U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE

58–335 CC WASHINGTON : 1999

S. HRG. 106–144

NATO’S 50TH ANNIVERSARY

SUMMIT

HEARING

BEFORE THE

COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN RELATIONS

UNITED STATES SENATE

ONE HUNDRED SIXTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

APRIL 21, 1999

Printed for the use of the Committee on Foreign Relations

(

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.access.gpo.gov/congress/senate

COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN RELATIONS

JESSE HELMS, North Carolina, Chairman

RICHARD G. LUGAR, Indiana

PAUL COVERDELL, Georgia

CHUCK HAGEL, Nebraska

GORDON H. SMITH, Oregon

ROD GRAMS, Minnesota

SAM BROWNBACK, Kansas

CRAIG THOMAS, Wyoming

JOHN ASHCROFT, Missouri

BILL FRIST, Tennessee

JOSEPH R. BIDEN, JR., Delaware

PAUL S. SARBANES, Maryland

CHRISTOPHER J. DODD, Connecticut

JOHN F. KERRY, Massachusetts

RUSSELL D. FEINGOLD, Wisconsin

PAUL D. WELLSTONE, Minnesota

BARBARA BOXER, California

ROBERT G. TORRICELLI, New Jersey

JAMES W. NANCE, Staff Director

EDWIN K. HALL, Minority Staff Director

(II)

CONTENTS

Page

Cambone, Dr. Stephen A., research director, Institute for National Security

Studies, National Defense University, Washington, DC .................................. 32

Prepared statement of ...................................................................................... 45

Grossman, Hon. Marc, Assistant Secretary of State for European Affairs ......... 14

Prepared statement of ...................................................................................... 50

Hadley, Hon. Stephen, partner, Shea and Gardner, Washington, DC ................ 31

Kramer, Hon. Franklin D., Assistant Secretary of Defense for International

Security Affairs .................................................................................................... 19

Prepared statement of ...................................................................................... 53

Kyl, Hon. Jon, U.S. Senator from Arizona ............................................................ 7

Prepared statement of ...................................................................................... 56

Larrabee, Dr. F. Stephen, senior analyst, Rand Corp., Washington, DC ........... 35

Prepared statement of ...................................................................................... 59

Warner, Hon. John W., U.S. Senator from Virginia ............................................. 7

(III)

(1)

NATO’S 50TH ANNIVERSARY SUMMIT

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 21, 1999

U.S. SENATE,

COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN RELATIONS,

Washington, DC.

The committee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:05 p.m., in room

SD–562, Hon. Gordon Smith, presiding.

Present: Senators Lugar, Smith, Biden, and Dodd.

Also present: Senator Warner.

Senator SMITH. Ladies and gentlemen, we will convene this hearing of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. I am chairman of

the Subcommittee on European Affairs. We will be analyzing

NATO’s Strategic Concept and how it is being evaluated and negotiated as we speak.

We expect to be joined by a number of other Senators, and also

Senator John Warner, the chairman of the Armed Services Committee.

We are going to accept into the record an exchange of letters that

Chairman Warner and the President have had on this issue. He

will be speaking to that also, I am sure.

[The letters referred to follow:]

UNITED STATES SENATE,

COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES,

Washington, DC, April 7, 1999.

THE PRESIDENT

The White House

Washington, DC.

DEAR MR. PRESIDENT:

The Administration, in consultation with our NATO allies, is now finalizing various documents to be submitted to the Heads of State for ratification at the upcoming 50th anniversary NATO Summit to be held in Washington later this month. A

key decision, in my view the most important one, is the revision of the Strategic

Concept for the future—perhaps a decade—that will guide NATO in its decision

making process regarding the deployment of military forces.

I am recommending, Mr. President, that a draft form of this document be reviewed, by the principals, but not finalized, at this 50th anniversary Summit. Given

the events in Kosovo, a new Strategic Concept for NATO—the document that spells

out the future strategy and mission of the Alliance—should not be written ‘‘in stone’’

at this time. Instead, NATO leaders should issue a draft Strategic Concept at the

Summit, which would be subject to further comment and study for a period of approximately six months. Thereafter, a final document should be adopted.

NATO is by far the most successful military alliance in contemporary history. It

was the deciding factor in avoiding widespread conflict in Europe throughout the

Cold War. Subsequent to that tense period of history, NATO was, again, the deciding factor in bringing about an end to hostilities in Bosnia, and thereafter providing

the security essential to allow Bosnia to achieve the modest gains we have seen in

the reconstruction of the economic, political and security base of that nation.

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Now NATO is engaged in combating the widespread evils of Milosevic and his

Serbian followers in Kosovo.

I visited Kosovo and Macedonia last September and witnessed Milosevic’s repression of the Kosovar Albanians. Thereafter, I spoke in the Senate on the essential

need for a stabilizing military force in Kosovo to allow the various international humanitarian organizations to assist the people of Kosovo—many then refugees in

their own land, forced into the hills and mountains by brutal Serb attacks. Since

then, I have consistently been supportive of NATO military action against Milosevic.

Unfortunately, it is now likely that the NATO Summit will take place against the

background of continuing, unfolding events relating to Kosovo. At this time, no predictions can be made as to a resolution.

We are just beginning to learn important lessons from the Kosovo conflict. Each

day is a new chapter. For example, NATO planners and many in the Administration, and in Congress, have long been aware of the disparities in military capabilities and equipment between the United States and our allies. Now, the military operation against Yugoslavia has made the American people equally aware and concerned about these disparities. The U.S. has been providing the greatest proportion

of attack aircraft capable of delivering precision-guided munitions. Further, the

United States is providing the preponderance of airlift to deliver both military assets (such as the critically needed Apache helicopters and support equipment) and

humanitarian relief supplies, the delivery of which are now in competition with each

other.

Until other NATO nations acquire, or at least have in place firm commitments

to acquire, comparable military capabilities, the United States will continually be

called on to carry the greatest share of the military responsibilities for such ‘‘out

of area’’ operations in the future. This issue must be addressed, and the Congress

consulted and the American people informed.

It is my understanding that the draft Strategic Concept currently under consideration by NATO specifically addresses NATO strategy for non-Article 5, ‘‘out of area’’

threats to our common interests—threats such as Bosnia and Kosovo. According to

Secretary Albright in a December 8, 1999 statement to the North Atlantic Council,

‘‘The new Strategic Concept must find the right balance between affirming the centrality of Article V collective defense missions and ensuring that the fundamental

tasks of the Alliance are intimately related to the broader defense of our common

interests.’’ Is this the type of broad commitment to be accepted in final form, just

weeks away at the 50th anniversary Summit?

During the Senate’s debate on the Resolution of Ratification regarding NATO expansion, the Senate addressed this issue by adopting a very important amendment

put forth by Senator Kyl. But this was before the events in Kosovo. The lessons of

Kosovo could even change this position.

The intent of this letter is to give you my personal view that a ‘‘final’’ decision

by NATO on the Strategic Concept should not be taken—risked—against the uncertainties emanating from the Kosovo situation.

The U.S. and our allies will have many ‘‘lessons learned’’ to assess as a pivotal

part of the future Strategic Concept. Bosnia and Kosovo have been NATO’s first forays into aggressive military operations. As of this writing, the Kosovo situation is

having a destabilizing effect on the few gains made to date in Bosnia. This combined

situation must be carefully assessed and evaluated before the U.S. and our allies

sign on to a new Strategic Concept for the next decade of NATO.

A brief period for study and reflection by ourselves as well as our Allies would

be prudent. NATO is too vital for the future of Europe and American leadership.

With kind regards, I am

Respectfully,

JOHN WARNER, Chairman.

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THE WHITE HOUSE

WASHINGTON

April 14, 1999

The Honorable JOHN W. WARNER,

Chairman, Committee on Armed Services,

United States Senate,

Washington, DC.

DEAR MR. CHAIRMAN:

Thank you for your thoughtful letter on the upcoming NATO summit and the revised Strategic Concept. I appreciate your attention to these important issues, and

I agree strongly with your view that NATO’s continued vitality is essential to safeguarding American and European security.

I have thought carefully about your proposal to delay agreement on the revised

Strategic Concept in light of NATO’s military operations in Kosovo. While I share

your deep concern about the situation in Kosovo and the devastating effects of Serb

atrocities, I am convinced that the right course is to proceed with a revised Strategic

Concept that will make NATO even more effective in addressing regional and ethnic

conflict of this very sort. Our operations in Kosovo have demonstrated the crucial

importance of NATO being prepared for the full spectrum of military operations—

a preparedness the revised Strategic Concept will help ensure.

The Strategic Concept will reaffirm NATO’s core mission of collective defense,

while also making the adaptations needed to deal with threats such as the regional

conflicts we have seen in Bosnia and Kosovo as well as the evolving risks posed by

the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. It will also help ensure greater

interoperability among allied forces and an increased European contribution to our

shared security. The Strategic Concept will not contain new commitments or obligations for the United States but rather will underscore NATO’s enduring purposes

outlined in the 1949 North Atlantic Treaty. It will also recognize the need for adapted capabilities in the face of changed circumstances. This approach is fully consistent with the Kyl Amendment, which called for a strong reaffirmation of collective

defense as well as a recognition of new security challenges.

The upcoming summit offers a historic opportunity to strengthen the NATO Alliance and ensure that it remains as effective in the future as it has been over the

past fifty years. While the situation in Kosovo has presented difficult challenges, I

am confident that NATO resolve in the face of this tyranny will bring a successful

conclusion.

Your support for the NATO Alliance and for our policy in Kosovo has been indispensable. I look forward to working closely with you in the coming days to ensure

that the summit is an overwhelming success.

Sincerely,

BILL CLINTON.

Senator SMITH. I am pleased to welcome before the committee six

distinguished witnesses to testify on matters surrounding NATO’s

50th Anniversary Summit. We will first hear from Senator Jon Kyl,

author of the Kyl amendment, which provided important direction

to the NATO Strategic Concept Review.

Senator Kyl will be followed by the administration point men on

NATO: Assistant Secretary of State Marc Grossman and Assistant

Secretary of Defense Frank Kramer.

Finally, we will hear from a panel of outside experts: Mr. Stephen Hadley, Dr. Stephen Cambone, and Dr. Stephen Larrabee.

Despite the ongoing war in Kosovo, it is fitting that leaders of

the alliance convene next week to celebrate the victory of democratic capitalism on the European continent. But in order for the

NATO summit to be successful, we must set NATO on a course to

meet the short-term challenge of the war in the Balkans and the

long-term test of maintaining European stability well into the next

century.

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The challenge to the leaders of the alliance is substantial. Failure is simply not an option.

I believe it is well known that I am a supporter of NATO and

that I look forward to the celebration. But, frankly, I must tell you

that I have never been more fearful for NATO’s future because I

fear, if the present trend continues in the war with Yugoslavia,

that a belief will take root in Congress and in the country that, but

for NATO, we would not be in this fight, and that because of

NATO, we cannot win this fight. I plead with the administration

to win this fight.

The administration has laid out the terms of victory, but I do

not, frankly, see the means or the unity that it takes to get the job

done. I might add that I am concerned about the organization that

is providing the targeting in this war.

Over the past year, NATO members struggled with the difficult

decisions on whether to intervene militarily in Kosovo. This is to

be expected in democratic nations for whom going to war is the last

recourse chosen.

I am worried, however, about a new form of isolationism in Europe. It manifests itself in excessive passive reliance upon international organizations and institutions, such as the United Nations, OSCE, the International Criminal Court, to provide the sole

defense for our common interests and values.

While I fully support these international organizations and their

attempts to end disputes in Bosnia and Kosovo with the support

of the United Nations and the OSCE, we must not forget that laws

are made for law abiding people, not criminals. Law enforcement

is also necessary to vanquish those who choose to live outside the

law.

Who can forget that the worst atrocities during the war in Bosnia were committed in the very presence of the United Nations protection force by individuals already under indictment for international war crimes?

If we had allowed a narrow reading of the United Nations Charter to place the claims of Yugoslav sovereignty above the defense

of our values in Europe, as some have argued, then I fear it would

have proven that we have learned little from the last century. After

all, the Jews herded into the death camps of the Holocaust were

citizens of sovereign countries.

What happened to the solemn pledge of ‘‘never again’’ that arose

from the horrors of World War II? Has it become never again except when a consensus cannot be reached in the United Nations Security Council?

On the eve of the summit, members of the alliance remain locked

in disagreement over a proposal to require United Nations approval for NATO actions outside alliance territory. Let me be blunt

on this point. Such a proposal, if agreed, would be fatal to the alliance.

NATO does not act except with the consent of its 19 democratic

governments. Does anyone seriously believe that submitting its decisions to the review of the United Nations Security Council will

add to NATO’s legitimacy?

As shown by China’s recent veto of a U.N. mandate in Macedonia, this will only create opportunities for mischief.

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NATO does not get its legitimacy from the United Nations. Rather, it is nations like those in NATO that give legitimacy to the

United Nations.

The question of the United Nations mandating is not only the

outstanding challenge for NATO, the alliance must also develop a

proper formula to reassure applicant nations that membership remains a real option.

I am quite optimistic about the chances for future NATO enlargement. The commitment toward enlargement enshrined in Article X

of the North Atlantic Treaty, repeated in the 1997 Madrid Summit

Communique and overwhelmingly endorsed by 80 U.S. Senators

last April, obviously creates a presumption that enlargement will

continue.

NATO must reassure candidate countries that we are serious

about further enlargement, not only through words of support of

enlargement but through concrete actions. More urgent than new

invitations, however, is a demonstration of will by NATO to meet

the challenges that confront us at the end of this century.

A final issue I understand that will be in dispute among the allies is related to the European Security and Defense Identity. The

United States can and will work in support of the European Union

foreign and security policies that are effective and backed by real

capabilities. However, we are in trouble on both sides of the Atlantic if the purpose of this effort in the EU is to differentiate Europe

from the United States, if the common policies consist of a lowest

common denominator and if common security is to be provided by

a separate and autonomous entity outside of NATO. For those who

would seek to use ESDI to set up a competition with the United

States, I say this. There are many in the U.S. Congress who would

welcome the opportunity to shed European security obligations, especially now.

In short, the U.S.-European partnership should and will have

room for a louder European voice. But this increased voice will

come at an increased dedication of European resources to act in

places like Bosnia and Kosovo, not from rearranging the architecture of European institutions.

Finally, on the subject of Kosovo, I am greatly dissatisfied by the

missteps and the missed opportunities that brought us to this

point. I am convinced we could have done more by acting sooner

than we did.

However, while I am troubled by the how and when of this war

with Yugoslavia, I have absolutely no problem with the question of

why. To stand idly by while Slobodan Milosevic brutalizes the population of Kosovo would diminish us as a Nation and as an alliance.

This is a view I am certain is shared by many of our European

partners and it is a factor that has produced a high level of NATO

unity for which I and many Americans are grateful to our European and Canadian allies.

Let’s all make sure to direct that unity toward a commitment

now to win this war.

When Senator Biden arrives, we will hear from him.

Until then, Senator Lugar is here and we welcome Senator Warner, the chairman of the Armed Services Committee.

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Senator Lugar.

Senator LUGAR. Mr. Chairman, I thank you. Later this week

NATO will honor its 50th anniversary at a summit here in Washington, DC. The leaders of the 19 NATO member nations and the

heads of State of many Partnership-for-Peace participants will participate in meetings to discuss the successes of the NATO Alliance

and its future in the post-cold war world. I have introduced Senate

Concurrent Resolution 27 on behalf of Senators Roth, Lott,

Lieberman, DeWine, Voinovich, Hagel and myself. It sets forth

three goals for the United States to achieve in discussions over the

Strategic Concept and the future of the NATO Alliance.

The main points of Senate Concurrent Resolution 27 are that

NATO’s open door policy toward new members established by Article X of the Washington Treaty has given countries of Central and

Eastern Europe the incentive to accelerate reforms, to settle peacefully disputes with neighbors, and to increase regional cooperation.

The result of a closed door policy would be the creation of new

dividing lines across Europe. A review of the nine current applicant

countries should be conducted. A review would provide NATO aspirants with additional incentive to continue democratic, economic,

and military reforms.

Second, NATO was oriented and organized to defend and respond

to an attack from the East. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union,

new threats have replaced the nightmare of the Soviets crashing

through the Fulda Gap.

The proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, rogue States,

terrorism, ethnic strife, and other potentially destabilizing elements now threaten the alliance. The true core of NATO has always been collective defense. But Article IV suggests that NATO

will consult and can act if the security of any of the parties is

threatened. So ‘‘out of area’’ is not a new NATO responsibility.

These types of actions are supported by language in the treaty,

ratified by the Senate in 1949.

It is important to remember that participation in non-Article V

missions is not obligatory. Each member is free to make an independent decision regarding participation.

Third, our allies have not moved far enough or fast enough to improve their capabilities to defend against newly emerging threats.

European forces lack serious power projection capabilities for demanding Article V missions in addition to the potential for meeting

Article IV contingencies.

This becomes self-evident when one considers the United States

currently contributes only 20 percent of NATO’s total conventional

forces but provides about 80 percent of NATO’s usable military capability for power projection missions.

The U.S. Government must demand rough transatlantic parity in

power projection. NATO is the only institution capable of building

these necessary force structures.

Mr. Chairman, I look forward to hearing my colleague, Senator

Warner, and, obviously, Senator Kyl, our distinguished first witness and others who have joined us.

Thank you.

Senator SMITH. Thank you.

Chairman Warner.

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STATEMENT OF HON. JOHN WARNER, U.S. SENATOR FROM

VIRGINIA

Senator WARNER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you,

Senator Lugar and Senator Kyl. We have, I think, a modest difference on my views.

Mr. Chairman, some time ago I wrote the President, expressing

my concern about putting in final form at this 50th Anniversary

the Strategic Concept. My suggestion to the President is that we

allow another 6 months within which to assess and study the lessons learned in Kosovo, Kosovo being the first combat operation of

the NATO forces.

It seems to me a relatively simple request. I have provided you

with copies and you have placed my letters in the record.

The President, in a respectful way, declined to accept this recommendation.

I would pick up on what Senator Lugar has just said here.

Eighty percent of the usable power projection forces are ours. We

are flying 60 percent of the missions. The airlift we have not even

yet tried to quantify. We have seen the competition in trying to get

the Apaches in place for the use of the airlift for the very needed

mission, ancillary though it is, of the refugees.

All of this is to say let’s pause a minute. In the aftermath of

whatever conclusion Kosovo comes to, let’s study it and let that be

a guidepost for a revision of the next Strategic Concept.

In this way, Congress could have a voice in it, the legislatures

of the other 18 nations could have a voice in it, and we could arrive

at a document that I believe would be received by the 19 nations

and their respective constituencies with a much greater feeling of

security, certainty, and confidence that we have done the right

thing.

There are so many unknowns coming out of the Kosovo operation, indeed remaining out of the Bosnia operation. There is no

compelling reason to rush to judgment and put this concept in

stone at the 50th Anniversary Conference against the background

of Kosovo.

This is my simple request. I am glad that many others are now

picking this up.

I thank the chair and my distinguished colleagues for indulging

me for a minute.

Senator SMITH. Thank you, Senator Warner.

Senator Kyl, we turn to you as our first witness.

STATEMENT OF HON. JON KYL, U.S. SENATOR FROM ARIZONA

Senator KYL. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I might say

that much of what I say will be seen as another way of saying what

all three of you, my distinguished colleagues, have already said.

The slight tactical difference that Senator Warner and I have with

respect to timing I think may end up being a distinction without

a difference, really, in that, whether we like it or not, we are going

to learn lessons if we are alert and if we are honest, and we had

better apply those lessons whether the Strategic Concept are adopted at this conference or not.

In this respect, I totally agree with Senator Warner. But I do

suspect that there will be a Strategic Concept document coming out

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of this particular meeting and that we should be alert to the fact

that it will probably be subject to differing interpretations. To that

extent, and to the extent that we do learn lessons from Kosovo, we

should be prepared to revisit the document and focus on those lessons.

Mr. Chairman, I want to thank you for holding this hearing, particularly at this important time, and for allowing me to testify.

As NATO celebrates its 50th anniversary and the accession of

three new members, it is useful to take stock of its accomplishments. But any assessment, as Senator Warner has said, must remain tentative in light of the war in Kosovo.

This conflict and its resolution will set the tone for the future far

more definitively than any summit declaration.

What can we, the Senate, do to guide the alliance over the next

decades is the question before you.

Last year, when we took up enlargement of the alliance, as you

noted, I offered an amendment that received very broad bipartisan

support—from 90 Senators. In that amendment, the Senate set

forth 10 principles that should guide U.S. policy as NATO revises

its Strategic Concept.

I would like to summarize just six of those.

NATO is, first and foremost, a military alliance and is the principal foundation for the defense of the security interests of its

members against external threats. NATO is and should remain capable of undertaking operations in defense of its interests without

reference to the permission of other bodies. Running a war by consensus within the alliance is difficult enough, as we are seeing. The

thought of doing so through the United Nations is totally impractical and dangerous.

There have been recent press reports of delays in blockading oil

shipments to Serbia because of French concerns about the absence

of a U.N. mandate. Meanwhile, American pilots—and they are

overwhelmingly American on most of the difficult missions—are at

risk striking oil refineries. This state of affairs is unconscionable.

Second, NATO members will face common threats to their security. The most serious is the potential reemergence of a hegemonic

power threatening Europe. The unstated concern was, of course,

Russia.

We all hope, of course, that Russia will succeed in its difficult

transition and emerge a prosperous and stable democracy. We

should do our best to assist Russia in its transition. But we should

recognize that Russia’s future is beyond our capacity to positively

influence except at the margin.

Recent NATO actions in Kosovo certify that we can have a negative impact on the relationship. In establishing relations between

NATO and Russia, we must strike a balance between consultation,

when constructive, and exclusion on those growing number of occasions when Russia’s goals are directly inimical to our own and Russia measures its policy’s success by the damage it can do to America’s global role.

A renewed threat from such a power is, fortunately, remote. A

threat from rogue States and gangster regimes which possess

weapons of mass destruction and seek the means to deliver them

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is here today. To this threat NATO’s response has reflected little

unity of purpose.

There is no alliance consensus on relations with Iran. Allies have

directly challenged and undercut our sanctions aimed at dissuading

Iran from sponsoring terrorism. Yet Iran may be within 5 years of

attaining a nuclear weapons capability and is developing a missile

capable of reaching Western Europe, both with Russian assistance.

In Iraq, only Britain joins us in ongoing military operations.

Some allies actively undermined UNSCOM inspections last year

and now seek to weaken the U.N. sanctions regime in their haste

to gain commercial advantage.

