ndupress.ndu.edu SF No. 296 1 

I

t is often stated that cohesion constitutes the center of gravity of the North 

Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). Yet divergent domestic pressures 

and external threat perceptions are threatening to pull Allies apart and 

leave the Euro-Atlantic security architecture in shatters. When NATO Heads 

of State and Government meet in Warsaw on July 8–9, 2016, the stakes will be 

high. Not since the end of the Cold War has the security outlook been as bleak 

or the collective resources for meeting multiple threats as meager.

This paper takes stock of the existing debates on the Warsaw Summit agenda 

and offers a set of recommendations on how U.S. officials might attempt to foster 

unity within the Alliance. A cursory review of the various commentaries on the 

Warsaw Summit agenda suggests that this exercise will have much in common 

with the proverbial practice of herding cats.1

 Different Allies all want to see more 

of what they individually desire, while the Alliance as a whole will struggle to 

satisfy competing demands. Much has been written already about the delicate 

balancing act required for shoring up eastern and southern defenses, as well as for 

reconciling the needs of deterrence with political dialogue. However, coming to 

grips with the diplomatic difficulties of finding consensus entails acknowledging 

that the difficulties are as much internal as they are external to the Alliance.

This analysis proceeds as follows. The first section discusses the various 

issues featuring on the Warsaw Summit agenda. While individual discussion 

items have logical answers, these often entail significant financial implications. 

The principal challenge for summit diplomacy will therefore reside in maintaining unity over the inevitable package deal that reconciles competing demands 

for resources. Success cannot be taken for granted. The three following sections 

detail a set of recommendations for dealing with the challenge of fragmentation. At the level of threat perceptions, a coherent narrative can be constructed 

The NATO Warsaw Summit: 

How to Strengthen Alliance 

Cohesion

by Alexander Mattelaer

STRATEGIC FORUM

National Defense University

About the Author

Dr. Alexander Mattelaer is Assistant 

Director of the Institute for European 

Studies in Brussels. During the spring 

of 2016 he was a Fulbright Schuman 

Visiting Fellow in the Center for 

Strategic Research, Institute for 

National Strategic Studies, at the 

National Defense University.

Key Points

◆ In July 2016 NATO leaders will 

meet in Warsaw to formally review whether earlier decisions on 

strengthening the Alliance’s collective defenses are sufficient. Greater 

efforts will be needed, but consensus may not be easy to achieve.

◆ Below the surface, the cohesion of 

NATO is under severe strain from 

multiple crises including Russian 

revanchism, mass migration, and 

terrorism. Summit preparations are 

also taking place under the shadow 

of potential strategic shocks. Internal disagreements fueled by rising 

populism could lead to a British exit 

from the European Union, a disorderly breakdown of the Schengen 

system, or worse.

◆ In this context it would be a mistake to underestimate the risk of 

NATO fragmentation. To strengthen 

cohesion, U.S. leaders should 

consider broadening the debate beyond the immediate concerns over 

Europe’s troubled neighborhood, 

fostering intra-European peer 

pressure on providing adequate 

military capabilities, and stimulating European nations to develop 

complementary force postures. 

These initiatives could revitalize 

the transatlantic bond, but would 

require patient engagement before 

and after the summit.

June 2016

CENTER FOR STRATEGIC RESEARCH
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only by taking the discussion beyond the Alliance’s immediate neighborhood. This requires that all Allies articulate their security concerns and integrate these into 

a 360-degree approach. Concerning defense resourcing, 

the free-rider problem can be addressed most effectively 

by fostering intra-European peer pressure, including 

through the European Union (EU). A commitment to 

sufficient defense spending should be integrated into the 

European Semester system of macro-economic coordination. Last but not least, capability and strategy development must be reframed as a regionally inspired division of labor built on complementary force structures. 

This would cast those nations closest to various threats 

into a role of first responder and others into that of provider of reserve forces, defensive depth, and support. The 

concluding section sketches a practical way forward for 

transforming crisis into opportunity. The United States 

can use the Warsaw Summit as a catalyst for revitalizing 

the Western-led global order.

The Warsaw Agenda and the 

Problem of Fragmentation

At face value, the agenda of the Warsaw Summit is 

straightforward. The NATO Heads of State and Government will review the progress that has been made 

in implementing the decisions taken at the 2014 Wales 

Summit. These relate to a broad program of increasing the Alliance’s readiness for meeting its three core 

tasks—collective defense, crisis management, and cooperative security—and adapting it to the deteriorating 

security environment. After all, Russia’s actions against 

Ukraine and the growing instability in the Middle East 

and North Africa prompted NATO leaders to declare “a 

pivotal moment in Euro-Atlantic security.”2

 The Warsaw 

Summit serves the function of determining whether the 

package of measures agreed upon in Wales is meeting 

expectations and offering further guidance as required. 

Many Allies consider NATO’s present military posture 

to be insufficient. At the same time, the Alliance is short 

of the required means for meeting political ambitions. 

This leads to a fundamental mismatch between the combined wish list of allied ambitions and available military 

and financial resources. This problem is further amplified 

by the broader crisis of European integration, which is 

not about security per se, but which cannot help but affect the defense debate in a negative way. Maintaining 

collective unity will therefore constitute the most important hurdle to overcome in Warsaw.

