The Munich Security Conference is recognised today as a top event on the defence and security policy agenda. Thirteen heads of state and government and almost 50 ministers attended. Discusssions so far have made it quite clear that NATO faces changes. Chancellor Angela Merkel presented a list of ideas for a new strategy. One central component was the concept of networked security.
The Chancellor shared the stage with the French President Nicolas Sarkozy and the Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk. This was the central part of the conference, and a highly symbolic one. France, Poland and Germany have not always lived in peace.
Angela Merkel listed all the opportunities posed by 2009 – a new US administration takes office; in September Germany commemorates the outbreak of the Second World War seventy years ago; NATO turns 60 in April, and twenty years ago the Berlin Wall fell.
On the other hand the world is in the grips of a severe economic crisis. The war in Gaza is still not ended, and the nuclear dispute with Iran continues, while in Afghanistan the international community has still not achieved what it set out to do.
This makes 2009 a test year, which will show "whether not we can cope together with globalisation in practice,” said Angela Merkel.
The publisher Ewald von Kleist founded the Munich Security Conference in 1962. He had learned from his experiences during the Second World War that the security-policy discussion between Europe and the USA is critically important for peace. Today the conference is considered to be one of the most important meeting points for personalities from the realms of politics, academia and the media. Since it is a non-governmental meeting, no official resolutions are passed. This leaves participants free to argue publicly and internally about critical issues, without the pressure of having to agree on a closing document.
New strategic concept for NATO
NATO has proved its worth as a defence alliance, which is why Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty (which lays out the right to individual and collective self-defence) should in the Chancellor’s view continue to embody the substance of NATO. In future its main responsibility should continue to be to ensure the defence of member states. But today we face new threats and new conflicts.
In April NATO will be celebrating its 60th anniversary. The anniversary summit will straddle the Franco-German border, and be held in both Strasbourg on the French side of the border and Kehl on the German side. It is time to reflect on a new strategy, declared Angela Merkel.
What must the new strategy assure?
The strategy must be based on the concept of networked security. International conflicts can no longer be resolved by any one country, but only together. "That is what I expect and what a great many Europeans expect of the United States of America,” declared the Chancellor.
Networked security must embrace both civilian and military means. Crisis prevention is every bit as important a part of security policy as crisis transformation. "NATO must become a forum for political discussion,” advocated Angela Merkel.
The EU and NATO must establish a new form of cooperation. To date a strategic partnership is agreed. Because of persisting differences of opinion between individual member states, however, such as Cyprus and Turkey, this has failed to live up to expectations. Now the European Security and Defence Policy is to be more closely integrated into NATO. One thing is quite clear - NATO and the European Security and Defence Policy are not competitors.
A regional approach is part of the new strategy, because no conflict is unique to any one country. The situation in Afghanistan is a good example. Most of the Taliban have pulled back across the border into Pakistan. Without involving Pakistan there can be no solution to the conflict in Afghanistan.
Significant progress is needed on monitoring and disarmament. We must decide how to proceed with the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe. Sixteen members of NATO and six Warsaw Pact states signed the Treaty in 1990. In 2007 Russia suspended the treaty unilaterally because of unresolved conflicts with NATO.
The new strategy must make it clear how Russia can be included in the security agency. Angela Merkel considers that the NATO-Russia Council would be the right body, but there should also be closer cooperation between the European Security and Defence Policy and Russia.
Next year will see a conference to review the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons. In the long term Angela Merkel visualises a "world without nuclear weapons”. Now, however, the focus must be on reducing the vast arsenals that currently exist.
We must also prevent Iran developing nuclear weapons at all costs. Germany still believes that a diplomatic solution is possible, but it is also willing to "consider harsher sanctions” if no progress is made on the nuclear dispute.
The Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty bans the proliferation of nuclear weapons and obliges signatory states to move in the direction of disarmament. At the same time it admits the right to make peaceful use of nuclear energy. The five nuclear powers (USA, Russia, France, the United Kingdom and China) and 184 states which do not have nuclear weapons have now signed the treaty. Only four states have currently failed to do so: India, Israel, North Korea and Pakistan.
In the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty the signatory states without nuclear weapons agree not to obtain nuclear weapons. The five official nuclear powers undertake in return, "to pursue negotiations in good faith ... on a treaty on general and complete disarmament under strict and effective international control.” The International Atomic Energy Agency monitors compliance with this treaty.