Allies voice a preference for responding to proliferation through

diplomatic means rather than through enhanced defense efforts,

such as missile defense. There is a large and growing gap between

the United States and Europe in both political will and military capabilities to respond to such threats.

NATO also may face threats to its security, stemming from ethnic and religious animosities, historic disputes, and undemocratic

leaders.

Mr. Chairman, it is not clear to me that there was sufficient

threat to justify our involvement in Kosovo. But the circumstances

there are the kind of conflict that could represent a security threat,

I think we would all agree, and our Strategic Concept should recognize that fact.

Kosovo points up a very disturbing state of affairs. Our European

allies have the greatest difficulty and are, in fact, sometimes incapable of responding in a politically unified and militarily proficient way to a threat to the stability and security of Europe. Allies categorically demand that an American presence remain in

Bosnia. Intervention in Kosovo is arguable on its merits, as I said.

But it is clearly not sustainable for the United States to carry almost the entire burden of Western security outside of Europe and

a large measure of it within Europe.

America’s armed forces are not capable and its people not willing

to carry both European and global responsibility without the assistance of those equally able to afford to do so and geographically

more at risk.

In any event, the particular circumstances of our involvement in

Kosovo under the current Strategic Concept—not the new one, but

the current one—should not be cited as proving that our new Strategic Concept should preclude a NATO response to a threat arising

out of ethnic conflict.

A NATO response may be necessary in some circumstances.

Whether it was in Kosovo is open to debate. But if it was the

wrong decision, it is not a fault of the Strategic Concept but a

misapplication of those concepts.

Third, the core mission of NATO is collective self-defense and its

allies must sustain the ability effectively to respond to common

threats. This will require that NATO members possess military capabilities to rapidly deploy forces over long distances and operate

jointly with the United States in high intensity conflicts—a point

that Senator Lugar made just a moment ago.

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Mr. Chairman, most allies are slowly but inexorably losing the

ability to field the kind of highly trained, well equipped forces that

can operate in even a medium intensity environment.

General Klaus Naumann, the German head of NATO’s Military

Committee, has warned that the day may soon be coming when European and American forces may no longer be able to fight along

side each other on the same battlefield because of the rapidly expanding gap in their combat capabilities.

The 1991 Strategic Concept stated that NATO military forces

could be safely reduced. This year I would hope to see an affirmation that they must be sustained and modernized.

Fourth, the amendment notes that NATO’s integrated military

structure underpins NATO’s effectiveness by embedding members

in a cooperative planning process and assuring unity of command.

As Europe seeks its security and defense identity, we should assure

that they are undertaken within the framework of the transatlantic

alliance.

A European Security and Defense Identity that excludes Turkey

would directly call into question the survival of NATO. Europe’s defense identity should be measured by the creation of a serious military capability and by its ability to successfully respond to crises

within Europe.

Fifth, the amendment states that nuclear weapons will continue

to make an essential contribution to deterring aggression, especially aggression by potential adversaries armed with nuclear,

chemical, or biological weapons, a point on which the 1991 Strategic Concept was silent. I would hope to see it reflected in the new

version since this threat is now with us in a much more immediate

way.

The final point of the Kyl amendment addresses burdensharing.

It is the view of the Senate, as expressed by my amendment, that

the responsibility and financial burden of defending the democracies of Europe should be more equitably shared. I would suggest

that the reverse has occurred and the current trendlines are going

in the wrong direction.

As the letter which you, I, the majority leader, and the chairman

and the ranking member of this committee sent to the President

in February stated, NATO is a tradeoff for the United States. The

United States is committed to help in the defense of Europe in return for having allies that are capable of defending against foes

that threaten the alliance both within and outside of Europe.

If the Europeans are permitted to shift the entire burden of

extra-European security to the United States, then public support

for NATO will wither. I am seriously concerned that the tone of the

new Strategic Concept will emphasize crisis management and

peacekeeping within Europe and shy away from any suggestion

that NATO may need to address extra-European threats, as was

implied by my amendment.

On present evidence, the new strategic concept will freeze unresolved arguments at some lowest common denominator. If we can’t

resolve the fundamentals now, it will be infinitely more difficult in

the midst of a conflict involving really vital interests.

At its 50th anniversary, NATO can count its blessings and take

pride in its achievements. Today we face a short-term crisis in the

11

alliance because of the war its forces are fighting in Kosovo. But

the myriad of other challenges we face has resulted in what I see

as a slow but steady withering of alliance cohesion, a gradual loosening of bonds.

Looking beyond Kosovo, I think that this deterioration can be reversed. What is needed is confident, consistent, and unified leadership on our part.

Lady Margaret Thatcher stated at a Heritage Foundation speech

that, and I quote, ‘‘America’s duty is to lead; the other Western

countries’ duty is to support its leadership.’’

Of course, Mr. Chairman, it would be undiplomatic for an American to state this truth quite so boldly. But I can offer no better

prescription to my colleagues here for an enduring Atlantic alliance

of free nations. Unity on our part is a prerequisite to European nations following our leadership.

Thank you again for the opportunity to testify.

Senator SMITH. Senator Kyl, I am mindful that you have another

commitment at 2:30. I wonder, though, since I think there is probably an interest in a little bit of an exchange, if you could stay just

a while longer, if that’s possible.

Senator KYL. Thank you.

Mr. Chairman, I have a statement which is much longer and

more lengthy, which I would like to submit as soon as I rewrite one

paragraph.

Senator SMITH. We will receive it when it is rewritten.

Senator KYL. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Senator Kyl is in the appendix on

page 56.]

Senator SMITH. Senator, it seems to me as I listened to the differences between you and Senator Warner, he is talking about timing and operations and I think you are talking about budgetary

commitments and maybe also a command structure that works.

Senator KYL. May I characterize it? I don’t know how I would be

talking about budgetary concerns, but I think he and I have stated

the same concern and it has been stated in one way or another by

the four of us who have spoken here. I think our only difference

is one of whether or not the Strategic Concept should be finalized

this week or should be deferred.

My view is that we had better listen to the lessons that come out

of Kosovo and adjust our thinking, if, indeed, it needs to be adjusted; that this can be done and should be done in the way that

Senator Warner prefers it to be done; but since the Strategic Concept is going to be defined in this next week, we should all be unified in insuring that it expresses the sense that we agreed to when

we adopted the amendment and brought the three new countries

into NATO; and that this must include an emphasis on terrorism,

the missile threat, nuclear issues, the responsibility of the NATO

countries to get up to speed with the United States; so that whatever we agree we must do together, we have the joint capability of

doing.

Senator SMITH. Do any of my colleagues have a burning question

for Senator Kyl?

Senator WARNER. If I could make an observation, there are three

of us up here that I can count who have been here for over 20 years

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in the Senate. I remember when I first came. We had a battle on

the floor of the Senate time and time again. Scoop Jackson, Stennis, Tower, and Goldwater would rally us out on the floor to stop

the move to cut NATO, to bring our troops home—the job is done,

it is over.

Senator, we could revisit some of that strong feeling emanating

from the grassroots of America in the aftermath of Kosovo. I hope

not. But I’ve witnessed it before, as have my colleagues who are

nodding their heads as I speak.

All I am saying is what is 6 more months to just leave it in draft

form? Come out with a draft. You are not likely to resolve at this

conference the tough issue of the relationship between the United

Nations and NATO operations. That may come out unresolved, and

properly so.

So there will be issues that will not be finalized. All I am suggesting is don’t go back 6 months from now and rewrite something

that was put in final form on the 50th anniversary. Just leave it

in draft form, study it, and then 6 months from now, in reflecting

on what has occurred, put it in final form. It’s a very simple request.

Senator SMITH. Perhaps you would like the administration to answer that very question.

Senator KYL. Yes, it’s not for me to say. You have addressed the

issue to the President and he will be the one, through his team,

who negotiates this and who will decide.

I think I have made my point clearly. I will be working with you.

I’m certainly willing to work with you on helping to identify what

these lessons are. But I certainly do not think they should preclude

us from recognizing that there could be undemocratic leaders and

ethnic conflict that create threats in the future that NATO would

want to respond to.

Recognizing the truth of that reality does not say to me anything

about whether or not our involvement in Kosovo at the current

time under the old Concept was warranted or not. That simply is

a recognition of what will be true and whether, in the future, we

make mistakes or do the right thing in getting involved as a result

of one of those conflicts again will perhaps be more a question of

how we applied the Concept than whether the Concept itself is correct or not.

Senator BIDEN. Mr. Chairman, may I take 60 seconds?

Senator SMITH. Yes.

Senator BIDEN. I would just respectfully suggest that had

Milosevic moved along unabated and NATO not reacted, we would

have proven that NATO is useless. NATO would be done. NATO

would be finished. I respectfully suggest that if we do not resolve

this in a way that the world looks to and says the right result occurred and Milosevic has been stopped, NATO’s viability will diminish precipitously.

But it would have had we not moved. Or how would we explain

to any American that you have ethnic cleansing going on in what

they consider to be the heart of Europe? Europeans deftly suggest

that it is not the heart. NATO—just what is NATO there for?

There is no Soviet Union to worry about today, there is no direct

13

threat coming through the Fulda Gap, but you have this happening

in Europe.

So I acknowledge that we may learn something. The most optimistic thing that Senator Warner has said is that we will visit and

make a judgment in 6 months. I hope in 6 months we will have

determined all the lessons we are going to learn because we have

finished the deal.

I just want to point out—and I will conclude with this, Mr.

Chairman, and here I am stating the obvious—this is a very delicate point in NATO’s maturation process here. The idea, though,

that we can have a circumstance where there is significant displacement of populations in the Euro-Asian continent, from the

Urals to the Atlantic, and for NATO not to be involved in it in any

way, I find incredibly difficult to figure out. What rationale do you

then proffer to the American people in the near-term as to why we

are spending over $100 billion to support NATO and why we still

have 100,000 troops in the region?

So this is a bit of a Catch 22. I don’t want to get into whether

or not it has to be done, left open, closed, whatever. But the idea

that somehow we could avoid this notion of NATO’s involvement I

think is whistling through the graveyard.

Senator WARNER. Mr. Chairman, may I associate myself with the

remarks of my distinguished colleague.

I need not remind you that it was this Senator who joined you

on the floor when we got 57 votes.

Senator BIDEN. Oh, absolutely. I am in no way suggesting otherwise.

Senator WARNER. There is no stronger proponent of NATO. I am

just trying to point out what I think is an obvious situation here.

Senator KYL. Mr. Chairman, I really just must add one more

minute because there really is not a disagreement among the five

of us here, I think.

But in a sense I guess what I was responding to is what I hear

from a majority of people that I talk to both in the U.S. Senate and

back home. I hear that threats arising out of ethnic conflict are

none of our business—arising out of our dissatisfaction with our involvement in this particular operation.

What I have tried to say, perhaps inelegantly, is that, even

though people may argue whether or not our involvement in this

particular conflict was justified or warranted, wherever you come

down on that, if you are against the operation, do not thereby conclude that threats to NATO, i.e., the United States, can never arise

from ethnic conflict or undemocratic leaders. It is an attack on that

concept of the proposed Strategic Concept that I am trying to respond to.

Senator BIDEN. I agree with you.

Senator KYL. Senator Biden, you and I agreed with each other

on the floor that that was one of the circumstances that needed to

be in there, just as much as the threat from chemical and biological

terrorists, which was not in there before, and the missile defense

issue, which was not in there before either.

These are all new kinds of threats that need to be stated in the

Strategic Concept. It does not really matter how you come down on

whether we got into this conflict wrongly or rightly. I think we

14

should not subtract that from the new Strategic Concept. That is

the point I guess I was trying to make.

Thank you very much, again, for the chance to speak to you.

Senator SMITH. Thank you, Senator Kyl. You have been terrific.

We call up now Assistant Secretary Marc Grossman, the administration’s representative here, and Assistant Secretary Kramer.

Welcome to you both.

Senator BIDEN. Mr. Chairman, I would like to suggest, while Mr.

Grossman is setting up at the table, that after he finishes handling

the Strategic Concept he come and settle the Social Security debate

and also the health care issue. I think they are all at about the

same level of difficulty.

Senator SMITH. We welcome you both.

Secretary Grossman, we invite you to proceed, and then we will

go to Secretary Kramer.

STATEMENT OF HON. MARC GROSSMAN, ASSISTANT

SECRETARY OF STATE FOR EUROPEAN AFFAIRS

Mr. GROSSMAN. Mr. Chairman, thank you very, very much. But

I will pass on everything else.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Obviously it is a pleasure to be here

today to testify before this committee, especially 2 days before the

NATO summit. I think both Assistant Secretary Kramer and I

have greatly benefited from the chance to listen to the colloquy

here amongst Senators.

I think it is right in running through all the things that you said

to be reminded that this alliance was founded 50 years ago by a

generation of Americans and Europeans who fought in World War

II and who witnessed the Holocaust. They created this alliance in

large part because they believed it was their obligation to insure

that such horrors never again occurred on European soil.

Today a new generation of political leaders, soldiers, sailors, airmen, diplomats on both sides of the Atlantic, are determined to uphold that legacy.

I want, before I start talking a little bit about the NATO summit,

first of all, Senator and all of your colleagues, to thank you and the

committee for the close bipartisan support that you have offered us

on NATO. I remember very well the first time I came to call on

you, just after I got my job, and you told me that we should work

together to keep this alliance strong. The sense of bipartisan teamwork that I think has taken place since then is very much a testament to you, certainly, and we have tried our very best to live up

to that as well.

We have tried to meet the requirements that you set for us, and

our staffs have worked extremely closely together to fulfill the requirements through briefings and reports to the committee on the

new Strategic Concept and on issues that are very important to the

summit.

I would also say that, for me, anyway, it is a very important moment to follow Senator Kyl and his testimony because during the

NATO enlargement debate, as he said, some 90 Senators agreed

with his amendment laying out clear criteria for NATO’s updated

Strategic Concept.

15

My message is simple, which is we heard what you had to say,

we noticed 90 votes, we thought the Kyl amendment was actually

an excellent way to think about the future of NATO, and we took

the criteria that had been established by Senator Kyl and by his

colleagues as our own. I hope that when you see the new Strategic

Concept unveiled this weekend that you will be satisfied that we

have met the benchmarks.

He talked about six of them and, of course, there are four more.

We have taken each one of those as a very important part of our

work.

In my testimony today, if you would allow me, I would like briefly to just touch on three questions. First is what are our goals for

the NATO summit and how do they serve U.S. national security interests. Second is what does the Kosovo conflict mean for the

NATO summit and the alliance more generally—the conversation

that you all were just having. And what is our longer-term strategy

for Southeastern Europe and what role, if any, can NATO play in

that strategy?

Mr. Chairman, our goal for the summit is to prepare NATO to

meet the challenges of the 21st century. In doing so, we have been

conscious of the need not to alter or to change NATO’s core purpose

that you all spoke about, which is collective defense, because its

commitment to collective defense is what underlines its success.

President Truman had it right in his speech at NATO’s founding

on April 4, 1949. He defined the alliance’s purpose in terms of defending the common territory, values, and interests of its members.

To me that made sense when he said it and it seems to me that

it makes sense today.

If NATO’s core purpose has not changed, the security environment that we confront certainly has. I think Senator Kyl did a good

job of laying out what has changed about the security environment.

Today, we have to be prepared to deal with a world in which the

threats to the alliance can come from new directions and where

conflicts beyond NATO’s territory can have an impact on our common values and our common interests.

NATO, in our view, must be able to do as good a job in meeting

the challenges of the 21st century as it did in meeting the challenges of the 20th century and the threats of the cold war.

When we talk about the future of NATO, it is not because we

want to change NATO’s course but, rather, because we want to assure that the alliance is well equipped to take on the challenges of

the future.

Now, based on these ideas, Secretary Albright and Secretary

Cohen have worked together since last December on a seven part

package of initiatives that we hope will come out in this summit.

These seven initiatives are the following.

First is a vision statement. I think it is very important that

publics get a chance to consider what it is that is in the future of

NATO—not only publics in the United States but publics around

the alliance—a new Strategic Concept, an enhanced open door policy, a defense capabilities initiative, an initiative on weapons of

mass destruction, a package of initiatives to enhance our work with

partners, and something on the European Security and Defense

Identity.

16

These initiatives are designed to create an alliance committed to

collective defense, but also one that is even more capable of addressing current and future risks, strengthened by and open to new

members, and working together with partners to enhance security

for the Euro-Atlantic area.

We have heard a lot of debate about this and some say of course

it would be better for the United States to stick to the status quo,

that that would be the best thing for America’s interests.

Other people say that NATO is a relic of the cold war and ought

to be put out of business.

For me, and I think for all of you, in listening to you, that ignores a key lesson that we learned from the history of the 20th

century, which is that we need a strong military alliance between

the United States and Europe and it must focus on preparing for

the threats of the future, not the threats of the past.

This is why the package of initiatives, these seven initiatives, are

so clearly in the national interest.

Mr. Chairman, given the conversation that you all just had, I

hope you would allow me briefly to touch on just a couple of parts

of this package because I think our views would be of interest to

you and your colleagues.

First, though Assistant Secretary Kramer will have more to say

about this, I think it is worthwhile to talk for a moment about the

strategic concept. It is important, I think, to remember what kind

of document this is and what kind of document this is not, and

what it will do and what it will not do.

As you have put the President’s letter in the record, I hope I can

quote from it here. As the President said in his letter to Senator

Warner, ‘‘the Strategic Concept will not contain new commitments

or obligations for the United States but, rather, will underscore

NATO’s enduring purposes outlined in the 1949 North Atlantic

Treaty.’’

What this document does do is provide a new framework and political-military guidance that will create incentives for allies to

build more flexible forces capable of meeting the broadest range of

possible threats to our common security, the threats that we must

confront in the 21st century.

Senator Warner, I know we will talk more about it, but we believe, given what we have achieved in the strategic concept, it is

time to lock those gains in. If I might say, I am sure Assistant Secretary Kramer would agree that we have to apply the lessons of

Kosovo. But we ought to see if we can capture what we have

gained in the Strategic Concept and then apply those lessons.

I would say something also about mandates. You have been very

eloquent on this subject, Mr. Chairman.

There is nothing in the Strategic Concept that will require NATO

to have a United Nations mandate for it to act. We would not accept that, as you and I talked about the other day.

Now the 1949 treaty acknowledges the important role of the

United Nations in international security and it reaffirms everyone’s

faith in the principles and purposes of the United Nations.

To translate it into policy, this means that, while it is obviously

preferable to have a U.N. endorsement of NATO actions, the alliance must retain the flexibility to act on its own.

17

Finally, just let me say a brief word about our open door policy,

about which Senator Lugar talked.

I know, Senator Smith, that when we were in Independence,

Missouri, welcoming the three new members some weeks ago, we

really recognized the historic event in which we were participating.

And at a time when we’re dealing with instability and conflict in

Southeastern Europe, it is important to step back and realize that

Central Europe is now, by and large, safe and secure, and that

NATO enlargement is a large part of that success story.

Based on the benchmarks that NATO set out in Madrid in terms

of judging candidates’ countries in terms of their performance and

the alliance’s own strategic interests, we do not believe that this

summit is probably the right time to extend further invitations for

additional new members.

But like Senator Lugar, we believe that the situation today only

underscores the need to reaffirm our open door policy both in word

and in deed. The commitment will be evident later this week, not

only in what we, as an alliance, say but through the issuance of

a new membership action plan, about which we talked last week,

a practical plan that goes beyond anything we have done in the

past in terms of using NATO’s talent and expertise to help those

countries help themselves become the strongest possible candidates

in the future.

Mr. Chairman, if I might just take two moments, I would talk

a little about Kosovo and the NATO summit.

I think the best way to describe this is as we prepare NATO for

the 21st century, we still have some 20th century work to do. The

summit will be largely a working meeting with Kosovo as a central

theme.

We still plan to commemorate NATO’s 50th anniversary because

we have very much to honor on that score. But the first focus has

to be on supporting NATO’s forces that are now in action in the

former Yugoslavia.

The conflict in Kosovo has underscored why we still need a

strong alliance between the United States and Europe, and it underscores why NATO needs to be more flexible and capable of handling a broad range of tasks.

As far as I am concerned, the Kosovo crisis has shown the need

for a new Strategic Concept. It showed the need, as Senator Lugar

said, for a vibrant and real open door policy. It underscores the importance of the defense capabilities initiative and it demonstrates

the requirement for NATO to have a close political and military relationship with all of its partners.

Mr. Chairman, no one on either side of the Atlantic who has

been involved in deliberations on Kosovo can imagine how we could

have responded effectively without NATO. I think that was Senator

Biden’s point. And if we did not already have a plan to modernize

NATO to meet such a crisis, we would be having to make such a

plan today.

At the same time, I think it is important to say that our goal,

of course, is not to involve our alliance in new situations, such as

Bosnia and Kosovo. Our goal is to prevent the need for having to

do this.

18

We think that the new Strategic Concept does not commit us to

act in new Kosovos any more than the old one did, but the more

prepared we are to respond rapidly and effectively to outbreaks

that threaten Europe’s stability, the more likely it is that we will

be able to deter such outbreaks.

Finally, let me spend a minute, if I could, on our long-term strategy for Southeastern Europe.

What we are thinking about this point can really be summed up

in two thoughts. First is that NATO must prevail in the Kosovo

conflict. Second is that we must move, working with the Europeans, to implement a long-term strategy to stabilize the region

and to integrate it into the European mainstream.

As President Clinton said last week in San Francisco, and I

quote, ‘‘If we truly want a more tolerant, inclusive future for the

Balkans and all of Southeastern Europe, we will have to oppose

Milosevic’s efforts and at the same time offer a better vision of the

future, one that we are willing to help build.’’

We never again want to fight in this part of Europe. So we must

insure that we never have to again.

As Secretary Albright said recently, Southeastern Europe is the

critical missing piece in the puzzle of a Europe whole and free. The

vision of a united and democratic Europe is critical to our own security.

The first requirement is to focus on a strategy aimed at transforming this region from Europe’s primary source of instability into

part of its mainstream. In this regard, I think we should all call

attention to the plans on Southeastern Europe’s stability that have

been put forward lately by Germany, by Turkey, and by Greece. We

welcome these kinds of forward looking propositions.

As the Germans really rightly noted in their proposal, a strategy

for this region must have several components—political, economic,

and security. It will eventually require the extensive involvement

of many key institutions, in particular the EU and the OSCE, and

NATO as well.

But I would say that NATO’s role is crucial because security is

a prerequisite for any stabilization program.