The NATO Readiness Action Plan (RAP) constituted the flagship of the 2014 Wales Summit.3

 This plan 

included so-called assurance measures as well as an ambitious adaptation agenda. The former concentrated on 

generating a continuous presence on NATO’s Eastern 

flank through rotational deployment of land, maritime, 

and air assets. The latter included the establishment of 

the Very High Readiness Joint Task Force (VJTF) and 

the commitment to increase the size and responsiveness 

of the NATO Response Force. The VJTF was intended 

to create a “mobile trip-wire” and serve as “a deployable 

guarantee of Alliance solidarity” that could be swiftly 

reinforced by follow-on forces as deemed appropriate.4

Furthermore, the adaptation agenda was geared toward 

revisiting the functioning of the Alliance in all its aspects, 

including decisionmaking procedures, strategic communications, and ways of countering so-called hybrid warfare threats. The speed at which the Alliance could identify and react to various forms of aggression constituted 

a central theme in this regard. All of the above was expected to come at a cost. NATO leaders therefore agreed 

to reverse the trend of declining defense budgets. This 

defense investment pledge contained a hard commitment to halt any decline in defense expenditure as well 

as a softer commitment of aiming to increase defense 

spending toward the 2 percent target as gross domestic 

product grows. Last but not least, NATO defense ministers in June 2015 reinforced these decisions by issuing 

new political guidance that raised the level of ambition 

in qualitative terms.

Despite the fact that the implementation of these 

decisions has continued apace, various Allies complain 

that the Wales package is insufficient. In part, this is related to a growing realization that VJTF deployment and 
ndupress.ndu.edu SF No. 296 3 

subsequent reinforcement may not be as assured or as 

rapid as required. The antiaccess/area-denial (A2/AD) 

challenge around Kaliningrad looms large in this regard.5

Correspondingly, the Alliance remains dangerously vulnerable to a hypothetical coup de main scenario in the 

Baltic region.6 Apart from this most dangerous scenario, 

the Baltic States may also be the target of unconventional destabilization efforts that could result in accidental 

conflict.7 As summit host nation, Poland leads the way in 

advocating a permanent NATO presence to be deployed 

along the Eastern flank.8 Yet what should a “forward defense” posture look like in detail?9

 Should the Alliance 

follow Russia’s example of throwing the 1997 NATORussia Founding Act overboard? Such a course of action 

entails committing significant combat forces that would 

become unavailable for other missions for an indefinite 

period. In addition, Germany’s minister of defense has 

already signaled that any forward presence will remain 

rotational and respectful of existing obligations.10 Yet the 

lack of appetite in boosting conventional defenses (combined with Russia’s saber rattling) is increasing pressure 

to revisit NATO’s nuclear deterrence policy.11 While the 

assumptions on which the 2012 Deterrence and Defense 

Posture Review were based are obviously no longer valid, 

the reinvigoration of nuclear deterrence is bound to generate considerable domestic opposition within several 

Allies participating in nuclear-sharing, most notably in 

Germany and Belgium.

The second major complaint is that the RAP is 

overwhelmingly geared toward the East, whereas several 

Allies are at least as concerned—if not more so—by the 

instability along the Southern flank of the Alliance. As 

migratory flows are stretching the administrative capacities of some Allies to the breaking point and Islamist 

terrorists succeed in targeting the European homeland, 

many allied defense establishments are being called upon 

to perform homeland missions that have significant repercussions in terms of force readiness.12 Nations such as 

Italy and Spain will push hard for getting a framework 

for the southern neighborhood agreed. The role of the 

Alliance in projecting stability overseas and mitigating 

conflict fallout is therefore unlikely to diminish. While 

working through and with partners will be a prominent 

item on the summit agenda, initiatives such as defense 

capacity-building also require substantial resources to 

generate the intended result.

The yawning gap between the combined ambitions 

of individual Allies and the total availability of financial, 

material, and human resources constitutes a fundamental problem. While the security challenges on NATO’s 

flanks each have logical answers in terms of what is required, the combined allied force pool is insufficient for 

meeting all demands—especially if one takes the factors 

of readiness and attrition into account. It can therefore 

be expected that different Allies recriminate each other 

for not doing enough. While those Allies openly flouting even the minimal commitment of halting the decline 

in their defense expenditure (that is, Albania, Belgium, 

Bulgaria, and Italy) will face intense pressure to change 

course, it remains an inescapable reality that NATO defense expenditure is ultimately driven overwhelmingly 

by the largest member states.13 The spectacular increases 

in defense spending by Allies such Poland, Latvia, and 

Lithuania cannot substantially mitigate the consequences of budgetary stagnation in the United States and 

Western Europe.

The end result of this financial context is that it will 

remain difficult during the coming years to resource the 

capabilities required for meeting the present level of ambition and shoring up allied defenses. In political terms, 

European Allies will experience a startlingly chilly reaction when realizing that their increasingly acute security 

concerns can partially be offset only by Alliance solidarity. Given that successive U.S. administrations have been 

complaining about ever-decreasing levels of European 

defense spending, this issue has real potential for becoming a transatlantic day of reckoning. This prospect has 

become all the more likely now that NATO burdensharing has become a theme in the electoral campaign for the 

U.S. Presidency.

