crisis in Eastern Europe that requires speed. And Russia has indicated that it does not oppose EU enlargement.
The course of sticking with NATO as it is now and supporting EU enlargement will do the job at no additional risk and no additional cost.
The aspect of this problem that concerns me the most is that the enlargement process has become uncontrollable, driven by its own dynamic. Azerbaijan has already indicated interest in joining NATO, and there have been statements of interest from Georgia. In fact, any member of the Partnership for Peace can apply, and there are 27 of these, in addition to present NATO members. There is literally no end to this enterprise in sight. The administration refuses to place any limits on it. Consequently, there is no logical end to potential United States security commitments and their costs and risks. Even if the administration decides at some point that the pace and the scope of open-ended NATO expansion are too great, the candidate states and their supporters, among them the Scandinavian states, will keep pushing. Any attempt by the administration to slow down enlargement will certainly be attacked by Republican leaders as weakness in the face of Russian opposition. We have to realize that we have a powerful domestic political dynamic driving this entire enterprise, and it may easily get out of control. I'm not attacking the fact that Republicans might criticize the administration in these circumstances, that's just the way our system operates. But the United States has put its fingers into a big grinder.
Confronted by possible charges of weakness in the face of Russia, the administration will probably continue with enlargement. Unless we find a way to put on the brakes at the outset, we may find that we are harnessed to a juggernaut with its own momentum and with no stopping point.
This risk of entering an uncontrollable process is something that the Senate should weigh seriously. If I were a senator, I would think very carefully before agreeing to take step one in such a runaway process. Instead, I would insist on seeing a detailed plan from the administration that shows the full extent, the timing, the costs, and the possible commitments in the entire enlargement program, before the United States takes the first step on this road. No new members should be admitted to NATO until the administration has produced such a comprehensive plan.
MICHAEL MANDELBAUM is a professor of American foreign policy at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. SUSAN EISENHOWER chairs the Center for Political and Strategic Studies. JACK MENDELSOHN is deputy director of the Arms Control Association JONATHAN DEAN is a former ambassador and now an adviser to the Union of Concerned Scientists on international security issues. The editors would like to thank John Isaacs of the Council for a Livable World, which sponsored this talk in Washington, D.C., for making the presentation available, and Jack Mendelsohn for his efforts in making its publication possible.