Now come this weekend, I think we will only be able to take the

first steps toward building a broad, long-term Southeast Europe

initiative at this summit. But we will keep you informed as we

move ahead because this will involve, obviously, lots of consultation, involvement, and support of the Congress if it is to succeed.

But at this summit, at this weekend, we want to adopt regional

stability measures that the alliance can implement on an accelerated basis which would include more frequent NAC consultations

with countries of the region, promotion of regional cooperation in

the Europe-Atlantic Partnership Council, better coordination of security assistance through the Partnership for Peace, and regionally

focused PfP activities and exercises.

Our goal on this weekend really is to promote three themes: one,

NATO’s unity and its determination; two, NATO’s adaptation to

the 21st century; and, three, some commitment, some vision of how

we want to move forward in Southeastern Europe to the future.

I thank you very much and, with your permission, I would turn

it over to my colleague, Assistant Secretary of Defense Kramer.

19

[The prepared statement of Mr. Grossman is in the appendix on

page 50.]

Senator SMITH. Secretary Kramer, welcome.

STATEMENT OF HON. FRANKLIN D. KRAMER, ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF DEFENSE FOR INTERNATIONAL SECURITY AFFAIRS

Mr. KRAMER. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

Good afternoon to all of you.

As does Assistant Secretary Grossman, I have a fuller statement

which I would ask to have entered into the record.

Senator SMITH. Without objection.

Mr. KRAMER. I would just like to summarize a few points.

As you have said, Mr. Chairman, and as others have said,

NATO, at bottom, is a military alliance. Kosovo proves that and

Bosnia proves that. What we will seek to do, both through the

adoption of the Strategic Concept but, more importantly, in actual

activities by the alliance is to enhance the capabilities of the alliance to deal with some of the issues that Senator Kyl outlined in

his testimony and as are set forth in the Kyl amendment.

Let me talk about three particular areas that the alliance will

prove this weekend. These are issues that have been pushed particularly by Secretary Cohen with the defense ministers but have

also been done with the full support of the entire administration.

The first is called the defense capabilities initiative, which focuses on conventional forces. The second, usually known as the

WMD initiative, focuses on weapons of mass destruction. Then the

third area, which does not have a specific initiative but has elements in each, is the area of terrorism.

In the defense capabilities initiative, we will seek to enhance the

mobility of the alliance, the lethality, if you will, its precision guided engagement, its survivability of forces, and its sustainability.

Those are all concepts that are actually included in the Strategic

Concept itself, which gives the guidance to the military planners.

The WMD initiative focuses, of course, on chemical and biological

weapons and also on nuclear weapons, on problems that we have

seen in different areas of the world—the attack on Japanese subways, the attempted attack on the World Trade Center, the nuclear

explosions in Pakistan and India.

With respect to terrorism, we will try to enhance intelligence

sharing, we will undertake greater activities with respect to force

protection, we will seek to have the capability to respond to terrorist attacks, and we will seek to have the ability to respond to the

consequences of any such attack.

The allies I think are willing to work with us on this. We have

heard Prime Minister Blair say that Europe needs to have capabilities, not just the ability to talk about issues. We have heard Prime

Minister Dalima of Italy say it is unfortunate that the allies spend

60 percent of what the United States spends but only get 10 percent of the capability.

We want to turn that around with these efforts.

There is some reason to believe that the allies will do that. The

United Kingdom, as you know, has already had a so-called strateVerDate 11-SEP-98 14:44 Sep 20, 1999 Jkt 549297 PO 00000 Frm 00022 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6602 58335 SFRELA1 PsN: SFRELA1
20

gic defense review. It has put into place actions to make its forces

more mobile and more capable of fighting in the 21st century.

The push for a European security and defense identity, as promoted by Prime Minister Blair, focuses on capabilities precisely in

accord with the kinds of things we want to promote in the alliance

under the defense capabilities initiative. So if we can keep the two

in harmony, we will have the Europeans going in the right place.

In Kosovo, because of the fact that we are a military alliance and

need to have these capabilities all come together, we have had extremely good cooperation among the United States and the allies.

We are there in Kosovo together. We are all performing the mission. But, as the committee has said, a significant portion of that

mission does fall on United States forces.

There are about somewhat over 700 airplanes in the allied air

campaign; in round terms about 200 of them are allied. This means

that there are 500 U.S. planes.

Depending on how you count, whether it is attack missions or

support missions, the United States nonetheless does the predominance of the missions—maybe about 55 percent or so of the attack

missions and a little less than 70 percent of support missions.

So there is a lot yet to be done in order to bring the allies along.

One of the real benefits of the Strategic Concept, as I said, and of

the summit itself is the approval of these various initiatives that

should enhance those capabilities.

As all of you have said and as I will underscore, we need to win

in Kosovo. If the alliance cannot preserve the values that it stands

for, if it cannot bring peace and democracy to Kosovo, then it does

not have the capability through its military forces to do what it has

committed to do. So we need to prevail.

With that, let me stop here and take your questions.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Kramer is in the appendix on

page 53.]

Senator SMITH. Secretary Kramer, picking up on the point with

which you ended, it seems to me that NATO unity is being stressed

to a point that it may have priority over NATO victory. I say this

out of a sense of concern that I have coming from news accounts

of the operational conduct of this war.

It seems to be war by committee and perhaps an operational dinosaur we are inventing. So my greatest alarm about the Strategic

Concept being put in concrete is whether or not there are some

operational things to be learned that should be included in it.

What you are telling me, I think, Secretary Grossman, is that

this is general enough that it does not preclude some operational

changes later. Maybe you can comment on those observations on

my part.

Mr. KRAMER. Let me comment on the last and then come back

to the first.

I think you will agree, having had a chance to look at it all, that

the Strategic Concept itself does not preclude having a whole variety of different approaches to operational decisions. The Strategic

Concept gives broad guidance as to the kinds of things that military planners should plan for, as to the kind of things that the alliance should do.

21

Then we also have a chain of command, which has just been revised and approved, and then we have the actual conduct of operations. So the Strategic Concept is in no way preclusive. It is actually quite flexible.

With respect to the operations themselves, I don’t know which

news stories you read or did not read. General Clark, together with

Secretary Solana, has very good authority with respect to the vast

majority of targets and targeting as to which he wants to undertake. There are some sensitive targets that are looked at, not in

NATO but by heads of State effectively. This is not too surprising

in a democracy. Even in this small group of five Senators there

were differences of nuance and approach with respect to some of

these things. We have 19 countries—19 democratic countries—that

work by consensus.

Senator SMITH. My specific concern, for example, is about a story

I heard where General Clark has asked for 2,000 targets but where

the allies can agree on 200. Is there any truth to that?

Mr. KRAMER. That story I have never heard and I don’t think it

is true.

What I would like to do, not in this hearing but in a way that

I can actually give you the full information, is to sit and talk to

you about what we have been doing. I don’t think we ought to go

into targeting issues in an open session.

Senator SMITH. I understand that. But I am trying to express a

very genuine concern that I have as to whether operationally we

can win.

Is unity among our allies the goal or is winning the goal, because

I, frankly, think they should be inseparably linked but I am not

sure they are?

Mr. KRAMER. The President has said very clearly that we have

to prevail. I think all the allies have said that we have to prevail.

As I said, General Clark, in general, has very good operational

flexibility. I don’t want to leave the impression that there have not

been any differences over any targets because there have been. As

I said, I am very happy to discuss that with you privately.

Senator SMITH. And there is flexibility remaining within the

Strategic Concept that we can make those adjustments later?

Mr. KRAMER. Yes, sir.

Mr. GROSSMAN. If I could just comment on that, I thought one

of the things obviously in the conversation between Senator Warner and Senator Kyl that was absolutely clear was that we have

to be able to learn the lessons of Kosovo—just like you would learn

the lessons of anything else.

I noticed in that conversation Senator Warner said that here we

are going to put this thing in stone.

I don’t see how we could possibly do that. Our objective is to try

to make progress on the Strategic Concept and lock in the gains.

I think Assistant Secretary Kramer would say that we have a lot

of gains in that Strategic Concept. Then, if there are lessons to be

learned, we will certainly learn them and through the alliance

mechanisms they can be put into all of the alliance documents.

So I think, as you all came to the end of your conversation, this

difference is really a small one. We will obviously not be blind to

lessons learned.

22

Senator SMITH. That is encouraging.

I have another comment. In part of my opening remarks I was

trying to reflect what I think is happening in the country. If you

read opinion polls, there is a slight majority that supports what we

are doing. I think that is borne out of a humanitarian instinct in

the American people. But I will bet prior to this attack on Belgrade, there were not 2 in 10 Americans that could tell you what

NATO meant.

I’ll bet a lot of them can now, and they are starting to ask the

question what does this mean in the future. I really do fear that

it could take root in this country that, but for NATO, we would not

be in this fight and that, because of NATO, we cannot win this

fight.

That is why I plead for our country’s sake, for the alliance’s sake,

for the future’s sake, that we win this.

Senator Biden.

Senator BIDEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I have several questions and they come off the comment that the

chairman just made. He indicated that unity in winning and unity

in victory have to be viewed separably. I would respectfully suggest

that we cannot win without unity.

By this I mean in the literal sense. I imagine the very consensus

that may be building, and if not consensus, 51 percent of the American people, whose support for what we are doing in Kosovo, would

evaporate to 10 percent if the President had to stand there and say

we are going it alone. We are going into Kosovo with one or two

other of our allies and that is how we are moving.

I suspect that would mean the end of any consensus or any congressional support for any operation in Kosovo.

So the good news is we have an alliance. The bad news is we

have an alliance. I mean this literally, not figuratively. It is the

good and the bad news.

So every President, I suspect—I should not say every—the last

President, this President, and the next President at least are going

to be faced with the conundrum of doing what our military or our

political people think is the right thing to do and possibly losing

the alliance or doing 80 percent or 90 percent of what we think we

should do and keeping the alliance.

I remind my World War II veteran friends, for whom I have

great admiration, who talk about how you just have to go to win,

I would remind them, if I am not mistaken, that the British were

swimming in the English Channel—literally swimming in the

English Channel—with thousands of small dinghies crossing to

take them back home before America even was roused to respond.

We had a President who was told that if he moved on providing

materiel for our friends in Europe, he would be impeached.

So this is nothing new. This is nothing new here, this idea of

having to get consensus.

I want to remind people that Dwight Eisenhower—I can never

understand as a student of history why people thought he would

not be a good politician. I can never understand that. He had kind

of your job in the extreme, Marc. He had to keep together, can you

imagine what kind of politician it took to keep together MontgomVerDate 11-SEP-98 14:44 Sep 20, 1999 Jkt 549297 PO 00000 Frm 00025 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6602 58335 SFRELA1 PsN: SFRELA1
23

ery, de Gaulle, Churchill and Roosevelt? I am serious. I am deadly

earnest.

I could recite for you as a student, not as a participant, of that

era probably a half dozen significant military compromises that the

United States military made in World War II because they could

not get the alliance to sign on to the approach.

So I don’t think we should be surprised by what is happening.

I met at length with General Clark this weekend. I can answer

the question in public for the chairman. The 2,200 figure is a totally unreliable assertion relating to those targeting disagreements.

There are targeting disagreements. I would put them, if you

want to give them a notion, in the category of 10 targets and 9

agreed upon, as opposed to 2 to 2,000.

I might add, I will just say what I can say publicly, there was

disagreement on going after the radio and television capacity of the

Serbian Government. We were pushing hard for weeks. Others in

the alliance thought that was a bad idea.

We bombed it last night.

It took a while to get there. It takes a while to get this consensus, but that is the nature of the alliance.

So it does not mean that we should not have some degree of trepidation about entering into use of force with the alliance, where we

may find ourselves at odds. I suspect if the President had said at

the outset of this: by the way, we are only going to use airpower

but here is our plan for ground forces if, in fact, it does not work,

I will not name them publicly but I can think of three allies who

would have said oh, oh, if you even mention that, don’t count me

in on anything—we’re out. We’re out, front end, we’re out.

Even the mere mention of the possibility of ground forces, just

the mentioning of them, would have done that.

I have learned a lot about the Balkans over the last 10 years and

a little bit about Napoleon, though not as it relates to the Balkans.

There is a quote attributed to Napoleon. He said ‘‘that you have to

act and then see.’’ That’s kind of where we are right now. I am

paraphrasing. You take action and then see what the next step is.

In this modern world, it is awfully hard for us to think that we

could have had a full battle plan countering every contingency in

advance with 19 members signing on at the front end to do anything.

So this is going to be a little ‘‘see’’ for us, which leads me to my

question as the yellow light goes on. It is this: the idea, Mr. Secretary, of the United Nations having a veto power over NATO alliance decisions, as the French and others have been pushing. First,

how urgently is that being pushed still? How important is it to the

allies? I think if it occurs, I’m out. I mean, I’m out. I would not support NATO.

Second, I do not understand the correlation of responsibility between the European Security and Defense Initiative and the EU’s

Common Foreign and Security Policy. I don’t understand that. Either I don’t know how they relate, and no matter how they relate,

are they both subordinate to NATO in that NATO gets the right

of first refusal?

To summarize, in terms of this new strategic initiative, (a) where

is the U.N. in the deal and (b) are both the European Security and

24

Defense Identity and the EU’s Common Foreign and Security Policy subordinate to NATO and how are they different from one another?

Mr. GROSSMAN. Thank you very much. Let me try to answer both

questions.

First of all, in terms of the United Nations, as both Secretary

Kramer and I said in our testimony, we will not accept any proposition which would require a United Nations blessing or such as a

requirement for NATO to act. I think that is not the position of the

United States and I know it is not the position of both of you because we have talked about this a lot.

In answer to your specific question, I would say—this is my description—I would describe the consensus inside the alliance as follows. It is that a United Nations Security Council resolution is desirable, but is not necessary because there are going to be times

when you would act without a Security Council resolution, just like

we are today in Kosovo.

The difficulty which we are having, which you rightly point out,

is trying to write that down and figure out how to put that into

words.

What we have said to all of our allies is the less said about this

the better. Let’s not have you try to put in your principle and us

try to put in our exception. Let’s just say that what has worked

since 1949—and I have become a big believer in carrying around

my NATO handbook so I can remember what the treaty says. The

treaty talks about the principles and purposes of the United Nations. The treaty talks about the importance of the Security Council in international stability. But since 1949, we have been able to

do this job in the right way from NATO.

So we are saying let’s keep to that.

There are countries, Senator, that want to do more, that would

like to have the United Nations be more involved. All I can tell you

is that both of us certainly at this table and all of our colleagues

have really resisted that.

Senator BIDEN. As a practical matter, they can get involved now.

If the French or anyone else wants the U.N. in, they can dissent

from the consensus. If the U.N. does not go along, they can say

that the NAC, that we’re not in. Let them make that decision.

Mr. GROSSMAN. Right. That is why I keep repeating to everybody

the fact that if there could be a Security Council resolution it would

be a very desirable thing.

But, you know, one of the most interesting things that has happened in this debate is that for many, many months people would

say that the era of vetoes is over. Don’t worry about this anymore.

Then all of a sudden, you have the Chinese veto UNPRADEP’s participation and presence in Macedonia just three or four weeks ago.

I think that has been one of the most powerful arguments on our

side of this that has come along. Here we had, in the midst of all

of this trouble and difficulty, and for a reason totally unrelated to

the Balkans—UNPRADEP goes away.

So we have said you cannot do this. NATO has to be prepared

to act, but recognizing that we are not saying the United Nations

is an irrelevant body, shouldn’t have a connection to NATO,

shouldn’t be talked about in the various documents. But the key

25

issue here is that I don’t think anyone else would support the requirement for a United Nations resolution or mandate for NATO

action.

On your second question, and here I hope Secretary Kramer will

help me, my short answer to your question about ESDI, Senator

Biden, is what you said in your speech the other day at Harvard.

This is to say that we have always, every one of us, supported the

fact that the Europeans ought to do more in their own defense. We

think the European Security and Defense Identity is a good thing.

In fact, for over a year the two of us have worked to have the Europeans make ESDI an important part of the summit.

In fact, you will remember that that was the seventh of the

seven initiatives. But we have said this is not USDI, it is ESDI.

The Europeans have to really work on this.

So we welcomed it and we want them to be a part of it. But, just

as you said in your speech, we have put down several markers that

we think are really important.

First, we do not think there ought to be duplication of effort here.

We spend enough money on defense, all of us, and we think there

is already a structure for this and we ought to try to stick to it.

Second, we don’t want to do anything to decouple America and

Europe through ESDI. That is a hugely important subject and I

will come back to it when I do CSFP.

Third is no discrimination. As Senator Kyl said, ESDI which became a European Union military force that excluded Turkey, Norway, and now many of the other countries that have joined NATO,

I think would be a very big disadvantage for us.

As we have pointed out since Independence, Missouri, 8 of the

19 countries are now not EU members. So ESDI is an important

thing. But I agree with you that it has to be done right.

In terms of the Common Foreign and Security Policy, I guess

that is really for a European to answer. But let me give you my

view.

I don’t think the Europeans have yet really figured out how the

Common Foreign and Security Policy will relate to defense policy.

Prime Minister Blair has talked about this. President Chirac has

talked about this. When the British and French met together at

Saint Malo, they tried to develop some initiatives here.

But what we have been saying is that this has to be a transatlantic effort, that ESDI has to take place inside of NATO. This

is not to say, as you and I discussed the other day, that there are

not countries who would like the European Union to do more autonomously. That is why, just to end, we agree completely with

you. Although I am sure there will be other diplomatic ways to say

it, when it all comes down, NATO ought to have a right of first refusal.

There are going to be times when the European Union might

want to act—in Albania, for example, a couple of years ago. But

NATO ought to have a right of first refusal. Then, if the European

Union would like to do something, if it can do something, we ought

to be in favor of that.

Senator BIDEN. Thank you very much.

My time has expired—has expired for a while. Thank you, Mr.

Chairman.

26

Senator SMITH. Senator Dodd.

Senator DODD. That has been very instructive and very, very

worthwhile.

First of all, thank you, Mr. Chairman for holding this hearing

today. It is very appropriate with the gathering of the heads of

State here in Washington.

It was, I guess, right about this time, actually I guess a few

years before April 4, 1949, when a prime minister of Great Britain

was in Fulton, Missouri, I think it was, and it was said from

Stettin in the Baltics and Trieste in the Adriatic an Iron Curtain

has descended across the continent.

For many, many years there we saw the effort to move that Iron

Curtain line West, and it was in no small measure the accomplishment of this alliance which resulted in the failure of that effort.

In fact, who would have believed even a little more than a decade

ago, or a decade ago, that we would be sitting and talking about

our allies on so many issues—the Middle East, Rambouillet, Russia. Imagine Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic being members of NATO.

We accept this now in such a routine fashion. And yet, if someone sat at that table 12 years ago and suggested that by the end

of this century that we describe what Europe would look like, I suspect there would have been a lot of skeptics, to put it mildly—on

this side of the dais as well as that.

So in the dark moments of where we are, at a particular fact situation, as we look at how we are going to resolve this particular

issue, I think it is terribly important, this arrival. Some say you

should not celebrate, that this is not a time to celebrate because

of events in Kosovo.

I disagree heartily. I think this is a time of celebration, of a remarkable alliance, and we should not shrink from that. In fact, I

think as part of the celebration recognizing previous accomplishments and defining future roles may, in fact, contribute to convincing some people in Belgrade and elsewhere that there is a common

determination and resolve here not to back away.

So I am not for fireworks and the like. Don’t misunderstand me.

But I don’t think there ought to be any sense of apology during this

gathering that is occurring.

Mr. Chairman, I was at NATO headquarters back a week or so

ago and got a full briefing from Wes Clark, our Ambassador, and

various other Ambassadors from NATO countries. This person’s

name will go unmentioned, but a senior military officer in the

United States Army and I had a wonderful conversation. By his admission he is getting on in years, as he described it.

Senator BIDEN. You’re narrowing the field there.

Senator DODD. Well, he’s not that senior. But he was telling me

this. He said, you know, I was thinking to myself when I came on

to this job that this is not what I was trained to do. He said I was

trained to believe I had one commander-in-chief, that there were

going to be certain instructions and a certain rule book that I followed, and that everything that I was trained to do was geared to

that. Now, all of a sudden, he said, I am thrown into this situation

where I am dealing with 18 other countries, dealing with different

military structures, and my commanding officer is from a NATO

27

country. This is very confusing. He said it was disturbing to him

and upsetting.

Then he said he woke up the following morning and described

himself looking in the mirror at himself. I will call him Harry,

though that is not his first name. He looked into the mirror and

said to himself: Harry, welcome to the 21st century, and if you are

not willing of understanding how this is going to be in a sense,

then you really don’t belong here doing this. This is going to be,

in a sense, I think how we are going to respond.

Some people once described that the end of the 19th century occurred at Verdun, and that some day someone might look at this

particular period—or even the Persian Gulf conflict, which was a

multinational effort that President Bush orchestrated—as sort of

the end of the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st century

and how we deal with something less than a bipolar world, where

you have Serbian type situations which require the collective activity of an alliance.

We had better figure out how to do it because the alternative is

unacceptable and won’t work, in my view, politically or otherwise.

There will be circumstances, I suspect, where we will have to act

in our own self-interest because others may disagree. But I am

hoping that will be more the exception rather than the rule because I don’t think that will sustain itself for very long.

So, aside from dealing with the particular fact situation in front

of us, it seems to me that it is going to be critically important that

this work for a lot of reasons, not the least of which is the future

of this alliance or alliance reactions to these kinds of situations.

Having said that to you, let me raise an issue that Senator Bob

Bennett of Utah and I have been working on a lot. I raised it when

I was in Brussels. It is the Y2K issue and as it relates to the NATO

structure.

We were talking about institutions and organizations being Y2K

ready. Obviously, in integrating 19 nations, some of which have

varying degrees of success and compliance with this issue, the obvious question I have is could you give me an assessment of how

NATO is doing on Y2K issues? Are we going to be a compatible alliance and organization in 254 days, which is what we have left between now and January 1, 2000?

Mr. KRAMER. The answer is I think we will be all right in NATO.

You said yourself that the different countries are achieving full

compliance at different rates and that is certainly true in NATO.

I have not gone back recently—we sort of keep charts on these

things, as you would imagine, and actually looked at the charts—

but I am guardedly optimistic that we will be able to conduct operations over the millennium date change and that any residual

problems will be solved expeditiously.

The second point on that is very important, again, as you implied, to carry back to not only NATO but also to the military establishments of these countries and beyond that. Even if one just

looks at a security issue, there are lots of nonsecurity activities

that dramatically affect how your military is operating.

In this regard, again, there are widely disparate levels of

achievement in the different countries.

28

We have a huge effort in the Pentagon now not only internally

but also to work with other countries, as does the whole Government, and we are really pushing forward.