European fears over NATO’s external defenses are 

reinforced by the combination of crises affecting the 
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broader process of European integration. The near-collapse of the Eurozone and the migration-induced stress 

on the Schengen area of borderless travel have provoked 

acrimonious disputes and accusations of political blackmail among Europeans. It is difficult to overestimate the 

extent to which political trust among these Allies has 

suffered. Both at the level of political leaders and their 

populations, the idea of solidarity among Europeans is 

under siege. NATO as an organization is not immune 

from these developments. On the one hand, both Russia 

and the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant actively seek 

to foster and exploit European disunity to their strategic 

advantage.14 On the other hand, it cannot be excluded 

that allied nations may engage in diplomatic retaliations 

against each other’s policies across different institutional 

frameworks.

The notion of European disintegration—if it were 

to take hold—cannot have but the most profound implications for Alliance management. The rise of political 

populism and Euroscepticism strengthens such centrifugal tendencies. This “challenge from within” may well be 

as dire as those NATO faces on its borders. It is not hard 

to see how political turbulence could result in strategic 

paralysis. On June 23, 2016, the United Kingdom will 

hold a referendum on whether the country should remain a member of the European Union. The potential 

breakup of NATO’s sister organization cannot help but 

undermine Western unity in the most insidious way possible. In addition, EU economic sanctions against Russia 

are set to expire on July 31, 2016, if not prolonged—a 

decision that requires European unanimity. The Dutch 

referendum on the Association Agreement between the 

EU and Ukraine shows how adroit Russia has become 

in fostering division through targeted disinformation 

campaigns. Last but not least, European domestic political controversy over themes such as immigration or 

economic affairs may well sap the Alliance of its resolve 

and therefore constitutes a critical vulnerability.

While the Wales Summit was widely heralded as 

a historic turning point, the agenda for Warsaw looks 

bleak. In spite of the significant progress realized over 

the past 18 months, doubts over whether the RAP will 

meet its objectives have proliferated. Such doubts over 

military readiness could be addressed, but it remains to 

be seen whether agreement can be found on how to share 

the costs that this will entail. Furthermore, the military 

debate has been greatly affected by a loss of confidence 

in European cooperation and unity. The key challenge 

therefore becomes: how can political fragmentation be 

contained and Alliance cohesion safeguarded?

Broadening the Security Debate

Any meaningful consensus within the Alliance begins with a shared appreciation of the international security environment. Unfortunately, many Allies perceive 

threats differently. This is largely the consequence of their 

geographical position on the European continent. The 

binary choice between strengthening the eastern defenses of the Alliance and tending to its southern neighborhood arguably constitutes the biggest point of friction 

in terms of Alliance management. This hurdle could be 

overcome by zooming out and approaching the security 

environment from 360 degrees. Even during the Cold 

War, NATO strategy was informed by careful analysis 

of the global security context. It would be foolish not to 

engage in a similar discussion today. Only if every Ally—

including the United States—puts forward its proper set 

of concerns can a balanced consensus be found.

The “East vs. South” debate is politically poisonous 

because it fosters a fear of abandonment in the most vulnerable Allies. The European map of defense spending 

patterns is revealing. In broad terms, the turning of the 

tide in defense spending is rolling over the European 

continent from east to west and from north to south. 

This creates the impression that some Allies are putting 

their money where their mouths are whereas others are 

not. Yet such a perception omits reference to broader political and economic considerations. Over time, the budgetary trend reversal will make itself felt in every nook 

and cranny of the Alliance. But even this will not offset 

the basic equilibrium between Articles 3 and 5 of the 

Washington Treaty: individual self-help and mutual aid 
ndupress.ndu.edu SF No. 296 5 

go hand in hand. Alliance membership does not absolve 

nations from the responsibility to maintain their own defenses and contribute to the common cause.

To achieve consensus, it is imperative that each Ally 

articulates its own set of security concerns. This inevitably means that the focus on the Eastern flank gets diluted to some extent. Concerns over the high North, the 

South Atlantic, the Sahel, or homegrown terrorism are 

all legitimate.15 In any case, these concerns will influence 

the strategic calculus made by individual Allies. The inclusion of such elements into the NATO debate will not 

only foster frank discussion and occasional disagreement, 

but it will also render the difficult discussion on burdensharing more honest. Some nations may object to such a 

360-degree approach and argue that the Alliance must 

concentrate solely on collective defense against Russia. 

Yet throughout its history NATO has always been a 

multipurpose organization, and no single-issue conception of the Alliance is likely to find widespread support.16

The U.S. rebalance to the Asia-Pacific region deserves a prominent place in this discussion.17 NATO 

strategy cannot ignore the fact that the United States 

has global security commitments that include treaty obligations in East Asia. While the number of U.S. forces is 

of course finite, global partners such as Japan and the Republic of Korea add real value to NATO by contributing 

to operations and supporting the liberal democratic view 

of world order. Discussions between NATO and such 

partners could help shed more light on the logic of extended nuclear deterrence, for instance. The selection of 

former U.S. Forces Korea Commander Curtis M. Scaparrotti as the new Supreme Allied Commander Europe 

suggests that the interdependency between Asian and 

European theaters is becoming increasingly prominent.

It remains possible to distill an Alliance-wide synthesis that puts all of these different viewpoints into 

perspective. Regional security challenges merit careful analysis, but they only acquire their full significance 

when put into a global context. This makes clear that the 

Alliance cannot choose to concentrate exclusively on 

either the Eastern or Southern flank, but will need to 

prepare for handling multiple challenges simultaneously. 

