Sharing the burden within NATO

Germany and most Western European countries view Russia first as an economic partner while the U.S. and its Eastern European backers require NATO to maintain full readiness for conventional war with Russia. Counter-insurgency in Afghanistan has created similar friction. The U.S. has led NATO through a costly, decade-long mission with ever-evolving goals, yet well over half of Germany’s population now thinks it was wrong to embark on this mission in the first place. And consensus is no easier to find on the basic questions, like how to field and equip a force for operations in Libya or even which countries should become members of NATO.

Leaders on either side of the Atlantic have failed to overcome these challenges or even to appreciate why some of their allies take differing positions. Secretary Gates profiled this lack of critical thinking by again cajoling the Europeans to spend more on their defense, knowing that the push was in vain but seemingly incapable of understanding why.

Paradoxically, money may offer incoming Defense Secretary Leon Panetta an avenue to bring the alliance back together. The U.S., Germany, and their allies have to apply tougher fiscal discipline to their militaries as part of efforts to control public spending. This will force tough choices about strategic priorities and create an opportunity to make them together.

Sound strategy begins at the national level. Allies have to define their national interests and choose how they want to apply their resources before coming to the bargaining table. The U.S. and Germany recently started down this path – Germany by releasing new defense policy guidelines with explicit reference to fiscal limitations and the U.S. by searching for $400 billion in national security savings over twelve years. But both countries and their allies still view their interests in a way that lacks sufficient focus.

Rigorously defining security interests and allocating national resources accordingly will prepare NATO’s members to revitalize negotiations that fizzled at last fall’s Lisbon Summit. Allies must quit imposing costs on others and instead openly communicate their priorities, honestly consider different views, and deliberately choose the missions in which NATO will cooperate. This stands in stark contrast to the strategic concept released in Lisbon which signed up for nearly everything, including conventional collective defense, crisis management, and cooperative security.

Should counterinsurgency be a priority in Afghanistan, or regime change in Libya? Is Russia more of a partner or a threat? Which countries, if any, can realistically aspire to join the club? Those are tough decisions, but making tough decisions together is the essence of an alliance. After making them, NATO’s members must recommit the funding and political will to follow through. Happily, greater discipline earlier in the strategy process will mean that the costs to be divvied up will be far lighter.

The transatlantic alliance would change by confronting these choices. That change is sure to be uncomfortable but it still should be welcome. Success in the Cold War permits us to discard stale divisions over security and, as President Obama and Chancellor Merkel emphasized in their public comments, to expand and deepen our economic, diplomatic, and cultural relationships. The U.S., Germany, and NATO’s other members can do more than step away from the fiscal precipice together – we can set the conditions for shared and sustainable security and economic growth.

Fiscal austerity is as much an opportunity as it is a challenge. Chancellor Merkel and President Obama missed the chance for a sober but important decision, and Secretary Gates forgot that this is a conversation, not a revival sermon. Still the need for a balanced vision of change is not going away, and neither is the opportunity. In 2012, the U.S. will host NATO’s next summit. Panetta and his new team should begin now to catalyze a fresh conversation about security priorities and to emphasize honest and transparent budget policy.

Christoph Schwarz and Matthew Leatherman are fellows of the 2011 Manfred Worner Seminar sponsored by the German Marshall Fund, the German Defense Ministry, and the U.S. Embassy in Berlin. Schwarz is a research associate with the Department of International Relations and the Institute for Political Science, RWTH Aachen University in Germany, and Leatherman is an analyst with the Stimson Center’s project on budgeting for foreign affairs and defense.