In general, I expect that we will have pretty good, but not perfect, success. But I don’t think you need to be overly concerned

from a military operational standpoint but I think there will be a

satisfactory result.

Senator DODD. Just quickly, Mr. Chairman, has there been some

product that this special committee that Majority Leader Lott and

Leader Daschle formed where we could get some sort of report—

however you want to transmit it to us, perhaps classified to some

degree—where we could get some up to date as possible assessment

of how this is going?

Mr. KRAMER. I think that is a very good idea.

Why don’t I arrange to get an assessment. If we can give it to

you unclassified, we obviously will. Then if it needs more detail, we

will do that. There are people who are working on this every day

both in the Pentagon and throughout the Government. I am not

one of them. I am just giving my best understanding. We will bring

it to you.

Senator DODD. By the way, when I talk about this, they were upbeat about it and how things were progressing. I met with the ministry of defense in France about this same issue and they were very

positive about where they are. Although they are not part of the

NATO military structure, they were fairly confident from their perspective that things are working well.

I am not suggesting by my question that I know something other

than that at all, but it might help to have that report.

Mr. KRAMER. We will bring that to you, Senator.

Mr. KRAMER. May I comment for a minute, Mr. Chairman, on the

broad point that the Senator made, in fact that all of you have

made?

I have more or less worldwide responsibilities, so I have not only

Europe, but the Middle East, Africa, the Far East, et cetera.

In all of these areas, it is our preference, if we can, to work with

our allies and friends. That implies coalition, a word that, as you

correctly suggest, is often associated with the Gulf War.

The Gulf War or, as Senator Biden said, World War II, involved

a lot of political activities that helped shape military activities, all

of which were ultimately successful. I can give you a list from my

own knowledge of a number of operations in World War II that

were precisely as you say, Senator, and in the Gulf War itself. One

of the things that we properly credit the President with was keeping the coalition together.

Well, the reason he got credit was because it was not so easy to

do.

We also have a coalition here in NATO and we want to work

that. It is not surprising that it takes some work.

There is another aspect we also, all of us—myself, Secretary

Grossman, all of you—have worked on—the issue of having the Europeans do more. As they do more, naturally they want to have a

say. With all due respect, I think Prime Minister Thatcher when

she said what she did—I am happy with the duty to lead. I am not

29

so sure that you can get someone to say it is their duty to follow,

which is more or less what she said.

We have to create the conditions in which they find it appropriate to follow the lead. We should not shirk from leadership. We

should assert it.

One of the things that we worked on very hard which was not

mentioned here, which I want to point out to you, is that in 1996,

we had the Berlin Ministerial. We set up an arrangement for

ESDI. The code words were ‘‘separable but not separate.’’ What this

meant was that NATO would be the organization of choice. But

when NATO chose not to be engaged for one reason or another—

and usually it was thought that it was because the United States

would be involved elsewhere and, therefore, could not engage—the

allies could use the NATO framework in a separable fashion to do

what they had to do themselves.

We said that we supported it. I worked on this a great deal personally and I think it is a very good solution. It is the kind of solution that keeps NATO in the forefront of the ESDI effort.

So you can both have ESDI and you can have the European

Union, as appropriate, or the Western European Union.

Senator BIDEN. Is Albania a representative example of that,

when the Europeans moved not in a formal sense? I mean, is that

conceptually the kind of thing we are talking about?

Mr. KRAMER. It is, with the exception of the fact, Senator, that

they did not do the so-called Operation Alba, under NATO.

What is a good example of that, actually, though in a certain

sense not quite, either, is the so-called Extraction Force, where it

was under NATO command but the United States did not have

people in the Extraction Force, you will recall. My round figures

suggest there were about 2,000 or 3,000 European troops that went

down to support the then KADOM and extract—it is not quite the

same because it was still with Wes Clark in the chain of command.

But they are moving toward it. I don’t want to give them too

much credit. I mean, one of the things that we all properly say is

they need to do more. That is why Prime Minister Blair’s statement is so worthwhile, because he said that, too.

Senator DODD. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Senator SMITH. Gentlemen, we thank you both.

Senator BIDEN. May I just ask one question, Mr. Chairman?

Senator SMITH. Sure.

Senator BIDEN. I may have misunderstood you, Mr. Secretary,

but when you were talking about weapons of mass destruction,

what did you say? Did you say that the alliance, that in the new

Strategic Concept, that there was a—maybe you can tell me where

weapons of mass destruction as an element of this comes in?

Mr. KRAMER. There are two things. Let me say, No. 1, that the

new Strategic Concept includes weapons of mass destruction as a

problem that must be dealt with, a problem of the 21st century. It’s

not the only one. I also mentioned terrorism, some ethnic conflicts

and the like, as well as the conventional kinds of issues.

The second thing I said is that there is a specific initiative that

will be approved at the summit, called, brilliantly enough, the

Weapons of Mass Destruction Initiative. This will commit the U.S.

30

and our allies to work on these kinds of issues and to be able to

respond to their use.

This initiative would include some kinds of things that have been

going on but would intensify others, such as passive defense, dealing with the consequences of the use of, say, a chemical weapon or

a biological weapon.

Senator BIDEN. I guess I am getting hung up on respond versus

information and intelligence.

In other words, I think it is good if you get what you have stated.

Am I giving more weight to the change in what has been the verbiage in the last couple of weeks?

I think we were talking about in terms of weapons of mass destruction the sharing of information and intelligence as opposed to

responding to the awareness of a threat that we learn as a consequence of the sharing of information and intelligence.

I would like to see the response part. But I’m not sure I do.

Mr. KRAMER. In broad terms, there are three parts. First of all,

there will be a so-called information center, which will be the focus.

I think you have heard Secretary Cohen talk to you about that.

That center would be a focus in the first instance for sharing information, precisely as you suggest.

The second part, which actually has gone on for a while but

which we will intensify, is to increase the capability of allies forces

to operate, for example, in chemical and biological environments.

A third part will be to work with the allies—we have not done

this yet, so I cannot give you specifics—to deal with the consequences. Let me give an example I have used in talking with allies.

If you have a biological or a chemical weapon used, the first responders naturally would be police and firemen in any country. If

it is a major event, they are likely to be overwhelmed. If you are

in a smaller country in the alliance, the military will be called in,

but maybe it cannot do enough, maybe it does not have all the capabilities.

The Czechs, for example, have good decontamination capabilities.

Maybe they could bring them to another country. It is that kind of

thing. We have not worked out the specifics, but we will get approval to do so.

Senator BIDEN. What I thought you meant by response was, to

take a hypothetical, tomorrow we learn that Milosevic has—I

should not use that example. Never mind, I won’t try to quantify

it.

In other words, I mean responding to a threat as opposed to a

use.

Mr. KRAMER. We do have the capability, as you well know, to respond. One of the things in an associated context but not that of

the weapons of mass destruction initiative that has come up—and

Secretary Grossman and I, as well as our principals and the President have been very strong about that—is that one reason to maintain the NATO nuclear doctrine as it is, is potentially, if necessary,

to have that threat out there to deter the use of WMD’s. I think

that is more what you are talking about. But that is not this initiative.

31

Senator BIDEN. Mr. Chairman, for the press who are here, I am

sincere when I say that my reference to Milosevic and to weapons

was a bad example which I will try to make up because I know of

no evidence of that. I don’t want anyone walking out of here saying

Biden started asking questions about Milosevic and chemical weapons and then withdrew.

I was trying to think of a simple example.

Senator DODD. They probably will do that, Joe, anyway.

Senator BIDEN. I just want to say that I know of no such capability.

Senator SMITH. Thank you, gentlemen. Both of you have been

very helpful. We thank you for your time and what you are doing.

Mr. KRAMER. We appreciate it and are happy to be here.

Mr. GROSSMAN. Thank you.

Senator SMITH. We are pleased now to call up our third panel,

Hon. Stephen Hadley, partner in Shea and Gardner; Dr. Stephen

Cambone, research director for the Institute for National Security

Studies of the National Defense University; and Dr. F. Stephen

Larrabee, senior analyst of the RAND Corporation.

Gentlemen, welcome. We will start with Mr. Hadley.

We welcome you, sir.

STATEMENT OF HON. STEPHEN HADLEY, PARTNER, SHEA AND

GARDNER, WASHINGTON, DC

Mr. HADLEY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. It is a pleasure to be

here this afternoon with the committee.

It is hard to know how best to contribute to what has been a very

useful discussion. I thought what I might try to do is the following.

I have spent time over the last week or so in an effort to try to

gather what information I could about what actually is going to be

in this new Strategic Concept and to try to compare it to the 1991

version, which is a document I participated in preparing, and also

with the criteria in the Kyl amendment.

This is obviously a bit difficult. There is not a final version, at

least that I have been able to identify. But there are still a number

of conclusions that I felt comfortable drawing which I thought I

would share with you this afternoon.

It is still a very general document. In tone it is not that much

different from the 1991 document, in terms of the generality of its

statements.

On Senator Warner’s concern, this 1991 document and my understanding of the successor document, are not going to be self-executing documents. These are not documents that commit to specific operations. They are, rather, a set of general principles and those

general principles will obviously have to be applied to specific

cases.

As to those principles, there appears to be a lot of continuity with

the 1991 document and, indeed, the key elements of that document,

which are reflected in the Kyl amendment, so far as I can determine, remain largely in the new Strategic Concept.

So, for example, the primacy of collective defense, the importance

of U.S. leadership, the list of security threats that are contained in

the Kyl amendment and were discussed in the 1991 version, are

still there. The need to enhance power projection capabilities, espeVerDate 11-SEP-98 14:44 Sep 20, 1999 Jkt 549297 PO 00000 Frm 00034 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6602 58335 SFRELA1 PsN: SFRELA1
32

cially of our allies, continues to be an area of emphasis and even,

as Secretary Kramer outlined, a greater area of emphasis.

It continues to reaffirm the importance of the integrated military

structure. So far as I can determine, it continues to talk about the

need for a role for nuclear weapons in deterrence and the need for

greater burden sharing.

So as I read it, the guts of these principles, so far as I can determine, continue to play in the new Strategic Concept.

There are some new areas of emphasis. Peacekeeping, humanitarian missions, so-called peace building and peace support, these

are new missions. My sense is that there is going to be much more

discussion of these missions than there was in the 1991 version.

I think we are going to find in that document, when it finally

comes out, a certain amount of reprioritization in the emphasis between safeguarding the freedom and security of the members of the

alliance versus creating a just and peaceful order in Europe. I

think, consistent with the emphasis on peace operations, peacekeeping, humanitarian assistance, we are probably going to see

more emphasis on creating a just and peaceful order in Europe.

I think that is, in fact, one of the things that has Senator Warner

concerned, because that is, obviously, new territory. It reaches beyond the notion of NATO as a strictly defensive alliance. It is new

territory and we are going to be doing a lot of learning from Kosovo

on that.

The only thing I would offer to Senator Warner is that we are

probably only going to begin learning the lessons of Kosovo 6

months out, and my guess is we will probably start out by drawing

the wrong lessons—whether we win or lose.

The learning process is going to take a long time and, quite

frankly, whether we adopt the Strategic Concept now or 6 months

from now, it is going to be only an interim Strategic Concept in the

same way that the 1991 version was only an interim Strategic Concept. It held up rather well, but the truth is Europe is changing

too fast to do anything more.

In any event, that is how it looks to me from what I can gather

about what you are liable to see when the Strategic Concept comes

out.

Thank you very much.

Senator BIDEN [presiding]. Thank you, Mr. Hadley.

Dr. Cambone.

STATEMENT OF DR. STEPHEN CAMBONE, RESEARCH DIRECTOR, INSTITUTE FOR NATIONAL SECURITY STUDIES, NATIONAL DEFENSE UNIVERSITY, WASHINGTON, DC

Dr. CAMBONE. Senators, thank you for the opportunity to appear

before the committee today.

Like Mr. Hadley, I went about checking sources and methods

and seeing what one could learn about the Concept. Indeed, I

would share with him the same conclusions, that basically we have

a document which attempts to maintain much of what was in the

old document but does, indeed, add some significant features, particularly with respect to the concepts that he outlined.

I would like to concentrate my remarks on that issue particularly

because I think that this is an occasion of rare moment in public

33

policymaking, when the theory and the practice of politics come together. It does not happen often, but it has happened here, I think.

What I believe we are seeing in the case of the Strategic Concept

for NATO is the basic core idea, which has been collective defense

of the sovereign member States of the alliance as an applique being

put over it. This applique is drawn from concepts of collective security, concepts that have grown up over the course of the last 50

years or so and have gained considerable currency, particularly in

Europe, though less so here in the United States. But there is a

core of opinion here in the United States who believes that indeed

we should be evolving our policies in the direction of the principles

of collective security.

Now, in principle there is nothing to be feared of collective security, as such. But it does take you down the path of trying to create

international communities. It tries to create a community in which

there are shared opinions and values and, indeed, then tries to enforce in that community those opinions and values.

Now a case like Kosovo raises a very interesting difficulty because this is clearly not the kind of activity that fits within the

international community. So how is one to deal with it? We will

come back to that.

From the point of view of collective defense organizations, it is

the territorial defense, political independence, and territorial integrity that one worries about. One views a situation like Kosovo with

great disdain and disgust. But it, by itself, does not motivate necessarily States to intervene.

A collective Security Concept does. This is the clash we have here

now, because with collective defense organizations, like NATO,

they are made up primarily of States like ours—decent States in

which citizenry is sovereign and they are themselves decent and

are brought to the point of abhorrence when they see something

like Kosovo. So they do wish to act.

So how then do we square the principles of collective security

and the principles of collective defense? We have not figured that

out yet.

But the mandate issue is what I believe is the effort to do that.

There are those who would seek a mandate, precisely for the purposes of imposing a collective Security Concept on our activities in

Europe and, quite frankly, elsewhere in the world.

For that reason, I am of the view that that approach to mandate

should be resisted and rejected because the United States is not,

given the sovereignty of our publics and our obligations and duties

around the world, in any position to bend to the will of the international community, as expressed through a mandate.

On the other hand, there is no reason to be afraid of a mandate

if, indeed, what that mandate does is codify into international practice and law the kinds of decent activity we believe ought to be conducted by sovereign States.

So, again, there is a way that one has to weigh the purpose of

a mandate when thinking about the subject.

Although the concept, as I understand it, will not include a requirement for mandates, the issue of mandates will not, with that

decision, be over. Even in Kosovo, it will not be over. We have two

major issues before us. One is war termination and what our aims

34

are going to be, what the terms of the peace are going to be. Then

we have post-war stability in Europe and in the Balkans’ region in

particular.

I am almost certain, as I am sitting here, that the issue of a

mandate will arise once again and people will demand that a mandate be sought with respect to war aims and to the post-war stability in the region.

We are going to have to be quite clear, I think, here in the

United States, about which approach we are going to take for those

mandates.

Let me touch on two other things. One is the defense capability’s

initiative, which was raised in our prior panel. I have again looked

at some of the issues that are involved there. There is great promise that, indeed, our allies are going to do what we are asking them

to do, and that is to improve their capability to conduct military

operations.

But the good news, Senator Biden, as you said earlier, is also the

bad news because I believe the principle which has moved our European allies to agree to the kinds of improvements that we are

seeking is that they have discovered that the military capability

necessary to conduct peacekeeping operations is virtually identical

to the type of military capability needed to conduct core missions

within the alliance.

So, even having succeeded on the issue of the capability’s initiative, we will not have put to rest the question of what kind of missions the alliance will have as its priorities. Rather, instead we will

assure we have an alliance that can conduct missions across the

full spectrum of missions.

Last, on the ESDI, ESDI is, I believe, a marvelous opportunity

for the United States and it is a marvelous opportunity particularly

in the context of Kosovo. This is because, as we move to war termination and post-war policy, I believe it is in the interest of the

United States to assure that our allies take the lead in pacifying

the region, in working to contain the rump of Serbia, and working

on the post-war stability in the region.

Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Dr. Cambone is in the appendix on

page 45.]

Senator SMITH [presiding]. Thank you.

Dr. Larrabee, I would point out that we have a vote coming up.

How long is your prepared statement?

Dr. LARRABEE. It should take about 8 or 9 minutes, I think.

Senator SMITH. Does anyone on the panel have a time problem?

Dr. LARRABEE. I don’t.

Dr. CAMBONE. [Nods negatively]

Mr. HADLEY. [Nods negatively]

Senator SMITH. Then we will go to vote.

Senator BIDEN. We only have about 7 minutes to vote. That is

why we had better not start your statement now.

Do you mind if we go to vote?

Dr. LARRABEE. OK. If you want to take a break, fine.

Senator SMITH. The committee will stand in recess.

[Recess]

Senator SMITH. We will reconvene this committee hearing.

35

Dr. Larrabee, we apologize to you and to all of our panel. We

welcome your testimony.

STATEMENT OF DR. F. STEPHEN LARRABEE, SENIOR ANALYST,

RAND CORPORATION, WASHINGTON, DC

Dr. LARRABEE. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I welcome

the opportunity to share with you and your distinguished committee my views on the key challenges facing NATO at the Washington summit and beyond. I have submitted a complete version of my

testimony for the record. However, in my remarks here I would like

to concentrate on what I see as three main challenges facing NATO

at the summit and beyond.

First is to adopt a new Strategic Concept which will prepare

NATO to meet the challenges it is likely to face in the 21st century.

Second is to manage the enlargement process in a manner that

enhances European stability.

Third is to achieve a satisfactory settlement of the Kosovo conflict that ensures the realization of NATO’s principal objectives and

preserves the cohesion of the alliance.

Let me address each of these issues separately.

First is the Strategic Concept. I believe the main focus at the

Washington summit should be on deciding NATO’s strategic purposes in the coming decades. The summit provides an opportunity

to articulate a bold vision of NATO’s purposes and to restructure

its forces to meet the challenges it is likely to face in the coming

decades.

Many of these challenges are outside NATO’s territory, either on

Europe’s periphery or even beyond Europe’s borders. The alliance,

therefore, needs to develop a broader definition of the threats to its

interests and restructure its forces to adequately address these new

threats and challenges.

Some critics argue that NATO does not need to change, that it

has worked well for 50 years and we should not tamper with it—

in short, if it ain’t broke, why fix it?

But this view ignores the significant changes in the security environment that have taken place since 1989.

I do not believe, Mr. Chairman, that it will be possible to sustain

public support for NATO over the long run either here or in Europe

if the alliance is primarily designed and configured to defend

against a threat that has largely disappeared while, at the same

time, ignoring the most pressing threats to allied security.

At the same time the nature of the U.S. relationship with Europe

needs to change. We need partners willing and capable of sharing

the burdens of responsibility. Our European allies need to be able

to share more of the responsibilities, including those in the military

sphere, to deter threats to our common interests. As noted, many,

if not most, of these threats are likely to be beyond NATO’s borders.

This is not a question of Europe needing more forces. Europe

today has more than enough forces. The problem is that European

forces are not structured to deal with the types of security threats

that the alliance is likely to face in the future.

Most European forces, Britain and France excepted to a large degree, are still configured to defend alliance borders which are no

36

longer seriously threatened. These forces need to be reconfigured in

order to be able to project and to sustain power beyond the alliance’s borders. I think the Kosovo crisis only underscores this problem, with the United States providing 80 percent of the usable

power projection forces.

The forces also need to be interoperable; that is, they need to be

able to work together effectively as part of a coalition. Thus we

need to insure that, as these forces modernize, they do so in ways

that allow them to operate effectively together.

Clearly, collective defense, Article V, should remain a core alliance mission. But in the future, most of the challenges that NATO

faces will be non-Article V challenges and will not involve a direct

threat to NATO territory. Thus the alliance will increasingly need

the capability to deploy forces outside NATO territory.

This will require forces that are more mobile, flexible, sustainable, survivable, and interoperable. The administration’s defense

capabilities initiative is designed to encourage improvements in

precisely these areas.

Finally, the alliance needs to preserve its freedom to act in a crisis. While it is preferable that NATO obtain a mandate from the

U.N. for any non-Article V actions, there are some instances, such

as Kosovo, where military action on NATO’s part may be required

even without a U.N. mandate. Such action should be the exception

and not the rule. But it would be unwise to include language in the

Strategic Concept that would prevent NATO from acting without a

U.N. mandate.

The second key challenge NATO faces is managing the process

of enlargement in a way that enhances European stability. In

structuring the next round of enlargement, NATO will have to balance five competing demands.

First is the need to maintain NATO’s cohesion and military effectiveness. As NATO enlarges, it must be able to maintain its core

competencies and military effectiveness. New members need to be

able to contribute not only to NATO’s old missions but to the new

missions as well.

Second is the need to keep the open door credible. NATO will

need to find ways to insure that the open door policy remains credible. I will come back to that. If NATO postpones a second round

of enlargement too long, many prospective members may begin to

lose hope of ever attaining membership. This could undercut the

democratic forces and slow the momentum toward reform in these

countries.

Third is the need to digest the first round. The fate and timing

of a second round will, to a large extent, depend on how well NATO

succeeds in integrating the first three new members. If they perform poorly and do not live up to expectations, this could diminish

the willingness of NATO members, particularly the U.S. public, to

support a second round.

Fourth is the need to maintain a viable partnership with Russia.

As in the first round of enlargement, NATO will need to take into

consideration the impact of enlargement on relations with Russia.

Moscow will need time to adjust to the new strategic realities and

NATO should be careful not to overburden the Russian political

process.

37

At the same time, NATO needs to maintain momentum in the

enlargement process and insure the credibility of the open door policy.

Fifth is the need to maintain internal consensus within NATO

itself.

Some members, such as France and Italy, have pressed for the

inclusion of Slovenia and Romania in an early second round. Others, such as Denmark and Norway, favor including the Baltic

States. NATO will have to balance these internal pressures to forge

an alliance-wide consensus.

These factors, in my view, argue for a deliberate, measured approach to further enlargement, one that gives NATO time to sort

out its strategic priorities and digest the first round and also gives

Russia time to adjust to the new strategic situation while making

clear that NATO enlargement is a continuing process. At the same

time, NATO needs to lay out a clearer roadmap at the Washington

summit which identifies concrete steps that will be taken to insure

that the door to NATO membership remains open.

As part of this effort, NATO, in my view, should announce at the

summit that it will review the performance of the aspirants at a

special summit in the year 2001 with an eye to identifying specific

candidates for a second round if their performance in the interval

warrants it.

Foreign and defense ministers should be tasked with preparing

a progress report similar to the report on enlargement published by

NATO in September, 1995, which could be presented at the ministerial meeting prior to the special summit. This report should assess the progress made by the aspirants and identify potential candidate members for a second round.