It is important to highlight the dimension of time as a 

planning variable: the threat from the east could be sudden and massive whereas the south is bound to be of 

lesser intensity but more enduring. Both could be jeopardized by events elsewhere in the world—most notably 

any future contingency in the South China Sea or on 

the Korean Peninsula. Correspondingly, the forward defenses of the Alliance in the east need to be robust, its 

stability efforts in the south unfaltering, and its pool of 

reserve forces sufficiently flexible to cater to contingencies whenever and wherever these occur. To some extent 

these challenges also require different sets of capabilities 

and suggest an implicit division of labor.

In many ways, recently announced U.S. decisions 

indicate the way forward. The quadrupling of funding 

of the European Reassurance Initiative in the fiscal year 

2017 budget constitutes a strong signal that NATO’s 

defenses are being substantially reinforced. Most notably, this includes the rotation of armored brigade combat teams from February 2017 onward.18 This will bring 

the total U.S. Army presence in Europe up to three fully 

manned brigades and prepositioned material for equipping a fourth. Some of these units (such as the 173rd Airborne Brigade Combat Team stationed in Vicenza, Italy) 

are earmarked for multiple theaters. At the same time, 

U.S. support to France and Belgium in dealing with terrorist threats underscores the fact that different tasks can 

be dealt with simultaneously. Setting such an example 

constitutes a powerful basis for demanding Allies to assume their fair share of building up a forward presence 

and maintaining sufficient reserves to offer rapid support 

where needed.

However, it cannot be expected that the United 

States alone should respond to the changing security 

environment in Europe. Europeans will need to look 

after their immediate neighborhood first so as to allow 

the United States to focus on the provision of reserve 

forces and high-end capabilities and enablers. Thus 

configured, the Alliance could add maximum value as 

a common platform for ensuring coherence across the 
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defense efforts of individual Allies. Of course, this requires that European nations invest sufficient financial 

resources and orient their defense capability development accordingly. The following two sections discuss 

how these aims could be furthered.

Fostering Intra-European Peer 

Pressure on Defense Spending

It is a longstanding transatlantic tradition for U.S. 

Secretaries of Defense to berate the European Allies for 

spending insufficient resources on security and defense.19

Yet when individual nations put forward competing demands for NATO security assurances, this trend could 

be replaced with Europeans berating each other for not 

doing enough. In particular, the requirement to maintain 

adequate levels of defense spending could be integrated 

into the framework of the European Semester—the EU’s 

annual cycle of macro-economic policy guidance and 

surveillance. While the European Union cannot substitute for the transatlantic security relationship, it might 

help mobilize solidarity among Europeans and embed 

their defense efforts into a wider policy framework, in 

particular vis-à-vis so-called hybrid threats. Such intraEuropean peer pressure would help address the financial 

aspects of the burdensharing debate.

Reviewing progress made toward meeting the Wales 

defense investment targets yields a mixed picture. On the 

bright side, most Allies have effectively stopped cutting 

their defense expenditures. Many of them project budget 

increases in the years ahead or are already in the process of expanding their defense outlays—some of them 

significantly.20 Yet the budgets from the largest Allies 

are essentially stagnant in real terms. Future projections 

tend to be based on rosy-colored economic projections. 

The possibility that Western economies may face a new 

recession in the coming years is hardly being factored 

in. Furthermore, many Allies have postponed investment 

projects in past years to pay for operational outlays in Afghanistan and elsewhere. As a result, they are now facing 

an accumulation of force modernization bills. This “bowwave” effect is affecting not only smaller Allies, such as 

the nations with aging F-16 fighter fleets, but also the 

larger ones such as Germany and the United States.21

This means that even substantial reinvestment in defense 

might not immediately translate into additional capabilities, as vast sums are consumed by the mere regeneration 

of present force structures. For meeting the Alliance level 

of ambition, the pool of capabilities must become deeper, 

wider, and more ready. All the above unfolds against a 

backdrop of increasing capability requirements for meeting the Alliance level of ambition. As a result, the pressure on all Allies to spend more and to spend more wisely 

will grow and persist (see figure).

Intriguingly, all Allies that are also members of the 

EU have subscribed to a multilateral system of macroeconomic policy coordination and budgetary supervision 

that is entirely separated from national security concerns. 

Under the European Semester system, national governments submit their annual budget and economic reform 

programs for review to the European Commission.22

The latter monitors progress toward the “Europe 2020” 

targets for sustainable economic growth and provides 

country-specific recommendations for meeting those. 

For Eurozone countries, this process even includes the 

European Commission issuing evaluative opinions on 

the submitted draft budgetary plans. This surveillance 

mechanism can lead to corrective action and even impose fines. While the European Commission takes note 

of defense spending as a national budget post, it does so 

only through a prism of fiscal prudence and cannot accord any value to this.

The fact that the European Semester system is de 

facto security-blind has already provoked substantial 

criticism. Addressing both houses of parliament in the 

aftermath of the November 2015 terrorist attacks in 

Paris, French President François Hollande declared that 

“the security pact will have precedence over the stability 

pact.”23 In effect, he signaled that extra spending on security and defense needed to be excluded from the sovereign debt targets monitored by the European Commission. While such flexibility may be warranted in light of 

exceptional circumstances, it would make more sense to 
ndupress.ndu.edu SF No. 296 7 

include minimal defense spending targets into the European Semester system. If the NATO defense investment 

pledge is to be given real meaning for budget planners, 

this would be a logical way forward. Budgetary consolidation and adequate levels of defense spending must go 

hand in hand; one should not serve as a smokescreen for 

ignoring the other.

Integrating some sort of defense investment pledge 

into the European Semester system would yield important benefits. First and foremost, it would avoid potential 

contradiction between uncoordinated budgetary targets 

set by NATO and the EU. In addition, such a Europeanized defense investment pledge would be more meaningful because it would be mainstreamed into the overall 

budgeting process of European states and coupled with 

a supranational sanctioning mechanism. Integrating defense investment targets would also give the European Semester system greater legitimacy by incorporating security 

The European Semester

The European Semester is the European Union’s annual cycle of economic policy coordination, which is intended 

to ensure implementation of EU economic rules and priorities. The key stages are:

November: The European Commission issues its annual growth survey, which proposes EU economic priorities 

for the coming year and formulates opinions on the draft budgetary plans of national governments within the 

euro area.

December–January: EU member states adopt national budgets and together formulate recommendations 

for the euro area as a whole.

February: The European Commission issues individual country reports (one per member state).

March: EU Heads of State and Government formally adopt economic priorities based on the commission’s 

annual growth survey.

April: EU member states present their national plans for economic reforms and sound public finances.

May: the European Commission provides country-specific recommendations for budgetary, economic and social 

policies.

July: EU Heads of State and Government formally endorse these country-specific recommendations.

September–October: National governments within the euro area present draft budgetary plans for the 

coming year to the European Commission.

Throughout the Year: The European Parliament engages in dialogue with the European Commission on 

the annual growth survey and the country-specific recommendations.

While the implementation of commission recommendations at the national level has a mixed track record, the 

system enables the surveillance of economic reforms undertaken by member states and includes a sanction 

mechanism for those that fail to take sufficient corrective action. Although it provides member states with 

budgetary guidance spanning all governmental functions, currently the need to invest in defense does not 

constitute an objective in this discussion. Thus adopting a “percentage of GDP” defense target would give 

defense expenditures some macroeconomic protection within the European Semester system.
8 SF No. 296 ndupress.ndu.edu

goals—a key function of government. Most fundamentally, it would give a recognizable procedural face to the 

idea of intra-European solidarity in the field of security. A 

defense-sensitive European Semester would help channel 

a debate that has already begun among Europeans in a 

productive direction. Thus it would offset the centrifugal 

forces that EU budgetary discussions have unleashed in 

the recent past.

Many objections could of course be raised to this 

proposal of introducing defense targets in the European 

Semester. Neutral EU member states could object to introducing formal NATO defense spending targets in an 

EU setting. Even allied nations might think twice about 

transposing what some consider to be only soft NATO 

guidance into more binding EU defense spending targets. Germany in particular will remain adamant that 

fiscal discipline should not be thrown overboard. The 

combination of these factors may well lead to a European “watering down” of what was agreed at the Wales 

Summit. At the same time, it is precisely by linking different policy arenas that grand bargains become possible. 

While it is likely that nations would only sign up to less 

ambitious defense spending targets when these become 

genuinely binding, the European Semester system could 

0

0.5

1.0

1.5

2.0

2.5

3.0

3.5

4.0

-15 -10 -5 0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35

ALB

Defense Expenditure Annual Change %, 2014–2015

Defense Expenditure as % of GDP, 2015

ITA

BGR

BEL SVN CAN

DEU

HRV

NOR

FRA

ESP

HUN

GBR

USA

TUR

DNK

NLD

CZE

ROU PRT

EST

GRC

LVA SVK

LUX

POL

LTU

Figure. NATO Defense Expenditure Data

Source: Defence Expenditures of NATO Countries (2008–2015), Press Release 11 (Brussels: NATO Headquarters, January 28, 2016). It should be 

pointed out that the percentage of gross domestic product spent on defense constitutes only a crude metric for measuring burdensharing.
ndupress.ndu.edu SF No. 296 9 

add realism and contribute to more efficient spending. It 

could provide significant incentives for increasing multinational cooperation in the field of defense procurement, 

for instance. More importantly, it could help shelter defense spending when the next economic downturn arrives by directly feeding security considerations into the 

debate over macro-economic policy.

The European Commission and the EU’s High 

Representative for Foreign and Security Policy have 

signaled their willingness to deepen cooperation with 

NATO and to get more involved in security matters. 

Their recent joint communication on countering hybrid 

threats suggests growing awareness about the security 

challenges in the EU’s neighborhood and calls for stepping up NATO-EU cooperation in areas ranging from 

situational awareness and strategic communication to 

crisis prevention and response.24 The notion of hybrid 

threats could serve as a means of unlocking EU support in a wide range of areas contributing to improving 

collective defense. This could include the mobilization 

of significant financial resources for modernizing Europe’s defense transportation infrastructure and supply 

systems, for instance.25 Given that the Warsaw Summit 

may well feature a NATO-EU joint statement, several 

opportunities for deeper cooperation could be identified. 

Exploring the ways in which NATO-EU budgetary 

policy coordination mechanisms could be synchronized 

would stand out as a promising avenue for realizing a 

major breakthrough.