Such a procedure would help enhance the credibility of the open

door and give prospective candidate members an incentive to undertake the necessary reforms to improve their qualifications for

membership. It would also buy time for NATO to digest the first

round and give Russia time to gradually accustom itself to the fact

that NATO enlargement is an ongoing process.

The third and the most pressing challenge and most immediate

challenge the alliance faces is successfully managing the conflict in

Kosovo. Kosovo, in my view, is a defining issue for the alliance.

How the conflict eventually is resolved will have a major impact on

NATO’s future, especially on NATO’s ability to carry out its new

missions. A failure to achieve NATO’s objectives in Kosovo would

undermine NATO’s credibility and ability to act as an effective security manager in post-cold war Europe.

In my view, NATO was right in undertaking the current military

action, and I agree very much with Senator Biden that if the

United States and the allies had sat idly by and done nothing to

stop Milosevic’s campaign of ethnic cleansing, NATO’s credibility

and effectiveness would seriously have been undermined.

Many Europeans and Americans would have asked what good is

NATO if it cannot deal with the most pressing security problems

in Europe.

At the same time, as Secretary Grossman noted, the United

States and its European allies need to look beyond the current conflict in Kosovo and develop a comprehensive, long-term stabilizaVerDate 11-SEP-98 14:44 Sep 20, 1999 Jkt 549297 PO 00000 Frm 00040 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6602 58335 SFRELA1 PsN: SFRELA1
38

tion strategy for Southeastern Europe. This strategy should have

a political, economic, and security component and should be designed to integrate Southeastern Europe into a broad Euro-Atlantic

framework.

The European Union should take the lead in promoting the economic component. This should include a broad plan for the economic reconstruction not just of Kosovo but of the entire region.

The end goals should be a closer association and eventual economic

integration of the region into the European Union.

This stabilization strategy, however, should also contain an important security component. Once the Kosovo conflict is over, the

United States and its allies should consider stationing a stabilization force not only in Kosovo but also in other countries on the periphery, especially Macedonia and Albania, provided, of course,

those countries wish such a force.

This stabilization force, which could be NATO led, would be designed to provide reassurance and establish a security umbrella

under which these countries could carry out a program of comprehensive economic and political reform.

As in Bosnia, the majority of the stabilization forces could and

should be provided by our European allies. They have the greatest

stake in security in the region. Moreover, they have been clamoring

to assume more responsibility for alliance security.

This would provide an opportunity for them to give substance to

their ambitions.

The U.S., however, should also contribute to the stabilization

force. We cannot expect to claim leadership in the alliance unless

we are willing to share the risks with our European allies.

Some U.S. forces could be redeployed from Germany to participate in these stabilization missions in Southeastern Europe. With

the end of the cold war and the entry of Hungary, Poland, and the

Czech Republic into NATO, the United States no longer needs

some 60,000 troops stationed on the central front to defend borders

that are largely no longer threatened.

Indeed, it may be time for the United States to consider a general redeployment of some of these troops to Southeastern Europe.

After all, it is this region, not the central front, where the most serious security problems in Europe are likely to be in the future.

Such a comprehensive stabilization strategy obviously cannot be

carried out overnight. It will take time and a significant commitment of resources, both on the part of the United States and its

European allies. But the price tag of lives and treasure is likely to

be significantly higher if such a comprehensive effort is not undertaken and the problems of Southeastern Europe are allowed to fester or continue to be addressed only in piecemeal fashion.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I welcome the opportunity

to answer any questions related to my testimony.

[The prepared statement of Dr. Larrabee is in the appendix on

page 59.]

Senate SMITH. Thank you, Dr. Larrabee, and thanks to all of you.

If you have some time—I have another 15 minutes—I would love

to pick your brains as I see some of the best brains on NATO in

the country right here at this dias.

39

I think every witness today has said in one way or the other that

we have to win in Kosovo; for NATO’s future we have to win now

that we have undertaken this.

As I understand the objectives that NATO has laid out, they are

the withdrawal of the Serbs from Kosovo, at least the security

forces of the Serbians; the return of the Kosovar Albanians to

Kosovo; allowing them an autonomous—not an independent, but an

autonomous—future; and an international peacekeeping force to

provide security.

Now those are our goals that, as I understand it, constitute victory.

Conversely, if I were Mr. Milosevic, I would be saying that what

I want out of this is to stay in power, stay alive, increase my power

if I can, and to get Kosovo ethnically cleansed.

If that is victory to him and the other is victory to us, we are

losing. We are losing.

It seems to me that we are not employing the means to achieve

this political end, parts of which I don’t even think are realistic. I

mean, autonomy? Who wants autonomy? The Albanians do not.

The Serbs won’t give it. So we are going to impose it through airplanes?

I don’t know where in military history armies surrender to airplanes. Moreover, I don’t know where in history you can retake territory unless you are prepared to stand on it.

This leads me back to some of my opening comments. Have we

created in NATO an operational dinosaur? This is an open question. I don’t have the answer and I would love for you all to comment on that. Are we winning, are we losing, and what have we

created here?

Dr. LARRABEE. Mr. Chairman, if I could address that question,

I think you have to distinguish here between goals and strategy.

I think the goals are right. I think NATO has the means. The question is whether it is employing the right strategy.

Your remarks suggest that you do not think so. My testimony in

full also suggests that I do not think so and that I agree with you

that air power alone is unlikely to achieve the objectives that

NATO has set out. But it is not that we do not have the means

or the capability. It is a question of whether we are employing

them correctly or not.

Senator SMITH. And do we have the will for it? I mean, I don’t

have the answer to that. One of the points of these kinds of hearings is for the congressional branch to nudge the executive branch

and we are trying to nudge them pretty hard right now because,

frankly, I see us losing the war.

Mr. HADLEY. I would just add a political point. I agree with your

analysis that we have a mismatch between declared objectives and

the means to achieve them. But to conclude that NATO is a dinosaur and is at fault, I think that I would disagree with. NATO is

an instrument. It is an instrument that reflects and does the will

of its members largely under U.S. leadership. I think the responsibility for the mismatch between objectives and means really

starts with our own policy.

So I think we have to look really here at home to see if the President can put together a consensus to bridge the gap. But I think

40

that is where the problem starts, with the policies pursued by the

members of NATO. NATO is not an independent actor here. It is

really an instrument of these countries.

That would be my comment.

Dr. CAMBONE. This goes, Senator, to the point about the war

aims. The set of war aims that NATO has put together that we

here in the United States have adopted as our own do not, as you

point out, match with the war aims of Serbia. Therefore, seeing

your way through to how you come to a successful conclusion to the

war, that is, how do you, in fact, muster NATO’s capabilities and

how do you apply them appropriately becomes the muddle that we

are in now.

We are operating against one set of objectives and he against a

different set. We have chosen to do it by different means. The

means we have chosen we thought to be consistent with the aims

we had.

Senator SMITH. Can we reverse field and change those?

Dr. CAMBONE. Therein lies the rub. Yes, you can reverse field.

Senator SMITH. It seems to me the means we have chosen have

said to Milosevic in very clear terms how he can win, which is we

have telegraphed our pain threshold, that we cannot take casualties. Therefore, all you have to do is carry on your ethnic cleansing

as quickly as you can and hunker down in your bunkers at night

and, guess what, when the bombs stop falling, you are the last man

standing and you win.

Dr. CAMBONE. I appreciate that. Changing field, though, requires

changing aims because, unless you change the aims, you cannot

muster the proper strategy. I think, consistent with your view of

Milosevic, which I think is shared by many, there would have to

be two, it seems to me. One is the defeat of his military forces, and

his security forces and, oh, by the way, the police forces that are

in Kosovo. Second, NATO would have to organize its strategy in

war in such a way that in the end it is capable of imposing a peace.

That’s hard.

Senator SMITH. Are the American people and the people of Europe’s member countries likely to support the evolution of our

means to achieve our goals?

Dr. CAMBONE. The means, yes. I believe that’s so. It is the question of whether they are prepared to support a change in aims that

is at the heart of this crisis, I think.

Dr. LARRABEE. May I just add a point and slightly disagree?

I think the aims, as stated by NATO, are the correct aims. I am

just looking at what Solana has said: verifiable stop to all military

action and immediate ending of the violence and repression; second, withdrawal of the Yugoslav Army, police, and paramilitary

forces; stationing in Kosovo of an international military presence;

and the unconditional safe return of the refugees.

The question is whether the means that we are employing, as

you suggested, will achieve those aims. I would not personally

change those aims. I would change the means because I do not believe the means that we are using—air power alone—will be able

to achieve those aims.

Mr. HADLEY. Senator?

Senator SMITH. Yes, go ahead.

41

Mr. HADLEY. I think one of the things that Senators can do to

help in this debate is this. I think the aims for the moment are

fixed. There is a discussion in the United States about means and

people are going quickly to the notion of whether we should put in

ground forces.

But putting in ground forces is not a silver bullet. You can put

in ground forces and, if you do it in the wrong way, in a way that

does not achieve our objectives, you can make the situation worse

rather than better. One of the things you can say to this administration is, OK, let’s talk about ground forces. What are the objectives for those ground forces? What are the requirements to achieve

them? And are you willing to get out of the way—your point about

the instrument—and let the military do what it needs to do to

achieve those objectives?

I think the debate about ground forces misses the point. The

question is whether ground forces will be a way of correcting the

mismatch between objectives and means. If so, how do you do it,

what is the strategy?

I think pushing the administration on that point is something

that needs to be done. I do not hear it in the public debate yet.

Senator SMITH. Well, we are pushing them. That is one of the

points of this meeting.

Steve Hadley, I wonder if you can tell me this. You spoke earlier

about nuclear policy in NATO. I wonder if you can tell me what

the disadvantages are of a no first use policy. I have my own views

on that. I wonder what yours are.

Mr. HADLEY. The problem of no first use I think really comes in

two forms. One is without having a chemical weapon capability

ourselves, being in the process of destroying our chemical weapons,

and without having any biological weapon capability, there is the

concern about deterring the use of those kinds of capabilities

against our forces.

I think one of the things we learned in the Gulf War is that the

possibility of a nuclear response was something that Saddam Hussein had in mind and it influenced his decision about whether to

get ready to use chemical or biological weapons.

One of the problems of no first use is it does not deal with the

full range of weapons of mass destruction, which is biological and

chemical. And we have used our nuclear weapons in some sense to

deter the use of those.

Then the other problem, of course, is a State like North Korea

and the conventional military capability it has within a very short

distance of Seoul, South Korea, and the need to deter that capability.

I think one of the things the administration has struggled with

is what would have been the effect of a no first use declaration on

the North Koreans.

So there are very practical issues that I think make it very difficult for us to consider adopting the no first use formula.

Senator SMITH. So as you understand the nuclear doctrine being

advanced and the new strategic concept in NATO, is it adequate?

Mr. HADLEY. From what I can determine—and nuclear issues, as

you know, are very neuralgic in the alliance and there may be

some last minute change—but from what I can determine, the

42

Strategic Concept on which they are working involves no significant change in the statements with respect to nuclear weapons.

Maybe the others have other insights.

Dr. LARRABEE. I have not seen the statement itself, but I think

it is fair to say that, with the exception of Canada and, initially,

Germany, none of the other members of the alliance is in favor of

changing the nuclear strategy at this time. Indeed, I would point

out that, when the German foreign minister made his statements

about the desirability for changing this, one of the first countries

to oppose that was Poland.

Senator SMITH. Good. Do you think the administration performed

well in preparing for and negotiating this new Strategic Concept?

Did we need a new Strategic Concept?

Dr. LARRABEE. In my remarks, I tried to suggest very strongly

that I think we do, although I do agree with Steve Hadley that if

one reads very carefully the original Strategic Concept, there is a

lot in the original one looking forward to some of the changes in

the security environment. But, on the other hand, one has to accept

that that old Strategic Concept, which was adopted in November,

1991, occurred before the collapse of the Soviet Union, before the

real onset of the war in Bosnia, before enlargement, before partnerships with Ukraine and Russia and before PfP. So there are a lot

of things that have happened in the meantime that require adjustments, not a whole-scale throwing out.

I think, from what I have seen in the administration I think it

has. I think Secretary Grossman gave a fair rendition that they

took very seriously Senator Kyl’s and the Senate’s admonitions and

have tried to stay within that framework.

Senator SMITH. Maybe each of you would like to take a crack at

that question, the need for a Strategic Concept and the preparation

for it.

Dr. CAMBONE. It is an idea in the proposing that always looks

better than in the doing. For the reasons that Steve Larrabee has

pointed out, there was reason to want to go back and look again

at the Concept.

I don’t know, again, having compared the two documents, one in

draft and the other, many of the paragraphs fall in the same place.

They are numbered in the same way. They say much the same

thing.

There are two differences of note. One is on, in fact, Russia. It

disappears as the problem that was painted in the 1991 Concept.

The second is, significantly, the increased role that is promised for

the alliance in the soft security aspect of affairs in Europe. This is

inescapable.

It is there and I suspect it is going to go forward. I think it has

support here and in Europe. It is something we are going to have

to wrestle with.

Did we have to do this? I don’t think so. But, having done it, we

are now going to have to wrestle with it.

Senator SMITH. Does ESDI worry you? Do you think that is a

good thing?

Dr. CAMBONE. It can be worrisome, again for the reasons that

have been pointed out. If it causes a split in view, then it will be

worrisome and troublesome.

43

But I think, for now, the Europeans understand that they are not

politically nor militarily capable of being independent of the transatlantic security arrangement, and we should use that recognition

as an opportunity to forge a closer tie. I think that, in turn, is

going to rest on some things done here in the Congress, particularly on matters having to do, for example, with infrastructure

funding.

If the United States is prepared to continue to support infrastructure at NATO that will support force projection missions, that

will help. If the United States is prepared to encourage buying European and mergers between U.S. and European firms, that will

help.

But we here need to take some measures as well to hold them

close and not cause them to try to look for ways to drive wedges

into that relationship.

Mr. HADLEY. I think, Senator, that Frank Kramer had a good

point. The Europeans should do more. We should urge them to do

more on burdensharing grounds. But the consequences of that are

that if they actually do do more, they will, like anybody else, want

more of a say. So the alliance management problems that you all

talked about earlier in the hearing are going to get worse rather

than better. But this is the price, I think, of the Europeans really

growing up and taking more responsibility.

Senator SMITH. It is a price worth our paying?

Mr. HADLEY. On balance, it is a price worth our paying.

Senator SMITH. That is my own judgment, too. But I have to express, as I began this hearing, my fear about NATO’s future because I think the American people will wake up to what NATO

means both grateful for what it has done—winning the cold war

without firing a shot—but also wanting nothing to do with what

they see it being in the future, which is a European police force for

these regional kinds of problems presented by the Balkans.

It is very likely what could be the reaction. And there is in both

political parties strong and growing isolationist feelings. Kosovo is

either going to magnify those or diminish those, depending on the

outcome.

Dr. LARRABEE. But, Senator, if I could add, one of the things the

administration has tried to do is to focus on conflicts beyond

NATO’s borders not only in Europe but looking further afield. In

part, I think what is behind this—and I think it was mentioned

here by some—is a sense that we want partners to be able to help

us be able to deal with these conflicts, not only in Kosovo and not

simply peacekeeping forces, but to able to deal with high intensity

conflicts, and that we should try to strike a new strategic bargain

with the allies so that, as we participate in missions, such as

Kosovo, they also take on more responsibilities outside of Europe

and outside the NATO area.

But to do that, you have to have some of the types of initiatives

I think the administration is promoting, particularly the WMD initiative, the DCI, the defense capabilities initiative, and the common operational vision.

All of these are designed to get improvements in allied forces and

particularly European forces to be able to have the type of capabilities that would deal with these types of challenges.

44

Senator SMITH. Are there any concluding comments?

Dr. CAMBONE. I share your concern about public opinion. It

brings me back to the issue of war aims.

My fear is that we will keep the war aims the same, we will commit American ground forces to them, and we are going to find a

satisfactory achievement of those aims extraordinarily elusive. It is

going to be very hard to do in time. I mean, it is going to require

a long-term, large-scale investment, I believe, in the region as a

consequence of what we committed ourselves to do.

So if we are going to commit the ground forces and win the war,

we have to step back and ask do we have the aims that will allow

us both to win the war and have an outcome over time in which

we have a pacification in Kosovo, a containment of Serbia, and regional stability in a way that minimizes the long-term commitment

of American military forces in the region.

The aims of the war are intimately associated with that longerterm consequence. I think we have to think very carefully about

those aims before the troops go in.

Senator SMITH. You have the final word.

Mr. HADLEY. I think you are right to be worried. If you read this

1991 document, it is all about defense and defense in the event of

attack. While it mentions interests, it is heavily territorial. That,

I think, is what the Americans understand about NATO.

I think they also understand the importance of the Gulf. I am

not sure they understand Kosovo. I, with you, am concerned that

Kosovo will fall between two stools. That is why the public debate

and the public education, getting the aims and the means right, is

critical. This is because I think Kosovo is a stretch for where the

American people are right now.

I think you are right to be worried.

Senator SMITH. Well, I hope I am wrong, but only time will tell.

We thank you all. This has been a very productive hearing.

With that, this hearing is adjourned.

[Whereupon, at 4:35 p.m., the committee adjourned.]

(45)

1Dr. Cambone is the Director of Research, Institute for National Strategic Studies, National

Defense University, Washington, DC. The views expressed in this statement and in his oral

presentation are his personal views and do not represent those of the National Defense University or the Department of Defense.

APPENDIX

PREPARED STATEMENT OF DR. STEPHEN A. CAMBONE 1

ISSUES SURROUNDING THE 50TH ANNIVERSARY SUMMIT OF NATO

I. Introduction

Mr. Chairman, it is an honor to appear before you and other Members of the subcommittee to discuss issues surrounding the 50th anniversary of the Washington

Treaty.

I will address three issues that are before the Alliance:

(1) whether the Alliance requires a mandate from the United Nations (UN)

or the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) to undertake military operations except when the territory of a member state is attacked;

(2) the need to modernize allied military capabilities; and

(3) the relationship of the European Security and Defense Identity (ESDI) to

NATO and to the long-term security interests of the U.S. in Europe.

How these issues are treated will define the purposes of the Alliance over time,

its capability to perform its assigned missions and the willingness of the American

public and Congress to support NATO as the center point of security in Europe.

Before turning to these issues it is important to note that the new Strategic Concept will preserve the basic tenets of the one it is to replace. This includes the continued emphasis on the central role of the Alliance as a collective defense organization whose primary purpose is to defend its member states against aggression. It

makes no change to Alliance nuclear doctrine.

At the same time, there are changes of note. The new Strategic Concept gives increased emphasis to the political role of the Alliance in promoting peace and stability in Europe. This brings with it the increased probability that NATO will find

itself drawn into what some call soft security problems—illegal immigration and

counter drug operations, for example. In this way the Concept increases the scope

of NATO’s security concerns. But it also creates the mechanism by which the U.S.,

and other allies, can block direct NATO involvement in soft security operations

while enabling coalitions of the willing among the allies to take on the mission.

Among other notable changes, the Strategic Concept elevates concern within the

Alliance for the dangers posed by terrorism and the potential of hostile state and

non-state actors to employ weapons of mass destruction against NATO members. It

takes welcome steps toward encouraging defensive measures against ballistic missile and information warfare threats.

II. The Question of Mandates

A prominent feature of the discussion over the new Strategic Concept is whether

the Alliance requires a mandate from the UN or the OSCE in order to undertake

so-called ‘‘non-Article V’’ missions.

The Strategic Concept will not contain a binding requirement for such a mandate.

This decision is welcome. However, it does not lay the issue to rest.

Behind the debate over the mandates is a more fundamental one about the basis

for security, the principles upon which the U.S., its allies and NATO will commit

to the use of force and the obligations that can be imposed on us by the international community to use that force. We stand at a crossroads in that debate. Since

the end of World War II, the U.S. has taken the perspective known as collective deVerDate 11-SEP-98 14:44 Sep 20, 1999 Jkt 549297 PO 00000 Frm 00048 Fmt 6601 Sfmt 6621 58335 SFRELA1 PsN: SFRELA1
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fense. Since the end of the Cold War another approach has taken shape, known as

collective or cooperative security. Many, both in Europe and in the U.S., who support the requirement for a mandate favor a change from collective defense to collective security. The U.S. Government has resisted this change. The pressure for

change will not abate.

As the leader of the Alliance, the position taken by the U.S. on these more fundamental issues is of critical importance. The United States Government and the

Congress need to clarify and express their views on the issue. Those with long experience with NATO might object to this advice. They might argue that the best approach is to allow the issues surrounding mandates to be worked out in the way

that NATO operates best, on a ‘‘case by case basis.’’ There is wisdom in this argument. But ‘‘case by case’’ should not imply ad hoc.

In my view we should resist efforts to infuse policy related to NATO, including

the aftermath of the war in Kosovo, with tenets drawn from the collective security

perspective. Adopting this perspective risks subordinating U.S. interests to the will

of the international community. That community, and the actions it calls for in its

mandates, is not directly accountable to the American citizens. A collective defense

perspective, by contrast, draws its strength from the fact that its authority to act

is derived from consent of its constituent member states, all of which in the case

of NATO draw their authority from their citizens. This approach does not militate

against mandates, as President Bush demonstrated in the case of Iraq. It does insist, however, that a mandate preserve the authority and obligation of American

citizens over matters of war and peace. This is essential to the continued support

of the American people, the Congress and U.S. Government to active participation

of the U.S. in international affairs.

The need for clarity on this issue is pressing. The war against the FRY began

without a mandate; it is quite possible that its end and aftermath will raise the

issue anew. It is possible that the issue of mandates, and the issues related to it,

will arise in the weeks and months ahead as we work with the international community to terminate the war against the Former Yugoslavia and provide for postwar containment, pacification, and regional stability. How the issue is handled requires careful reflection, and choice, on the mandate issue and the underlying issues

related to collective security and collective defense.

I would offer two points of departure for guiding reflection the mandate issue.

They are not exclusive of each other. However, they do lead to different policy conclusions.

The first point of departure is to consider the issue of mandates from the perspective of collective security. This perspective, at the limit, takes the position that except for direct self-defense, no state has an inherent right to use force against another state. Nevertheless, there clearly are occasions when force is a legitimate instrument of policy, as in the case of protecting humanitarian relief operations or defending populations of sovereign states when their human rights are being abused.

In the latter case it might be argued, for example, that by making war on its own

people, a state forfeits its sovereignty over those people. Under such conditions the

international community has an obligation to protect those people until a new government is created for or by them.