Toward Complementary Force 

Postures

The cohesion of NATO remains critically dependent on its collective defense commitment. Unfortunately, the present gap between available resources and 

military requirements casts doubt over the credibility of 

NATO’s defenses. As this growing gap is the result of 

both an increased threat level and the progressive hollowing out of many allied militaries, it would be unwise 

to assume that the turn of the tide in defense spending 

will be sufficient in addressing the problem in the near 

to mid-term.26 Allied defense planners will thus remain 

under pressure to shore up NATO’s deterrence posture 

with insufficient resources. The Warsaw Summit may 

call for addressing this issue through increased multinational cooperation, technological advances, and institutional adaptation. Yet in the end, NATO commanders 

will need to be given real capabilities. When under stress, 

NATO may need to revert to an explicit division of labor 

in terms of which Ally provides what type of warfighting 

capabilities and where. For this to be possible, European 

defense establishments need to be nudged toward developing complementary force structures. These could be 

geared toward regional areas of responsibility that match 

the national interests of the nations involved.

At present, NATO’s available military capabilities 

fall short of what may be required if a collective defense 

scenario materializes.27 Over the past years, Russia’s 

armed forces have trained and honed their skills for conducting large-scale combat operations.28 To have a credible conventional deterrence in place, analysts suggest 

that NATO would need to be able to surge some 13 brigades into the Baltic States to deter Russian aggression 

by denial (based on a 1:3 force ratio).29 Even when adding up those forces deployed in theater and rapidly available follow-on forces, such troop numbers are not easy 

to come by. Furthermore, such quantitative calculations 

make abstraction of the geographical and infrastructural 

advantages that Russia can exploit, for instance, by resorting to A2/AD tactics. Moreover, since Russia is not 

the only actor posing a threat to the Alliance, some resources will inevitably be tied up elsewhere. For example, 

it is hard to see how NATO could fail to accommodate 

a Libyan request for assistance. Last but not least, several 

nations have national commitments and responsibilities 

that preclude making all their forces available to the Alliance. Homeland operations to deal with internal security 

and refugee management loom particularly large in this 

regard. The combined pool of forces at the disposal of 

the Alliance is therefore inadequate in terms of readiness 

and may even lack sheer numbers when facing the prospect of combat attrition.
10 SF No. 296 ndupress.ndu.edu

The hardest question for NATO defense planners is how to convince individual Allies to fill the required force pool in the most efficient way possible. In 

recent years, the Alliance has struggled to address the 

longstanding capability shortfalls taught by operational 

experience. Similarly, the widespread expectation that 

intensifying multinational cooperation would offset the 

impact of national force reductions has not been borne 

out. This suggests that the post–Cold War defense planning system—overwhelmingly geared toward the conduct of expeditionary crisis response operations—has 

failed to keep allied militaries fit for the future. As collective defense has returned to the foreground, the question may be asked whether the military division of labor 

within the Alliance needs to be revisited.

During the Cold War, the continental European 

Allies were tasked to provide the hard core of land 

forces and tactical air support, whereas secure air and 

sea lines of communication were the responsibility of 

the United States and United Kingdom. Through the 

provision of its nuclear umbrella, the United States 

acted as the underwriter of the collective defense system, ready to risk its own national security on behalf 

of its Allies. This stands in stark contrast to the trend 

that has been established in the aftermath of the Cold 

War. During the past two decades, European militaries slowly attempted to develop expeditionary capabilities as were required for stabilization operations in the 

former Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, and elsewhere. The 

Alliance committed to the notion of capability-based 

planning, which decoupled force planning from specific 

geopolitical threats. As a result, individual Allies often 

struggled to recognize their national interest in the capability sets they were assigned.

A new approach would merge both of these historical experiences. It is increasingly clear that the frontline 

states of the Alliance need to shift the focus of their national defense plans and corresponding force structures. 

The Baltic States, for instance, need to transition from 

light to mechanized forces. Similarly, Poland may focus 

on combining local defense forces with reconnaissancestrike capabilities and deterrence assets.30 A country such 

as Italy, in turn, would naturally focus its efforts in the 

Euro-Mediterranean basin and tailor its force structure 

for leading crisis management and cooperative security 

efforts there.31 The resulting picture is that those nations 

closest to the various threats the Alliance faces would 

need to ready themselves to act as first responders. They 

would do so out of sheer necessity borne from self-help. 

In turn, the Allies less geographically exposed must commit themselves to developing and maintaining those capability sets needed to offer effective aid and assistance to 

those in need. Practically speaking that could mean the 

Franco-German axis provides the internal backbone for 

strengthening Europe’s defenses in the south and east, 

respectively. Relying on its maritime-centric expeditionary capabilities, the United Kingdom could maintain a 

flexible posture ready to assist where needed. As always, 

the United States continues its role as underwriter of the 

Alliance system and provider of those capabilities that 

are out of the reach of individual Allies.

Such a division of labor organized around the “compass rose” that the Alliance carries in its emblem would 

clarify what is expected from each Ally. It also meshes 

well with the foreign policy ambitions of the nations 

involved. The distribution of military tasks on the basis 

of regional orientation and proximity would help ensure 

domestic support for shoring up national defense efforts. 

This is a key argument to counter the foreseeable objection that regionalization risks cementing Alliance fragmentation. While such a division of labor to some extent 

dilutes the notion of “all for one,” it is far more likely to 

make the required financial and material sacrifices politically acceptable. As such, the added value of the Alliance needs to be found in the overall coherence it could 

bring to various regional plans and national efforts that 

would otherwise unfold without the required coordination. Through its common funding and standardization 

efforts, the Alliance could add the overarching capability 

sets and interoperability skills that benefit all nations simultaneously, such as an integrated command structure. 