From the perspective of collective security, mandates are necessary. The international community, most likely through the UN, however, must authorize the use

of force. That authorization is needed both to limit the use of force to specific tasks

and as a deterrent to others who would violate the security of the international community. Many who take this view see a mandate as essential for political and legal

reasons if NATO is to take any action other than those related directly to self-defense. For some a mandate can create a new form of legitimacy. That is, a UN mandate can permit the international community to do legitimately what a sovereign

state, taking the counsel of its moral sentiments and national interests, might otherwise consider an illegitimate use of force.

The second point of departure is to consider the issue of mandates from the perspective of collective defense. This perspective sees the decision to use force as one

reserved to a sovereign state in pursuit of its legitimate interests. The greater the

control of a sovereign citizenry over their government the less likely that force will

be used for base or evil purposes. In an effort to discipline the international system,

like-minded states have established norms of intemational behavior and agreed to

assist each other in defense of those norms. They include respect for the territorial

integrity and political independence of states and opposition to the use of force to

change state boundaries.

This is the perspective that lay at the heart of NATO’s formation and of its ethos.

The members of the alliance have a strong attachment to their sovereignty, an attachment reaffirmed in the new Strategic Concept. As a result, Article V of the

47

Washington Treaty does not oblige the members to do anything specific in case an

ally is attacked. The Treaty only obliges each ally to ‘‘take such actions as it deems

necessary, including the use of armed force, to restore and maintain the security of

the North Atlantic area.’’ The circumstances of the Cold War left few in doubt that

an attack on one would constitute and attack on all, bringing the member states

of the Alliance to the defense of the ally under attack.

The collective defense ethos of NATO is compatible with that of the UN Charter.

In fact, Article V requires NATO to report the actions it has taken to defend its

member states to the Security Council. It also requires that NATO cease operations

when the Security Council has ‘‘taken the measures necessary to restore and maintain international peace and security.’’ Article V implicitly leaves the judgment

whether those measures are acceptable to the allies.

From this perspective the UN is seen as an organization with specific responsibilities assigned by treaty and not as one representative of, or empowered to act independently on behalf of, the international community. This perspective does not relieve NATO member states of the obligations they have assumed under the UN

Charter. At the same time, this perspective does not see those obligations taking

precedence over the sovereign obligations of the individual states or of those states

to each other under a collective defense agreement.

From the perspective of collective defense, mandates are not required to enable

inherently legitimate action by a sovereign state and cannot create rights for the

international community that supersede those of individual states. Hence a mandate

for action is not needed by NATO, which operates only at the direction of its sovereign member states, themselves subject to the authority of their citizens. Nor can

a mandate compel action by NATO. If one is sought, a mandate can serve one or

more purposes. Most importantly, it can serve as a method of codifying in international law the norms of behavior advocated and practiced by sovereign states governed by a democratic citizenry. A mandate can also serve as a vehicle by which

states not immediately affected by a NATO action can express their agreement with

that action. It can serve as well as a mechanism to enlist the aid of those states

in restoring and enhancing international peace and security.

At bottom the question of mandates is about the basis for the legitimate use of

force. The collective security approach tends to the view that the international community should confer legitimacy on any use of force other than for self-defense.

There are those who would argue that a mandate can legitimize and authorize the

use of force by the international community—for example, intervention into the internal affairs of a sovereign state to defend human rights—in ways that heretofore

the same international community would have been seen as illegitimate.

A collective defense approach tends to view the use of force for other than selfdefense as discretionary, drawing its ultimate legitimacy from the source of all authority, the consent of the governed within the state. There are those who would

argue that discretionary force should aim to reinforce the principles of modern, liberal government—for example, that governments are held to account for their practices if they affect the sovereign rights of other states.

As a practical matter, and as noted earlier, the two perspectives outlined here are

not exclusive of each other. The war against the FRY underscores the point.

The decision by NATO to take action against the FRY has all the hallmarks of

discretionary use of force by democratic states. The allies understood that FRY attitudes toward and operations in Kosovo, which had engendered armed opposition by

ethnic Albanians living in Kosovo, had set the stage for wider instability in the Balkans and the possibility that war could ensue within and among the states of the

region. This in turn could pose a wider threat to NATO allies and European stability. From the perspective of the moral sentiments and national interests of the allies, this is a legitimate basis on which to wage war through NATO against the

FRY.

At the same time, the rhetoric surrounding the confrontation between NATO and

the FRY is more in keeping with the collective security perspective. This rhetoric

defines the purpose of the war as the defending the rights of the people of Kosovo

against their own government.

Which perspective (or the relative proportion of the two) will guide NATO’s war

aims, war termination demands and post-war policies is still in the balance. The

choice could set a long term precedent.

From a collective security perspective, a right to intervene in the domestic affairs

of a state implies an obligation to rebuild the political basis for peace and stability

in the region by resolving the problems that led to conflict. Ironically, while this obligation might extend to a regime change in Belgrade, it does not require one. A

negotiated outcome could be acceptable if arrangements can be found to protect the

Kosovars in Kosovo and provide them with some form of autonomy guaranteed by

48

international forces. That outcome might include partition or the creation within

Kosovo of autonomous, loosely confederated, ethnically based enclaves. While the

terms of a negotiated settlement are uncertain, it is certain that it would require

a very long-term political, economic and military commitment to Kosovo, the FRY

and the region by the international community, and particularly the United States.

From a collective defense perspective the obligations of the allies to the Kosovars

are more limited in their extent. Resolving the war depends less on taking up the

cause of the Kosovars than in assuring that the government in Belgrade is held to

account for destabilizing the region and threatening a wider war. This view elevates

war aims from and end to the fighting, a return of refugees and creation of an autonomous Kosovo to a defeat of Serbia’s military forces and peace terms dictated by

NATO to include possibly, a change of government in Belgrade. It is a perspective

that requires a higher level of political and military commitment in the near-term,

but is likely to result in a reduced burden over the longer term.

‘‘Getting it right,’’ will go a long way to determining whether NATO will continue

to serve as the center point of security in Europe. The Congress has an interest in

how we state our war aims and post-war objectives. If without conscious choice we

adopt approaches more akin to collective security than collective defense, we may

find that we have confused allies, potential adversaries or ourselves about our real

interests. That would place the Alliance and the security of Europe at risk.

III. Core Capabilities

The concern over mandates and the underlying question of the legitimate use of

force is important. It is of far less consequence if the Alliance does not develop and

maintain the capacity to conduct effective military operations across the full spectrum of conflict. The Alliance as a whole does not possess that capacity today. The

allies have recognized this fact. As a result they have agreed to a new, common

operational vision and to launch a Defense Capabilities Initiative (DCI) at the Summit.

The aim of the initiative is to close the apparent gap between the technical capabilities of U.S. forces and those of our allies. Key to the DCI is an agreement among

the allies to the creation of a common operational vision for the employment, and

hence the development and fielding, of allied forces.

This is a highly technical initiative. It has a straightforward objective. Allied

forces were designed and equipped to meet a Warsaw Pact invasion. The forces were

designed to fight from relatively fixed positions, close to their home bases and with

the use of supporting civilian infrastructure, for a short period of time. And, given

the expectation of the scale of nuclear escalation, those forces were not expected to

be highly survivable against ballistic or cruise missiles armed with nuclear, biological or chemical warheads. This was consistent with NATO Cold War doctrine.

The allies have agreed in the Strategic Concept to adopt a new common operational vision or doctrine that reflects new threat realities. It will guide the transformation of allied forces to meet modern requirements. It stresses mobility, sustainability and survivability for forces operating at long distances from their home

bases. The common operational vision that is to guide NATO modernization is based

on the same tenets as Joint Vision 2010, the doctrine guiding the modernization of

U.S. military forces.

In earlier times the DCI might have been dismissed as so much window-dressing.

The number of NATO modernization efforts that have come and gone without having materially improved NATO’s capability is too painful to recall in detail. But

what is different today is that the capabilities identified in the DCI are essential

to the successful performance of any military mission. That is, whether performing

a core mission or a new mission, the allies know they need forces that can move

quickly and efficiently, communicate clearly and securely, protect themselves from

attack and deliver firepower with decisive effect and a minimum of unintended consequences. The Strategic Concept explicitly recognizes that the force capabilities

needed for success in Bosnia and in Kosovo are not significantly different from those

needed to perform the core Article V mission.

In support of the operational vision, the Defense Capabilities Initiative (DCI) calls

for:

• substantial allied investment in command, control and communications (C3), • improvements to air, road, rail and sea transport,

• multinational logistics,

• increased security against information warfare and NBC attack, and

• procurement of weapons systems—both lethal and non-lethal—able to operate

effectively under all conditions.

The administration deserves congratulations for promoting the DCI. It focuses on

capabilities that are beneficial to the allies both from a national perspective and alVerDate 11-SEP-98 14:44 Sep 20, 1999 Jkt 549297 PO 00000 Frm 00051 Fmt 6601 Sfmt 6621 58335 SFRELA1 PsN: SFRELA1
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lied perspective. It comes at a time when the allies are modernizing their militaries.

As a result, the DCI has a higher probability of success than history might lead us

to suppose. That said, the challenge is to manage it to a successful conclusion.

There are a variety of pressures on the allies that will make it difficult for them

to achieve the objectives of the DCI. Sluggish economies, high unemployment, costs

associated with the management and enlargement of the European Union and the

inefficiencies imposed by the still consolidating defense industry in Europe are

among the most prominent impediments. The Congress will need to urge both the

administration and the allies to overcome these impediments. The Congress can

measure and encourage progress by:

• monitoring the rate at which allied units are transformed from territorial defense roles to force projection roles and insisting that a greater fraction of

NATO infrastructure funding be devoted to the force projection role; • encouraging a higher level of allied investment in research and development; • increasing the ease with which the U.S. can ‘‘buy European’’ and U.S. industry

can merge with European firms when such transactions improve our security

and make economic sense.

Finally, the committee structure of the Alliance that is charged with managing

the DCI is hopelessly complicated and a dinosaur of the industrial age. The allies

have agreed to a special high level group to oversee this structure. That is not

enough. Congress must encourage NATO to update and adapt that structure to increase the likelihood that the DCI will succeed.

IV. The European Security and Defense Identity

The agreement by the members of the European Union (EU) to a common currency, the Euro, will have a profound effect on politics in Europe, to include the politics of security. A common currency will drive the member states of the EU to conform their fiscal and budgetary policies. This, in turn, will require that they conform

their social and security policies.

In the area of security policy, the EU has long worked toward the development

of a European Security and Defense Identity (ESDI). The U.S. overcame its skepticism of an ESDI late in the Bush Administration. The first Clinton Administration

gave its endorsement to the idea at the Brussels Summit in 1994 and set out to

develop a way for NATO to both encourage and support an ESDI. By 1996 the outlines of a plan were in place. The heart of the American interest in ESDI is uncomplicated. The U.S. would prefer that our European allies take on a greater proportion of the security tasks and defense responsibilities for Europe. This would free

U.S. forces for operations elsewhere while at the same time generate allied forces

that might, on a case by case basis, join the U.S. in operations outside of Europe.

The Europeans, too, want greater autonomy in security and defense matters. But

outside NATO, they have little in the way of competent structures to manage European security and defense affairs. Allies, operating in and through the EU and the

Western European Union (WEU), have begun to fix this deficiency. Recent steps

taken in this direction include the St. Malo agreement on defense cooperation between Britain and France and the discussions surrounding the absorption of the

WEU into the EU. Other, less obvious steps are to be found in the decisions surrounding the privatization of defense industries in France, defense industry consolidation in Europe and the sponsorship of the Rambouillet talks by the UK and

France.

Whereas the DCI is a highly technical initiative, the ESDI is fraught with political complications. In its simplest formulation it commits NATO to provide to the allies operating under an EU/WEU umbrella assets they would need to perform military missions that NATO has refused to take on. These missions are likely to be

limited primarily to soft security operations-humanitarian relief, search and rescue

and peace operations. The extraction force deployed by the UK and France to provide protection to the monitors of the ill-fated Rambouillet accords—mobile but

lightly armed with the implicit support of NATO—is an example of the kind of missions the ESDI envisions Europeans taking on in the near- to mid-term.

The assets are primarily those that are part of NATO’s infrastructure and to

which the allies have contributed, in the aggregate, some 75% of the cost. In addition to those assets that a ‘‘coalition of the willing’’ of NATO members might call

on NATO to provide, the Strategic Concept envisions releasing allied forces assigned

to NATO for employment by the Europeans. The release of those forces is contingent

on NATO’s certification they are not needed to perform NATO missions. Moreover,

the Concept recognizes the right of NATO to recall those forces should they subsequently be required.

It is likely that NATO personnel will assist in drafting the plans for any operation

conducted by the Europeans. The WEU will serve as NATO’s planning partner and

50

it is through the WEU that the Europeans would conduct an operation. NATO’s insight into and influence over the operation would continue via the Deputy SACEUR,

who would have command of the operation on behalf of the Europeans. The Europeans are still working out among themselves whether the WEU will be subordinate

to or operate in cooperation with the EU.

A number of issues are still in need of resolution. The one of particular interest

to the Congress what is called NATO’s ‘‘right of first refusal’’ and whether, having

refused to take on a mission, it is automatically required to release assets to a European coalition of the willing. There are those in Europe who would argue that the

EU/WEU should have an independent claim on NATO resources and national forces

assigned to NATO, one that would take precedence over a NATO decision to take

on a mission. This view is driven by the notion the EDSI must not be subordinate

to NATO if it is to reflect European as opposed to transatlantic values and objectives. At present, this argument appears to be more a form of political posturing

for European audiences than a serious proposal. The EU/WEU is not yet ready to

act, either politically or militarily, independently of the transatlantic security community.

Over time, however, the EU/WEU will grow in confidence and stature. As it does,

it is important that the U.S. and its EU-member allies develop compatible views on

how security in Europe is best sustained and the role of force in sustaining European security. The closer those views are the less controversy is likely to plague

ESDI and NATO’s support of it.

For that reason, it is imperative that the U.S. continues to influence the evolution

of European views on ESDI. And at the same time, the U.S. must evince a willingness to adjust its own approaches should it discover the Europeans have a better

idea. The opportunity for such influence and learning is at hand with Kosovo. The

U.S. will retain the lead on air operations and would need to lead any ground operation against hostile resistance. But war termination aims and long-term post-war

security policy in the Balkans is now at issue. Both will need resolution in the next

weeks to months. Both the U.S. and its allies have an interest in seeing that Europe—under the aegis of the EU and WEU—take the lead over the long term in

pacifying Kosovo, containing Serbia and stabilizing the region. This can be done in

a variety of ways. It is worth noting here that our allies will tend to follow a collective security approach on this and other issues of European security.

In crafting our approach, the U.S. ought to avoid choices that serve to deepen our

involvement—and by necessity reduce the influence and responsibility of Europe—

for the region. We ought to favor approaches that promote European responsibility

for the region over the long term but commit the U.S. in the near term to creating

with our allies the conditions for their ultimate success. While this implies close cooperation with our allies in all aspects of planning for post-war Kosovo, it also requires closer adherence to a collective defense perspective than they may find comfortable.

Such an approach also places the focus squarely on our diplomatic as opposed to

our military capabilities. Our diplomats must fashion the terms of war termination

and post war policy with an eye to their affect on our long-term strategic interests

with respect to NATO, the EU and Europe as a whole. And that means responsibility for successful diplomacy is shared by this subcommittee, the full committee and

by the committee’s counterpart in the House.

V. Closing

Mr. Chalrman, thank you for the opportunity to place my thoughts before the subcommittee. I stand ready to answer any questions you or other members of the subcommittee may have.

PREPARED STATEMENT OF ASSISTANT SECRETARY MARC GROSSMAN

Thank you Mr. Chairman. It is a pleasure to be here today to testify before this

Subcommittee just two days before the Washington NATO summit.

The Alliance was founded fifty years ago by a generation of Americans and Europeans who fought in World War II and witnessed the Holocaust. They created this

Alliance in large part because they believed it was their obligation to ensure that

such horrors never again occurred on European soil. Today a new generation of political leaders, soldiers and diplomats on both sides of the Atlantic are determined

to uphold that legacy.

Mr. Chairman, thank you and the committee for the close bipartisan support you

have offered on NATO.

51

I remember well my first visit to your office. You told me that we should work

to keep this Alliance strong. That sense of bipartisan teamwork was evident during

the Senate debate and vote on NATO enlargement.

I hope you agree that we have continued this teamwork over the course of the

last year. Our staffs have worked together closely to fulfill the requirements you set

for us through briefings and reports to the Committee on the new Strategic Concept

and on preparations for the Summit in general.

It is also a pleasure to follow Senator Kyl and his testimony earlier today. During

the NATO enlargement debate some 90 Senators led by Senator Kyl passed an

amendment laying out clear criteria for NATO’s updated Strategic Concept. We

heard your message and made the criteria established by Senator Kyl our own. I

am confident that when you see the new Strategic Concept unveiled this weekend,

you will be satisfied that we have met that benchmark.

Mr. Chairman, in my testimony today I would like to focus on three questions:

(1) What are our goals for the NATO Summit and how do they serve U.S. national

security interests?

(2) What does the Kosovo conflict mean for the NATO Summit and the Alliance

more generally?

(3) What is our longer-term strategy for Southeastern Europe and what role can

NATO play in that strategy?

THE WASHINGTON SUMMIT: PREPARING NATO FOR THE 21ST CENTURY

Mr. Chairman, our goal for the summit is to prepare NATO to meet the challenges of the 21st century. Over the course of the last year President Clinton, Secretary of State Albright and Secretary of Defense Cohen have all talked about both

the need and the opportunity to use this summit to set a solid strategic direction

and course for the future. In doing so, we have been conscious of the need not to

alter or change NATO’s core purpose, which underlies its success.

President Harry S Truman had it right in his speech at NATO’s founding on April

4, 1949: He defined the Alliance’s purpose in terms of defending the common territory, values, and interest of its members. That made sense in 1949. It makes sense

today.

If NATO’s core purpose has not changed, the security environment that we confront today has. Today we must be prepared to deal with a world in which threats

to the Alliance can come from new directions and where conflicts beyond NATO’s

territory can have an impact on our common values and interests. NATO must be

able to do as good a job in meeting the challenges of the 21st century as it did in

dealing with the threats of the Cold War.

When we talk about the future of NATO, it is not because we want to change

NATO’s core but rather because we want to ensure that this Alliance is better

equipped for the future.

Based on these three themes, Secretary Albright announced last December a

seven-part package of initiatives for the Summit.

Those seven initiatives, which we expect will be approved at the Summit, include:

(1) A Vision Statement;

(2) The new Strategic Concept;

(3) An enhanced Open Door Policy;

(4) The Defense Capabilities Initiative (DCI);

(5) The Weapons of Mass Destruction Initiative (WMDI);

(6) A package of Partners Initiatives;

(7) The European Security and Defense Identity.

These initiatives are designed to create an Alliance committed to collective defense, but also even more capable of addressing current and future risks, strengthened by and open to new members, and working together with partners to enhance

security for the Euro-Atlantic area.

Some say it would be best for America to stick with the status quo. Others claim

that NATO is a relic of the Cold War and should go out of business. Both views

ignore a key lesson we learned from the history of the 20th century. We need a

strong military Alliance between the U.S. and Europe, and it must focus on preparing for the threats of the future not of the past. That is why this package of initiatives is so clearly in the U.S. national security interest.

Mr. Chairman, if you would allow me, I’d like to briefly touch on two parts of this

package of initiatives that I know have been of special interest to you and your colleagues.

The first is the new strategic concept. It is important to remember what kind of

document the new strategic concept is and what it will and will not do. As the President said in his letter to Senator Warner, ‘‘The Strategic Concept will not contain

52

new commitments or obligations for the United States but rather will underscore

NATO’s enduring purposes outlined in the 1949 North Atlantic Treaty.’’

What this document does do is provide a new framework and political-military

guidance that will create incentives for allies to build more flexible forces capable

of meeting the broader range of possible threats to our common security we must

confront today and in the 21st century.

Mr. Chairman, in this connection let me also say something about the issue of

mandates. There is nothing in this strategic concept that will require NATO to have

a UN mandate for it to act.

The 1949 Treaty acknowledges the important role of the United Nations in international security and it reaffirms faith in the purposes and principles of the UN.

Translated into policy, this means that while it is obviously preferable to have UN

endorsement of NATO actions, the Alliance must retain the needed flexibility to act

on its own.

Finally, let me say a brief word about our open door policy. Senator Smith, I know

you were with Secretary Albright in Independence, Missouri some weeks ago when

we welcomed the three new members into our Alliance. At a time when we are dealing with instability and conflict in Southeastern Europe, it is important to step back

and realize that Central Europe is now safe and secure—and that NATO enlargement is a large part of that success story.

Based on the benchmarks NATO set out at Madrid in terms of judging candidates’

countries in terms of their performance and the Alliance’s own strategic interest, I

do not believe that this summit is the right time to extend further invitations for

additional new members.

This, however, only underscores the need to reaffirm our open door policy both

in word and deed. That commitment will be evident later this week not only in what

we as an Alliance say but through the issuing of a new Membership Action Plan

or MAP—a practical plan that goes beyond anything we have done in the past in

terms of using NATO’s talent and expertise to help these countries help themselves

become the strongest possible candidates for the future.

KOSOVO AND THE NATO SUMMIT

Mr. Chairman, as we prepare NATO for the 21st century, we still have 20th century work to do.

The Summit will be largely a working meeting with Kosovo as a central theme.

We still plan to commemorate NATO’s 50th anniversary: we have much to honor

on that score. But the first focus has to be on supporting NATO forces in harm’s

way.

The conflict in Kosovo has underscored why we still need a strong Alliance between the United States and Europe. It also underscores why NATO needs to be

more flexible and capable of handling a broad range of risks.

The Kosovo crisis:

—shows the need for a new Strategic Concept to prepare the Alliance for the full

spectrum of possible missions;

—shows the need for a clear Open Door policy and long-term vision for those countries in the region aspiring to eventual NATO membership and who are assisting the Alliance in the current crisis;

—underscores the importance of a Defense Capabilities Initiative to ensure that

American and European forces can operate together effectively in the future;

and, finally

—demonstrates NATO’s interest in having a close political and military relationship

with its Partners that we can rely on in a crisis.

Mr. Chairman, no one on either side of the Atlantic who has been involved in deliberations on Kosovo can imagine how we could have responded effectively without

NATO. And if we did not already have a plan to modernize NATO to meet the needs

of such crises, we would have to come up with one now. At the same time, let me

make it clear that our goal is not to involve our Alliance in new situations such as

Bosnia and Kosovo; our goal is to prevent that need.

NATO’s new Strategic Concept does not commit us to act in new Kosovos any

more than the old one did. But the more prepared we are to respond rapidly and

effectively to outbreaks that threaten Europe’s stability, the more likely it is that

we will be able to deter such outbreaks.

A LONG-TERM STRATEGY FOR SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE

Mr. Chairman, let me conclude with brief remarks on the need to stabilize Southeast Europe and on the role we think NATO can play in such an effort.

53

It can be summed up in two thoughts: first, NATO must prevail in the Kosovo

conflict and second, we must move, working together with Europe, to impement a

long-term strategy to stabilize the region and to integrate it into the European

mainstream. As President Clinton said last week in San Francisco, ‘‘If we truly

want a more tolerant, inclusive future for the Balkans and all of Southeast Europe,

we will have to both oppose (Milosevic’s) efforts and offer a better vision of the future, one that we are willing to help build.’’

We never again want to fight in this part of Europe. We must ensure that we

never again have to. Southeast Europe, as Secretary Albright said recently, ‘‘is the

critical missing piece in the puzzle of a Europe whole and free. That vision of a

united and democratic Europe is critical to our own security.’’

The first requirement is to focus on strategy aimed at transforming this region

from Europe’s primary source of instability into part of its mainstream. In this regard, I call your attention to the Southeast Europe stability proposals put forward

by Germany, Turkey, and Greece. We welcome these types of forward-looking proposals. As the Germans rightly noted in their plan, a strategy for this region must

have several components—political, economic, and security. It will eventually require the extensive involvement of many key institutions, in particular the OSCE

as well as the EU and NATO. NATO’s role will be critical because security is a prerequisite of any stabilization program.

We will only be able to take the first steps toward building a broad, long-term

Southeast Europe Initiative at this Summit, but we will keep you informed as we

move ahead. It will require the involvement and support of Congress, if it is to succeed.

At this Summit, we want to adopt regional stability measures that the Alliance

can implement on an accelerated basis. These might include: more frequent NAC

consultations with countries from the region, promotion of regional cooperation in

the EAPC; better coordination of security assistance through PfP; and regionally focused PfP activities and exercises.

PREPARED STATEMENT OF ASSISTANT SECRETARY FRANKLIN D. KRAMER

Mr. Chairman and Members of the Committee:

I welcome the opportunity to appear before you today. Recent events over the past

few weeks underscore the vitality of the NATO Alliance, an Alliance designed to

achieve peace, freedom, and democracy through a collective strength derived from

the robust defense capabilities of its members.

SUMMIT GOALS

At the Summit, Allied leaders will approve a revised Strategic Concept that reflects the present and foreseeable security environment and focuses on transforming

the defense capabilities of the Alliance to meet the challenges of the 21st century.

While collective defense continues to be the core function of the Alliance, future missions should include ‘‘out-of-area’’ contingencies such as Bosnia and Kosovo, which

threaten the overall strategic stability of Europe. They should also include readiness

to respond to threats such as those posed by weapons of mass destruction (WMD)

and by terrorism. Both the fighting in Kosovo as well as the proliferation of chemical, biological and nuclear weapons and the means to deliver them demonstrates

that the Alliance must prepare its military capabilities so it can act when required.

As you know, in taking any such NATO action, it is our strong belief that UN

Security Council resolutions mandating or authorizing NATO efforts are not required as a matter of international law—and, as the Kosovo situation has shown,

that view is widely shared in the Alliance. NATO’s actions have been and will remain consistent with the purposes and principles of the United Nations—a proposition reflected in the Washington Treaty itself. The United States will not accept

any statement in the new Strategic Concept that would require a UN Security

Council resolution for NATO to act.

To ensure that the Alliance has the means, as well as the doctrine, to deal with

the full range of possible challenges, Secretary Cohen proposed a Defense Capabilities Initiative last June and September to transform the Alliance’s defense capabilities to meet future security challenges. The Defense Capabilities Initiative has as

its foundation a Common Operational Vision. That vision emphasizes development

of forces that have four core defense capabilities of mobility, effective engagement,

sustainability, and survivability. NATO’s revised Strategic Concept will include this

common operational vision.

We have likewise sponsored a WMD initiative to address the growing risks to Allied populations, territory and forces posed by the continuing spread of nuclear, bioVerDate 11-SEP-98 14:44 Sep 20, 1999 Jkt 549297 PO 00000 Frm 00056 Fmt 6601 Sfmt 6621 58335 SFRELA1 PsN: SFRELA1
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logical and chemical weapons and their means of delivery. Additionally, we have

sought to ensure that the Alliance can do its part in dealing with risks of terrorism.

The Summit will lay the groundwork for NATO to use military capabilities to help

deal with terrorism. Key issues will be: force protection—as Khobar Towers demonstrates; responding to terrorist acts; reducing the effects of terrorist attacks; and

sharing information among militaries so they are able to protect themselves and to

respond.

ACHIEVING THE GOALS

Some have asked what practical difference the new Strategic Concept will make?

Or, put another way, why will Allies suddenly begin to transform their capabilities

now to meet this ‘‘common operational vision’’ when even the 1991 Strategic Concept

called for changes in mobility and flexibility? The U.S. has made substantial strides

because we have always had to be mobile. Our logistics and communications capabilities are designed to be deployed. The ability to engage with precision—be it with

PGMs or humanitarian aid continue to be the hallmarks of U.S. military operations.

ALLIED PROGRESS THUS FAR

There have been several important and encouraging developments that have demonstrated our Allies’ commitment to the transformation of NATO to meet the challenges of the future. Key European leaders are personally committed to the process.

Last autumn, Prime Minister Tony Blair called for a Europe able to speak with one

voice and possessing military means to back up its decisions. He has said, ‘‘European defense is not about new institutional fixes. It is about new capabilities, both

military and diplomatic.’’ He has also said, ‘‘To retain U.S. engagement in Europe,

it is important that Europe does more for itself. A Europe with a greater capacity

to act will strengthen both the European Union and the Alliance as a whole.’’ German Defense Minister Scharping has suggested deliberations on a strategic reconnaissance capability to be created by European NATO states as well as a strategic

air transport component that would also be available for independent European operations.

More importantly, key European Allies have begun to match their words with action. Last July, the UK completed their Strategic Defense Review, laying out the

structure of their forces leading into the next century. The UK will lease four strategic C–17 or equivalent transport aircraft beginning in 2001. Strategic sea lift for

rapid deployment of forces will be enhanced by the acquisition of 6 ‘‘roll-on roll-off’’

ships (two are already funded) in 2000.

Similarly, the Germans and Italians are undertaking major military restructuring

efforts which, when completed, will provide NATO with highly mobile and capable

units ready to undertake a wide range of roles and missions. French forces have

been undergoing substantial changes since 1995 in order to make them more mobile

and deployable, and better able to carry out the Alliance’s new missions.

The Alliance has approved—and the Summit will underscore—the importance of

a capabilities-based focus to a European Security and Defense Identity which emphasizes the need for greater efforts to develop European forces capable of dealing

with regional crises. ESDI done right will lead to a more balanced partnership in

any future operations.

DEFENSE CAPABILITIES ‘‘IN PRACTICE’’

The Strategic Concept and the Defense Capabilities Initiative provide the political

and military guidance for NATO defense planners—the blueprint—or, if you will,

the theory. Kosovo provides a real-world example of NATO forces rising to the challenge of repression and inhumanity to secure peace, freedom, and democracy.

Kosovo is an application of the Strategic Concept and the Defense Capabilities Initiative—or, if you will, the practice.

NATO’s operations in Kosovo—as well as in Bosnia—highlight the importance of

the key elements of the Defense Capabilities Initiative—mobility, sustainability,

survivability and precision engagement. Kosovo demonstrates that, to achieve its objective, NATO must be able to get to the problem, to attack effectively with precision

munitions, to sustain the effort and to be survivable in a hostile environment. What

we have been able to do in Kosovo has been substantial. The Alliance has promptly

deployed for the air campaign against the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia some 700

aircraft (over half of them U.S.), and more will likely be added. These forces have

been highly effective in the conduct of the air campaign. Likewise, the Alliance has

deployed since 1995 a substantial peacekeeping force in Bosnia. In contrast to

Kosovo, nearly 80% of SFOR, and nearly 100% of the NATO forces currently serving

on the ground in the Former Yugoslav republic of Macedonia, are European and CaVerDate 11-SEP-98 14:44 Sep 20, 1999 Jkt 549297 PO 00000 Frm 00057 Fmt 6601 Sfmt 6621 58335 SFRELA1 PsN: SFRELA1
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nadian. The SFOR air component of 117 NATO aircraft for Bosnia reflects a contribution of 18 U.S. planes and 99 European and Canadian craft.

Despite the demonstrated vitality of the Alliance, Operation Allied Force also illustrates the striking need for the Defense Capabilities Initiative. While thirteen Allies are participating in air operations in and around Kosovo, the U.S. is shouldering the greatest proportion of the operation, particularly as the military effort intensifies. As Italian PM D’Alema has noted, Europe spends 60% of what the U.S.

spends on defense, but only enjoys 10% of the capabilities. This is what the Defense

Capabilities Initiative is designed to change.

KOSOVO

During the Summit we will continue to be engaged in Kosovo. The Alliance is

firmly committed to ending the ethnic cleansing in Kosovo, and to providing a safe

and secure environment for those who have been displaced. We have read a sad litany of war crimes or violations of international humanitarian law in Kosovo: ethnic

cleansing; the detention and execution of military-aged men (tens of thousands unaccounted for); the wanton destruction of villages and towns across Kosovo; and the

forcible displacement of over 1 million ethnic Albanians.

There should be no question as to what the U.S. and its NATO Allies intend to

accomplish by taking action in Kosovo: a verifiable stop to all military action and

the immediate end of violence and repression; withdrawal from Kosovo of all Serb

military, police and paramilitary forces; restoration of order there by stationing of

an international peacekeeping force with NATO as its core; unconditional and safe

return of all refugees and displaced persons as well as unhindered access to them

by humanitarian aid organizations; and the establishment of a democratic political

framework agreement for Kosovo, in conformity with international law. Our principal priority, in conjunction with the air campaign, is to ensure that the refugees

have food, shelter and required care.

One area in which our Allies are contributing the lions’ share of resources is in

the humanitarian effort on the periphery of Kosovo. On my recent trip to the refugee camps in and around Skopje and in meeting with General Jackson, the UK

Commander of the Allied Rapid Reaction Force, I observed how strongly engaged

our Allies are in this mission. NATO solidarity is indeed a reality.

No one can be sure when this campaign will end. But we must win. It is vital

that we stay the course. This means not only through military power but also

through our humanitarian efforts with both Allies and Partners. This brings me to

my last connection among the Strategic Concept, the upcoming Summit, and

Kosovo: the relationship between NATO and its Partners. Current operations include the cooperation of Partners (for example, port facilities; over-flight rights). The

Partnership for Peace (PFP) and the Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council (EAPC)

have given us the ability to call upon partners easily and to consult regularly with

them. Any post-conflict implementation force will utilize the participation of NATO

partners, underscoring the need for the Summit initiatives designed to guide partner participation in planning, deciding, and implementing certain Alliance missions.

We will also announce at the Summit a plan to upgrade the forces that partners

will have available for future NATO-led operations. The result will be to give partners a political stake in the process and to give NATO wider military options involving partners.

CONCLUSION

Kosovo illustrates the complexities of the evolving security situation in Europe.

It represents not only a challenge but also an opportunity for us to solidify NATO’s

role as the principal institution for transatlantic political and military engagement

in Europe, and the source of stability and security for the Euro-Atlantic region for

the next fifty years. Kosovo is an acknowledgement of our basic position that NATO

should be the instrument of choice when we and our Allies decide to act together

militarily.

In sum, we are determined to maintain the Alliance’s freedom of action and transform its defense capabilities to meet the challenges of the 2lst century. We are determined to use those capabilities to achieve the values and objectives of the Alliance. The NATO Summit and its associated initiatives will set us firmly on course

to build a new NATO for the new century.

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PREPARED STATEMENT OF SENATOR JON KYL

Mr. Chairman, I want to thank you for holding these important hearings and for

inviting me here to testify. As NATO celebrates its fiftieth anniversary and the accession of three new members it is useful to take stock of its accomplishments and

assess its vision for the future. But any assessment must remain tentative in light

of the war in Kosovo, This conflict and its resolution will set the tone for the future

far more definitively than any Summit declaration. I will try to step back somewhat

from current events to assess the longer term trends and enduring realities with

which NATO must deal while drawing certain immediate lessons from the Kosovo

war.

To state the obvious, NATO has been a spectactularly successful enterprise. After

its creation in 1949, it was instrumental in helping prevent further Soviet gains in

Europe. Under American leadership, NATO was key to winning the Cold War.

Today, most of the states of Eastern Europe are now making great strides toward

democracy and prosperity. To what does NATO owe its success? What can we, the

Senate, do to guide the next decades of the Alliance?

Mr. Chairman, it was with these thoughts in mind that I offered an amendment

last year when we took up the enlargement of the Alliance. I was pleased that it

received very broad bipartisan support from 90 Senators. That overwhelming vote

was the latest reflection of the strong bipartisan support that NATO has enjoyed

over its lifetime.

In that amendment, the Senate set forth ten principles that should guide U.S. policy as NATO revises its Strategic Concept. NATO revised its Strategic Concept in

1991 to take into account the changes brought on by the collapse of the Soviet

Union and the end of the Cold War. What the Senate said last year was that the

core concepts of the 1991 Strategic Concept remain valid and should be reflected in

the revised Strategic Concept. Therefore, we should assess the new Strategic Concept to be unveiled at the Summit next week against the original and against the

bipartisan expression of the Senate’s vision:

The first two points of the Kyl amendment are that NATO is first and foremost

a military Alliance and is the principal foundation for the defense of the security

interests of its members against external threat. Based on its shared democratic values, NATO’s success in securing peace is a function of its military strength and its

strategic unity. This is the irreducible core of the Alliance that must be preserved

as it adapts to new circumstances. NATO is not a cooperative security arrangement.

Nations working together in a cooperative security arrangement may or may not defend each other in case of aggression. A cooperative security arrangement doesn’t

define the territory to be defended or the means to do so. NATO does precisely these

things and therein lies its unique contribution.

Some view military alliances as obsolete. They think that other regional institutions such as the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) or

global bodies such as the U.N. can gradually take the place of NATO. While these

institutions have a useful role to play in some instances, they cannot and should

not substitute for the formal commitment and integrated military structure of the

Atlantic Alliance. NATO is and should remain capable of undertaking operations in

defense of its interests in accord with its own decision making processes and without reference to the permission of other bodies. Running a war by consensus within

the Alliance is difficult enough, as we are seeing. The thought of doing so through

the U.N., as some propose, is totally impractical and dangerous. There have been

recent press reports of delay in blockading oil shipments to Serbia because of French

concerns about the absence of a U.N. mandate. Meanwhile American pilots—and

they are overwhelmingly American on the most difficult missions—are at risk striking oil refineries. This state of affairs is unconscionable. The administration is to

be commended for learning from its earlier overly sanguine approach to the efficacy

of international organizations and the rhetoric of collective security. It should not

return to those ways.

The third point is that strong United States leadership of NATO promotes and

protects vital national security interests. Not major interests; not minor interests;

vital interests—interests we as a nation are prepared to spend our blood and treasure on. Reasonable people may differ on how far America’s vital interests extend

and Kosovo is a case in point. But for 50 years America’s vital interests have included Europe’s democracies. The growth in the number of Europe’s democracies is

in large measure a result of the success of NATO in its first 40 years. The Washington Summit will celebrate the recent accession of three new Allies—Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic—countries enabled by the success of NATO to return

to their earlier democratic roots.

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Fourth, the United States maintains its leadership role of NATO by sustaining

a superior military force, through stationing of combat forces in Europe, and by providing officers for key NATO commands. Hosting the armed forces of another country isn’t always popular, even armed forces such as America’s whose behavior is

usually exemplary. Armed forces can sometimes be noisy neighbors and occasional

tragedies occurs. Such routine inconveniences and occasional tragedies are the

prices of freedom. The administration is to be commended for its insistence that the

United States retain the command of the Alliance’s Mediterranean command, whose

forces are crucial to the projection of American power into the Middle East and Persian Gulf.

Fifth, NATO members will face common threats to their security. My amendment

listed four categories of threats. The most serious is the potential re-emergence of

a hegemonic power threatening Europe. The unstated concern was, of course, Russia. Mr. Chairman, we all hope that Russia will succeed in its difficult transition

and emerge a prosperous and stable democracy. We should do our best to assist

Russia’s transition, but we should recognize that Russia’s future is beyond our capacity to positively influence except at the margin. Recent NATO actions in Kosovo

certify that we can have a negative impact on the relationship, on the other hand.

Similarly, we do no favors to Russia’s democrats if we yield to the demands of hard

liners in the Duma or the Defense Ministry for relief from arms control obligations,

or passively acquiesce to continued Russian military presence in the Newly Independent States.

The adaptation of the Conventional Forces on Europe Treaty and its ability to

command support by the Senate is relevant in this regard. If an adapted CFE Treaty fails to address in a meaningful way the real security problems within its scope—

namely problems in the Newly Independent States exacerbated by Russian stationed forces in Moldova and Georgia and massive arms aid to Armenia in its conflict with Azerbaijan—it will rightly be seen as undeserving of ratification. The tentative agreement on March 30 for Russian withdrawal from Moldova and reductions

in Georgia will be a welcome step if carried out. It goes without saying that CFE

adaptation should not prejudice NATO’s ability to deploy forces within its members

or undertake further enlargement as new aspirants achieve high standards of functioning democracy and military commonality. In establishing relations between

NATO and Russia, we must strike a balance between consultation when constructive and exclusion on those growing number of occasions when Russia’s goals are

directly inimical to our own and Russia measures its policy success by the damage

it can do to America’s global role.

A renewed threat from a hegemonic power is, fortunately, remote. A threat from

rogue states and gangster regimes which possess weapons of mass destruction and

seek the means to deliver them is here today. To this threat, NATO’s response to

these threats has reflected little unity of purpose. There is no Alliance consensus

on relations with Iran. Allies have directly challenged and undercut our sanctions

aimed at dissuading Iran from sponsoring terrorism. Iran may be within five years

of attaining a nuclear weapon capability and is developing a missile capable of

reaching Western Europe, both with Russian assistance. In Iraq, only Britain joins

us in ongoing military operations. Some Allies actively undermined UNSCOM inspections last year and now seek to weaken the U.N. sanctions regime in their haste

to gain commercial advantage. Allies voice a preference for responding to proliferation through diplomatic means rather than through enhanced defense efforts. There

is a large and growing gap between the United States and Europe in both political

will and military capabilities to respond to such threats. The determination of the

United States to construct a national missile defense risks further widening this gap

unless Europe moves quickly.

NATO faces potential threats to the flow of vital resources. This is not much in

mind in this era of prosperity and declining commodity prices, but recall that assuring energy supplies, particularly to Europe, was central to the Gulf War. We can

make no easy assumption that such threats are a thing of the past.

NATO also may face threats to its security stemming from ethnic and religious

animosities, historic disputes and undemocratic leaders. It is not clear to me that

there was sufficient threat to justify our involvement in Kosovo. But the circumstances there are the kind of conflict that could represent a threat to vital interests and our Strategic Concept should recognize that fact. Kosovo points up a very

disturbing state of affairs: our European Allies have the greatest difficulty, and are

sometimes incapable, of responding in a politically unified and militarily proficient

way to a threat to the stability and security of Europe. Our aircraft carry the bulk

of the war because they are the only ones capable of undertaking most of the missions. Allies categorically demand that an American presence remain in Bosnia. It

is clearly not sustainable that we should carry almost the entire burden of Western

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security outside Europe and a large measure of it within Europe. America’s armed

forces are not capable, and its people are not willing, to carry both European and

global responsibility without the assistance of those equally able to afford to do so

and geographically more at risk. In any event, the particular circumstances of our

involvement in Kosovo under the current Strategic Concept should not be cited as

proving that our new Strategic Concept should preclude a NATO response to a

threat arising out of ethnic conflict. A NATO response may be necessary in some

circumstances; whether it was in Kosovo is open to debate. If Kosovo was the wrong

decision, it is not the fault of the Strategic Concept but a misapplication of those

concepts.

The next two points are that the core mission of NATO is collective self defense

and all Allies must sustain the ability to effectively respond to common threats. This

will require that NATO members possess military capabilities to rapidly deploy

forces over long distances, sustain operations for extended periods of time, and operate jointly with the United States in high intensity conflicts. Mr. Chairman, most

Allies are slowly but inexorably losing the ability to field the kind of highly-trained,

well-equipped forces that can operate in even a medium-intensity environment without unacceptable risk of casualties. Allied armed forces are slipping from one to two

generations behind American forces in critical new technologies, and the gap is widening as the U.S. once again undertakes overdue investment in modernization. General Klaus Naumann, the German head of NATO’s Military Committee, has warned

that the day may soon be coming when European and American forces may no

longer be able to fight alongside each other on the same battlefield because of the

rapidly expanding gap in their combat capabilities. The 1991 Strategic Concept stated that NATO’s military forces could be safely reduced; this year I would hope to

see an affirmation that they must be sustained in number and modernized to meet

increased threats.

The amendment notes that NATO’s Integrated Military Structure underpins

NATO’s effectiveness by embedding members in a cooperative planning process and

assuring unity of command. As Europe seeks its Security and Defense Identity, and

new and more flexible command arrangements are put into place, we should assure

that they are undertaken within the framework of the transatlantic Alliance. A European Security and Defense Identity that excludes Turkey would directly call into

question the survival of NATO. Europe’s defense identity should be measured by the

creation of serious military capability, not artificial diplomatic constructs, and by its

ability to successfully respond to crises within Europe while the U.S. takes the lead

in extra-European contingencies.

The ninth point of the amendment addresses nuclear issues. It states that nuclear

weapons will continue to make an essential contribution to deterring aggression, especially aggression by potential adversaries armed with nuclear, chemical, or biological weapons, a point on which the 1991 Strategic Concept was silent. I would

hope to see it reflected in the new version since this threat is now with us in a much

more immediate way.

A credible NATO nuclear posture requires the stationing of U.S. nuclear forces

in Europe to provide an essential political and military link between Europe and

North America and will require widespread European participation in NATO nuclear roles. This point was explicitly made in the 1991 Strategic Concept and should

remain. While the prospects for nuclear use are indeed remote, a large part of the

reason that this is the case is precisely because of the credibility of the NATO nuclear deterrent. Moreover, that deterrent is a major reason against the proliferation

of nuclear weapons by countries directly under its shelter, aspiring to NATO membership, or reliant on the stable international order of which NATO is the central

pillar. The credibility of NATO’s deterrent is of far greater value than the Nonproliferation Treaty in this regard.