Streamlining and facilitating the efforts that all nations 
ndupress.ndu.edu SF No. 296 11 

engage in for their own reasons toward the collective 

good—is that not what an alliance is all about?

Conclusion

In the run-up to the Warsaw Summit, NATO needs 

a sustained effort in building common threat perceptions, consensus about investment needs, and a distribution of military tasks and responsibilities. The constant 

flow of worrisome news coming from NATO’s volatile 

neighborhood suggests that such an effort would need 

to be maintained for the foreseeable future. Summit 

agendas have the tendency to be derailed by events, and 

nobody is served by setting high expectations that could 

not be fulfilled. A patient commitment to plowing ahead 

even in adverse conditions and on all levels of government might serve the Alliance best. Even without any 

unexpected drama, the discussions at Warsaw will be difficult enough.

At the same time, every crisis presents its own set of 

opportunities—provided it is managed well. For the first 

time in a generation there is the prospect of a genuine 

trend-reversal in European defense spending. This could 

help put NATO’s defense on a more sustainable footing and meet the longstanding expectation of Europeans 

becoming more credible security partners—both in their 

own neighborhood and beyond. In turn, this offers a 

unique window for revitalizing the broader Western-led 

global order that has come under siege from authoritarian powers.32 What is at stake is not only the NATO 

agenda, but also the future of the free world. Economic 

prosperity and security must go hand in hand. All the 

turbulence plaguing the European continent has at least 

served as a reminder that neither can be taken for granted. As a result, domestic support for overhauling the policies of the past is on the rise. All of these developments 

are to be welcomed as long as they are channeled into a 

coherent direction that reflects the interests of all Allies.

Throughout its history, NATO has been able to 

overcome major challenges and headwinds. Achieving 

unity has never been easy. Yet it has never been impossible to strike the required grand bargains on what needed 

to be done. The Warsaw Summit constitutes an opportunity to continue this tradition. Working out a compromise package among the largest nations, and gradually 

expanding this consensus to include all 28 Allies, is the 

most pragmatic way forward. Rebuilding NATO’s military readiness to realize the agreed political objectives 

will take time and effort, but progress is being made. As 

always, showing some grit will go a long way.

Notes 1 Compare, for example, Karl-Heinz-Kamp, The Agenda of the 

NATO Summit in Warsaw (Berlin: Bundesakademie für Sicherheitspolitik, 2015); Trine Flockhart, An Agenda for NATO’s 2016 

Warsaw Summit: Back to Basics or Just Backwards? (Copenhagen: 

Danish Institute for International Studies, August 2015); Rainer L. 

Glatz and Martin Zapfe, NATO Defence Planning between Wales and 

Warsaw: Politico-military Challenges of a Credible Assurance against Russia (Berlin: Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik, January 2016); Job C. 

Henning and Douglas A. Ollivant, “Radically Rethinking NATO and 

the Future of European Security,” War on the Rocks, March 24, 2016; 

Michal Baranowski and Bruno Lété, NATO in a World of Disorder: 

Making the Alliance Ready for Warsaw (Washington, DC: German 

Marshall Fund of the United States, March 2016); Hans Binnendijk, 

Daniel S. Hamilton, and Charles L. Barry, Alliance Revitalized: NATO 

for a New Era (Washington, DC: Center for Transatlantic Relations, 

April 2016).

2 Wales Summit Declaration (Newport: North Atlantic Treaty 

Organization [NATO], September 5, 2014).

3 For detailed discussions, see John R. Deni, “NATO’s New 

Trajectories after the Wales Summit,” Parameters 44, no. 3 (Autumn 

2014), 57–65; and John-Michael Arnold, “NATO’s Readiness Action 

Plan: Strategic Benefits and Outstanding Challenges,” Strategic Studies Quarterly 10, no. 1 (Spring 2016), 74–105.

4 Glatz and Zapfe, 4.

5 Stephan Frühling and Guillaume Lasconjarias, “NATO, A2/

AD and the Kaliningrad Challenge,” Survival 58, no. 2 (2016), 

95–116.

6 Compare, for example, David A. Shlapak and Michael W. 

Johnson, Reinforcing Deterrence on NATO’s Eastern Flank: Wargaming 

the Defense of the Baltics (Santa Monica, CA: RAND, 2016); and A. 

Wess Mitchell, “A Bold New Baltic Strategy for NATO,” The National 

Interest, January 6, 2016.

7 See Julianne Smith and Jerry Hendrix, Assured Resolve: Testing 

Possible Challenges to Baltic Security (Washington, DC: Center for a 

New American Security, April 7, 2016).

The author is grateful to Dr. G. Alexander Crowther, 

Daniel Fiott, Dr. Christopher J. Lamb, Colonel Richard H.M. Outzen, USA, and Dr. Luis Simon for commenting on an earlier draft of this paper. The responsibility for any errors is, of course, the author’s alone.
12 SF No. 296 ndupress.ndu.edu

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and Strategic Support

8 See, for example, Polish President Andrzej Duda’s remarks at 

the Atlantic Council, Washington, DC, March 30, 2016; compare 

Tomasz Paszewski, “Can Poland Defend Itself?” Survival 58, no. 2 

(2016), 117–134.

9 John R. Deni, “Poland Wants More Than NATO Can Give,” 

The National Interest, February 10, 2016.

10 Ursula Von der Leyen, “Keynote Speech Delivered at the 

GLOBSEC Conference,” Bratislava, German Ministry of Defense, 

April 15, 2015.

11 Compare Franklin C. Miller, Adjusting NATO’s Nuclear Policies: 

A Five Step Program (Washington, DC: Atlantic Council, March 23, 

2016); and Karl-Heinz Kamp, “Welcome to the Third Nuclear Age,” 

The National Interest, May 2, 2016.

12 In the aftermath of the terrorist attacks in Paris and Brussels, 

for instance, French and Belgian authorities responded by deploying 

approximately 9 percent and 16 percent of their land forces on homeland operations, respectively. Taking rotations into account, this put 

significant strain on their respective force pools. Several other nations 

are calling upon their militaries for meeting pressing tasks in border 

security and refugee management. The Bundeswehr is said to provide 

some 9,000 soldiers to help with Germany’s intake of refugees. See 

“Calls for Bundeswehr to Reallocate Resources from Refugee Care to 

NATO Missions,” Deutsche Welle, December 28, 2015.

13 The combined defense budgets of France, Germany, Italy, the 

United Kingdom, and the United States account for more than 90 

percent of the Alliance total.

14 See, for example, Sijbren de Jong, Confuse, Divide and Rule—

How Russia Drives Europe Apart, Policy Brief 2/2016 (Brussels: 

Institute for European Studies, March 2016).

15 Compare Duncan Depledge and James Rogers, “Securing the 

Wider North,” RUSI Newsbrief 36, no. 2 (2016), 19–20; Alexander 

Mattelaer, “The EU’s Growing Engagement in the Sahel: From 

Development Aid to Military Coordination,” in The Neighbours of the 

European Union’s Neighbours: Diplomatic and Geopolitical Dimensions 

beyond the European Neighbourhood Policy, ed. Sieglinde Gstöhl and 

Erwan Lannon (Surrey: Ashgate, 2015), 45–65; Bruno Cardoso Reis, 

“Brazil versus NATO? A Long-term View of Maritime Security in 

the Atlantic,” in Forum Paper 23, Enduring NATO, Rising Brazil: 

Managing International Security in a Recalibrating Global Order, ed. 

Brooke A. Smith-Windsor, (Rome: NATO Defense College, 2015), 

227–250.

16 See Alexander Mattelaer, “The Silent Function of the Alliance: 

NATO’s Role as a Multilateral Repository of Military Expertise,” ibid., 

53–69.

17 For extensive background on the rebalance, see Michael Green 

et al., Asia-Pacific Rebalance 2025: Capabilities, Presence, and Partnerships (Washington, DC: Center for Strategic and International Studies 

[CSIS], January 2016).

18 “EUCOM Announces European Reassurance Initiative Implementation Plan,” EUCOM Live Blog, March 30, 2016.

19 See, for example, Robert Gates, “Reflections on the Status and 

Future of the Transatlantic Alliance,” Brussels, Security and Defence 

Agenda, June 10, 2011.

20 Alessandro Marrone, Olivier De France, and Daniele Fattibene, 

Defence Budgets and Cooperation in Europe: Developments, Trends and 

Drivers (Rome: Istituto Affari Internazionali, January 2016).

21 For discussion of the “bow wave effect,” see Todd Harrison, Defense Modernization Plans through the 2020s: Addressing the Bow Wave

(Washington, DC: CSIS, 2016).

22 Compare, for example, Zsolt Darvas and Álvaro Leandro, Economic Policy Coordination in the Euro Area under the European Semester

(Brussels: European Parliament, Economic and Monetary Affairs 

Committee, November 2015).

23 Speech by President François Hollande before a joint session of 

Parliament, Versailles, November 16, 2015.

24 Joint Framework on Countering Hybrid Threats: A European 

Union Response (Brussels: European Commission, April 6, 2016).

25 Daniel Fiott, “Modernising NATO’s Defence Infrastructure 

with EU Funds,” Survival 58, no. 2 (2016), 77–94.

26 Compare Claudia Major and Christian Mölling, For a “New 

Realism” in European Defense: The Five Key Challenges an EU Defense 

Strategy Should Address, Policy Brief No. 117 (Washington, DC: German Marshall Fund of the United States, April 2016).

27 Compare David A. Schlapak and Michael W. Johnson, “Outnumbered, Outranged, and Outgunned: How Russia Defeats NATO,” 

War on the Rocks, April 21, 2016.

28 Johan Norberg, Training to Fight: Russia’s Major Military 

Exercises 2011–2014 (Stockholm: Swedish Defence Research Agency, 

2015); Andrew Monaghan, “The ‘War’ in Russia’s ‘Hybrid Warfare,’” 

Parameters 45, no. 4 (Winter 2015–2016), 65–74.

29 Kathleen H. Hicks and Heather A. Conley, Evaluating Future 

U.S. Army Force Posture in Europe: Phase I Report (Washington, DC: 

CSIS, 2016).

30 Tomasz Szatkowski, “Poland,” in Alliance at Risk (Washington, 

DC: Atlantic Council), 23–26.

31 Andrea Gilli, Alessandro R. Ungaro, and Alessandro Marrone, 

“The Italian White Paper for International Security and Defence,” 

RUSI Journal 160, no. 6 (December 2015), 34–41.

32 Jeffrey Gedmin, “The West in Crisis: The Demise of Europe or 

Transatlantic Renewal?” War on the Rocks, May 5, 2016.