Mr. Chairman, a declaration of no-first-use of nuclear weapons would add absolutely nothing to NATO’s long-standing restraint on any use of force which is a function of the democratic societies it serves. But it would greatly undermine the Alliance’s ability to deter use of chemical or biological weapons which are today in the

arsenals of rogue states and gangster regimes. Hints of nuclear use and consequent

uncertainty about the American response probably contributed to Iraq’s decision not

to employ its arsenal of weapons of mass destruction during the Gulf War. The administration is to be commended for resisting politically popular but dangerously

naive appeals by German and Canadian leaders for reconsideration of NATO’s timetested doctrine.

The final point of the Kyl amendment addressed burdensharing. The 1991 Strategic Concept stated that ‘‘the European members of the Alliance will assume a greater degree of the responsibility for the defense of Europe.’’ It is the view of the Senate

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fending the democracies of Europe should be more equitably shared. I would suggest

that the reverse has occurred, and that current trend lines are going the wrong direction. Kosovo is once again a case in point. I would appreciate a statement from

the administration if it disputes this judgment.

Mr. Chairman, as the letter which you and I, the majority leader and the leadership of this Committee sent to the President in February stated, NATO is a tradeoff for the United States. The United States is committed to help in the defense of

Europe in return for having Allies that are capable of and committed to defending

against foes that threaten the Alliance from both inside and outside Europe. If the

Europeans are permitted to shift the entire burden of extra-European security to

the United States, then public support for NATO will wither. I am seriously concerned that the tone of the new Strategic Concept will emphasize crisis management

and peacekeeping in Europe and shy away from any suggestion that NATO may

need to address extra-European threats to NATO’s interests. I am further concerned

that, on present evidence, the new Strategic Concept will freeze unresolved arguments at some lowest common denominator rather than register agreement on fundamentals. If we cannot resolve fundamentals now, it will be infinitely more difficult

in the midst of a conflict involving our vital interests.

At its fiftieth anniversary, NATO can count its blessings and take pride in its

achievements. Today we face a short term crisis in the Alliance because of the war

its forces are fighting in Kosovo. But the myriad other challenges we face have resulted in what I see as a slow but steady withering of Alliance cohesion, a gradual

loosening of bonds. Looking beyond Kosovo, I think that this deterioration can be

reversed. What is needed is confident and consistent and unified leadership on our

part. Lady Margaret Thatcher stated at a Heritage Foundation speech that ‘‘America’s duty is to lead: the other Western countries’ duty is to support its leadership.’’

Mr. Chairman, it would be undiplomatic for an American to state this truth quite

so boldly. But I can offer no better prescription to my colleagues here for an enduring Atlantic Alliance of free nations. And, unity on our part is a prerequisite to European nations following our leadership.

PREPARED STATEMENT OF DR. F. STEPHEN LARRABEE

NATO’S ADAPTATION AND TRANSFORMATION: KEY CHALLENGES

Mr. Chairman, I welcome the opportunity to share with you and your distinguished committee my views on the key challenges facing NATO at the Washington

Summit and beyond. This is a large and complex subject. To do full justice to it

would require more time and space than permitted here. In my testimony, therefore,

I would like to concentrate on what I see as the three main challenges facing NATO

at the Washington Summit and beyond:

—First, to adopt a new Strategic Concept which will prepare NATO to meet the

challenges it is likely to face in the coming decades.

—Second, to manage the enlargement process in a manner that enhances European

stability.

—Third, to achieve a satisfactory settlement of the Kosovo conflict that ensures the

realization of NATO’s principal objectives and preserves the cohesion of the Alliance.

Let me address each of these issues separately.

I. THE STRATEGIC CONCEPT

I believe that the main focus at the Washington Summit should be on deciding

NATO’s strategic purpose(s) in the coming decade. The summit provides an important opportunity to articulate a bold vision of NATO’s purposes and to restructure

its forces to meet the challenges it is likely to face in the coming decades. Many

of these challenges are on Europe’s periphery or beyond Europe’s borders. The Alliance therefore needs to develop a broader definition of the threats to its interests

and restructure its forces to adequately address these new threats and challenges.

NATO must change because the nature of the security threats and challenges has

changed. During the Cold War NATO faced a threat of a massive invasion from the

East. Its defense posture was structured to deter such a threat. Today NATO faces

a much more diverse set of risks and challenges. These include ethnic conflict,

threats from weapons of mass destruction, terrorism.

The locus of these threats and challenges, moreover, has shifted. Today they are

no longer on the Central Front—as was the case during the Cold War—but on Europe’s periphery and beyond Europe’s borders. Thus the Alliance needs to develop

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the military capability to deal with this broader range of threats and challenges. In

particular, this means that NATO has to acquire the capability to deploy and sustain troops outside NATO territory.

Some critics argue that NATO does not need to change—that it has worked well

for fifty years and we should not tamper with it. In short, ‘‘If it ain’t broke, why

fix it?’’ But this view ignores the significant changes in the security environment

that have taken place since 1989. I do not believe, Mr. Chairman, that it will be

possible to sustain public support for NATO over the long run, either here or in Europe, if the Alliance is primarily designed and configured to defend against a threat

that has largely disappeared while at the same time ignoring the most pressing

threats to allied security, especially those in Europe. This, in my view, is a recipe

for the atrophy and disintegration of the Alliance, not its revitalization.

At the same time, the nature of the U.S. relationship with Europe needs to

change. We need partners willing and capable of sharing the burdens of responsibility. Our European allies need to be able to share more of the responsibilities, including the military sphere, to deter threats to our common security interests. As noted,

many, if not most, of these threats are beyond NATO’s borders.

This is not a question of Europe needing more forces. Europe today has more than

enough forces. The problem is that European forces are not structured to deal with

the type of security threats that the Alliance is likely to face in the future. Most

European forces—Britain and France excepted—are still configured to defend Alliance borders which are no longer threatened. They need to be reconfigured in order

to be able to project—and sustain—power beyond the Alliance’s borders.

The forces also need to be interoperable—that is, they need to be able to work

together effectively as part of a coalition. Thus we need to ensure that as these

forces modernize they do so in ways that allow them to operate effectively together.

However, true ‘‘force compatibility’’ requires not just compatible military forces, but

the development and refinement of a common operational doctrine. This is one of

the goals of the Administration’s initiative on a ‘‘Common Operational Vision.’’

The new Strategic Concept, to be adopted at the Washington Summit, should be

seen against this background. It needs to identify the new challenges that the Alliance is likely to face in the coming decades and to provide NATO planners with

guidance on how NATO forces should be structured to deal with these challenges.

Several issues are important in this regard:

The increased importance of non-Article V missions

Collective Defense (Article V) should remain a core Alliance mission. But in the

future most of the challenges that NATO faces will be non-Article V challenges and

will not involve a direct threat to NATO territory. Thus the Alliance will increasingly need the capability to deploy forces outside NATO territory. This will put new

demands on NATO defense planning and will require forces that are more mobile,

flexible, sustainable, survivable, and interoperable.

Reharmonizing U.S. and European Strategic Priorities

Second, and equally important, the new Strategic Concept needs to reharmonize

U.S. and European strategic priorities. These priorities are increasingly out of sync.

U.S. force planning is driven by the need to prepare for high-intensity combat, particularly in areas beyond Europe. European forces, on the other hand, are largely

focused on defending borders that are no longer threatened and on peacekeeping.

The Strategic Concept provides an important opportunity for addressing these deficiencies. While not abandoning collective defense as a key mission, the Strategic

Concept should emphasize the need for the Alliance to be able to deploy forces outside NATO territory—which is where most future threats are likely to be located.

As noted, this will require more mobile, flexible, sustainable, survivable, and interoperable forces.

Moreover, these forces will need to be able to conduct a full spectrum of missions,

including those in high-intensity conflicts. A new Strategic Concept that limits

NATO to just peacekeeping missions will not reharness overall U.S.-European strategic priorities. Nor will it address the ‘‘mission gap’’ between the U.S. and European forces. Unless this gap is diminished, it will be increasingly difficult for U.S.

and European forces to operate effectively together.

The Mandate Issue

Finally, the Strategic Concept needs to preserve NATO’s freedom to act in a crisis.

While it is preferable that NATO obtain a mandate from the UN for any non-Article

V actions, there are some instances—such as Kosovo—where military action on

NATO’s part may be required even without a UN mandate. Such actions should be

the exception and not the rule. But it would be unwise to include language in the

Strategic Concept that would prevent NATO from acting without a UN mandate.

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The Alliance must preserve the right and freedom to act when its members deem,

by consensus, that their security interests are threatened.

II. ENLARGEMENT

The second key challenge NATO faces is managing the process of enlargement in

a way that enhances European stability. At the Madrid Summit in July 1997 the

Alliance not only decided to invite three new members to join—Hungary, Poland,

and the Czech Republic—but it also agreed to maintain an ‘‘open door’’ to future

members.

I believe that the decision to maintain an open door to new members beyond the

first three was historically right and justified. However, the process of further

NATO enlargement will have to be managed prudently. NATO will have to balance

five competing demands:

The Need to Maintain NATO’s Cohesion and Military Effectiveness

As NATO enlarges, it must be able to maintain its core competencies and military

effectiveness. New members need to be able to contribute not only to NATO’s old

missions but to new ones as well. Collective defense (Article V) will remain a core

mission. However, most of NATO’s operations in the future are likely to involve crisis management missions. Thus, one of the key criteria for selecting new members

ought to be how well candidates can contribute to the full spectrum of new missions.

This would help to give NATO enlargement a stronger strategic rationale as well

as preserve NATO’s core competencies.

The Need to Keep the Open Door Credible

NATO will need to find ways to ensure that the open-door policy remains credible.

If NATO postpones a second round of enlargement too long, many prospective members may begin to lose hope of ever attaining membership. This could undercut

democratic forces and slow the momentum toward reform in these countries.

The Need to Digest the First Round

The fate and timing of the second round will, to a large extent, depend on how

well NATO succeeds in integrating the first three new members. If they perform

poorly and do not live up to expectations, this could diminish the willingness of

NATO members—and particularly the U.S. Senate—to support a second round of

enlargement. Thus a lot will depend on how well the first new members meet their

membership obligations.

The Need to Maintain a Viable Partnership with Russia

As in the first round of enlargement, NATO will need to take into consideration

the impact of enlargement on relations with Russia. Moscow will need time to adjust

to the new strategic realities and NATO should be careful not to overburden the

Russian political process. This could spark a dangerous backlash in Russia. At the

same time, NATO will need to maintain momentum in the enlargement process and

ensure the credibility of its open-door policy. If NATO acquiesces to Russian demands or accepts Russia’s attempts to draw new ‘‘red lines,’’ this could have a negative political impact on many prospective aspirants, especially the Baltic states, and

reinforce imperial nostalgia in certain parts of the Russian political spectrum.

The Need to Maintain Internal Consensus

Finally, NATO will need to maintain an internal consensus within the Alliance.

At the moment, there is no consensus within NATO about who should be included

in a second round or when the next round should take place. Some members, such

as France and Italy, have pressed for the inclusion of Slovenia and Romania in an

early second round. Others, such as Denmark and Norway, favor including the Baltic states. NATO will have to balance these internal pressures to forge an Alliancewide consensus. But as the process of enlargement unfolds, NATO should not lose

sight of its larger interests. Enlargement should not simply be reduced to a game

of internal ‘‘horse trading’’ devoid of a larger strategic rationale. Otherwise it could

end up weakening rather than strengthening NATO.

ENLARGEMENT AND NEW MISSIONS

There is, moreover, an important linkage between enlargement and NATO’s new

missions. If it is to live up to its promise—and maintain public support, especially

in the United States—NATO needs to remain an effective military alliance. That

was one of the key messages that emerged from the Senate debate on NATO ratification. Thus NATO needs to both enlarge and take on relevant new missions. This

is the best way to ensure that it remains a militarily effective alliance well into the

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21st century and also to disarm critics who argue that enlargement will dilute

NATO and turn it into a talk shop.

Clarifying NATO’s strategic purpose will also help manage and structure the enlargement process. Potential new members will not only have to be able to contribute to NATO’s traditional missions such as collective defense but also to NATO’s

new missions such as crisis management and peacekeeping. Thus one criterion—but

by no means the only criterion—for judging potential candidates for membership

ought to be how they contribute to NATO’s new as well as its traditional missions.

This would provide a yardstick for measuring aspirants’ performance and readiness

for membership.

A candidate’s performance alone, however, does not automatically ensure membership. It is a necessary but not sufficient condition for membership. Membership also

needs to be in NATO’s strategic interest. Some candidates may score well in a number of key areas—democratic reform, viable market economy, civilian control of their

military, etc. However, a good ‘‘scorecard’’ alone does not automatically guarantee

membership. There still must be a strong consensus within NATO that admitting

a particular candidate is in NATO’s strategic interest.

TIMING OF THE NEXT ROUND

NATO needs to ensure that enlargement remains an open process. There should

be no arbitrary ‘‘red lines.’’ No country should be excluded simply because of geography or because it was once part of the Soviet Union. At the same time, there are

strong reasons not to rush the next round of enlargement.

—First, digesting the first three members is likely to be difficult. There is a growing recognition that digesting the first three members is likely to be more difficult

than originally assumed and that they will need considerable time before they can

make the adjustments needed to be fully capable allies. It is important that the first

round goes well and is perceived as having been successful. Otherwise, it will be

difficult to get support for a second round.

—Second, at the moment there are no clearly qualified candidates for a second

round. Slovenia is the best qualified for admission on political and economic

grounds. But it adds little to the Alliance’s military capability. Romania looked like

a strong candidate for a second round at the time of the Madrid Summit. But its

chances have actually declined since Madrid as a result of its internal difficulties,

especially the slowdown in economic reform. By contrast, Slovakia’s chances have

improved since the former Prime Minister Vladimir Meciar’s defeat in the September 1998 elections. The new Slovak government under Mikulas Dzurinda has put

renewed emphasis on joining NATO and the EU. But it is too soon to tell whether

its performance will match its rhetoric. Austria may eventually apply for membership, but not until after the next election, at the earliest. Besides it would have to

significantly increase its defense spending—which is well below the NATO average—before it could be seriously considered for admission. The last thing the Alliance needs is new ‘‘free riders.’’ Lithuania’s chances have improved lately, but it still

remains a long-shot, especially because of the possible impact of its admission on

relations with Russia.

In short, there are no clear-cut candidates for a second round. All the leading candidates have some liabilities and will need time to improve their qualifications.

Thus NATO should not rush into an early new round of expansion.

—Third, there is no consensus within the Alliance for an early second round. With

the exception of France, and to a lesser extent Italy, there is no support within the

Alliance for issuing new invitations or singling out prospective candidates at the

summit. Indeed, some members, especially Britain, are strongly opposed to an early

second round. Thus any attempt to push for issuing new invitations at the summit

would meet strong resistance within the Alliance and could result in the emergence

of a disruptive dispute that could make it more difficult for the Administration to

get support on other important issues such as the Strategic Concept and DCI.

—Finally, Russia will need time to adjust to the new strategic realities. While Russia should not be given a veto over further expansion, proceeding with a second

round too quickly—before Russia has had a chance to digest the impact of the first

round—could inhibit, rather than facilitate, this process. This is all the more important because Russia is nearing the end of the Yeltsin era. His successor may not

have the same stake in good relations with the West that Yeltsin had. Hence Russian sensitivities will need to be carefully managed.

MAINTAINING THE CREDIBILITY OF THE OPEN DOOR

These factors argue for a deliberate, measured approach to further enlargement—

one that gives NATO time to sort out its strategic priorities and digest the first

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round and also gives Russia time to adjust to the new strategic situation, while

making clear that NATO enlargement is a continuing process.

At the same time, NATO needs to enhance the credibility of the open door. Otherwise many aspirants will lose hope and their incentive to continue to pursue domestic reforms could be weakened. In particular, NATO needs to lay out a clearer road

map at the Washington Summit which identifies concrete steps that will be taken

to ensure that the door truly remains open.

NATO should announce at the summit that it will review the performance of aspirants at a special summit in 2001, with an eye to identifying specific candidates for

a second round if their performance in the interval warrants it. Foreign and defense

ministers should be tasked with preparing a progress report similar to the Report

on Enlargement published by NATO in September 1995, which could be presented

at the ministerial meeting prior to the special summit. This report should assess

the progress made by the aspirants and identify potential candidate-members for a

second round. Invitations to new candidate-members could then be issued at the

special summit. The new candidate-members could thus formally join the Alliance

some time in 2002.

Such a procedure would help enhance the credibility of the open door and give

prospective candidate-members an incentive to undertake the necessary reforms to

improve their chances for membership. It would also buy time for NATO to digest

the first round and give Russia time to gradually accustom itself to the fact that

NATO enlargement is an ongoing process.

III. KOSOVO AND NATO’S FUTURE

The third and most pressing challenge facing the Alliance is successfully managing the conflict in Kosovo. Kosovo is a defining issue for the Alliance. How the conflict is eventually resolved will have a major impact on NATO’s future, especially

NATO’s ability to carry out its new missions. A failure to achieve NATO’s objectives

in Kosovo would undermine NATO’s credibility and ability to act as an effective security manager in post-Cold War Europe.

In my view, NATO was right in undertaking the current military action in

Kosovo. If the U.S. and its allies had sat idly by and done nothing to stop Milosevic’s

campaign of ethnic cleansing, NATO’s credibility and effectiveness would have been

seriously undermined. Many Europeans and Americans would have asked: What

good is NATO if it cannot deal with the most pressing security problem in Europe?

Moreover, this would have been a serious risk that the countries of Southeastern

Europe would have eventually been destabilized. Thus NATO had to act, both for

geostrategic as well as moral reasons.

At the same time, I think there is a need to reassess NATO’s strategy in light

of the new realities. In my view, airpower alone is unlikely to achieve NATO’s objectives. Eventually ground troops may be required. But even if NATO ultimately can

achieve its objectives without the use of ground troops, we should at least begin preparing for their possible use—NOW. This would send an important political signal

to Milosevic about NATO’s determination and could affect his willingness to comply

with the objectives NATO has set out.

In addition, we need to do more to improve the situation of the refugees currently

camped in Albania and Macedonia. They represent a potentially explosive political

problem. If their plight is not eased soon, both Albania and Macedonia could be destabilized, creating the very situation we ostensibly intervened to prevent. Thus

stepping up humanitarian relief for the refugees—including temporary relocation, if

necessary—must be a top Alliance priority.

A STABILIZATION STRATEGY FOR SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE

Finally, the U.S. and its European allies need to look beyond the current conflict

in Kosovo and develop a comprehensive, long-term stabilization strategy for Southeastern Europe. This strategy should have a political-economic and security component and should be designed to integrate Southeastern Europe into a broader EuroAtlantic framework.

The European Union should take the lead in promoting the economic component.

This should include a broad plan for the economic reconstruction not just of Kosovo

but of the entire region. Particular emphasis should be put on developing the transportation and communication infrastructure throughout the region. The end goal

should be closer association and eventual economic integration of the region into the

European Union.

Participation in this reconstruction plan should be open to all governments in the

region willing to commit themselves to the establishment of a viable market economy, promotion of democratic reform and the protection of minority rights—includVerDate 11-SEP-98 14:44 Sep 20, 1999 Jkt 549297 PO 00000 Frm 00066 Fmt 6601 Sfmt 6621 58335 SFRELA1 PsN: SFRELA1
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ing Serbia. While Serbia would not qualify for such reconstruction assistance unless

there were to be a significant change of regime in Belgrade, no stabilization of

Southeastern Europe will be complete over the long run without a democratic and

stable Serbia.

Including Serbia in the reconstruction offer would provide an incentive for internal change in Belgrade. As other countries in the region begin to prosper and be

more closely integrated into a European—and Euro-Atlantic—framework, many

Serbs are likely to ask why they should be left out from sharing the economic and

political benefits of closer ties to Europe which their neighbors are enjoying. Thus,

such an offer of assistance—predicated on the conditions outlined above—could

serve as a stimulus for internal change in Serbia and contribute to the overall stabilization of the region over the long run.

This stabilization strategy should also contain an important security component.

Once the Kosovo conflict is over, the U.S. and its allies should consider stationing

a stabilization force not only in Kosovo, but also in other countries on the periphery,

especially Macedonia and Albania (provided those countries wish such a force).

This stabilization force, which could be NATO-led, would be designed to provide

reassurance and establish a security umbrella under which these countries could

carry out a program of comprehensive economic and political reform. Without such

an umbrella many of the governments in the region may not feel confident enough

to embark on the necessary political and economic reforms or may feel compelled

to divert scarce resources into the military sector, especially if there is a non-democratic, hostile government in Belgrade.

As in Bosnia, the majority of the stabilization forces could—and should—be provided by America’s European allies. They have the greatest stake in security in the

region. Moreover, they have been clamoring to assume more responsibility for alliance security. This would provide an important opportunity for them to give substance to their ambitions.

The U.S., however, should also contribute to the stabilization force. We cannot expect to claim leadership in the Alliance unless we are willing to share the risks with

our European allies. And, like our allies, we also have a strong stake in ensuring

stability in the region.

Some U.S. troops could be redeployed from Germany to participate in these stabilization missions in Southeastern Europe. With the end of the Cold War and the

entry of Hungary, Poland and the Czech Republic into NATO, the U.S. no longer

needs some 60,000 troops stationed on the Central Front to defend borders that are

no longer threatened. Indeed, it may be time for the U.S. to consider a general redeployment of some of these troops into Southeastern Europe. After all, this region,

not the Central Front, is where the most serious security problems in Europe are

likely to be in the future.

The U.S. and its allies should also strengthen regional cooperation, such as the

Southeastern European Peacekeeping Brigade (SEEBRIG), which is composed of Albania, Bulgaria, Greece, Italy, Macedonia, Romania, and Turkey. It will take a

while for the multinational brigade, which will initially be stationed in Plovdiv, Bulgaria, to become a credible military force. However, such regional structures have

an important political as well as military function and can help promote trust and

cooperation among the military establishments of the region, thereby contributing

to overall regional cooperation and stability.

Such a comprehensive stabilization strategy obviously cannot be carried out overnight. It will take time—and a significant commitment of resources, both on the

part of the U.S. and its European allies. But the price tag—in lives and treasure—

is likely to be significantly higher if such a comprehensive effort is not undertaken

and the problems of Southeastern Europe are allowed to fester or continue to be addressed only piecemeal.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I welcome the opportunity to answer any

questions related to my testimony.

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