NATO's Decision-Making Procedure
Released: 2004-03-08T00:00:00

RS21510 -- NATO's Decision-Making Procedure

Updated March 8, 2004

Background (1)

In February 2003, the United States asked that NATO begin planning to provide Turkey with defensive systems in the event of an attack by Iraq during theimpending war with Saddam Hussein's regime. The request also asked that NATO members backfill for some U.S.forces in the Balkans, needed for thepossible conflict with Iraq. France, Germany, and Belgium objected in the North Atlantic Council (NAC), NATO'ssupreme political body. They contendedthat granting the request would be the equivalent of acknowledging that Iraq had impeded U.N. weaponsinspections, as yet unproven in the view of the threegovernments, and be a pretext for war. NATO Secretary General Robertson at that point invoked the "silenceprocedure," under which any membergovernment objecting to the request must send him a formal letter stating its opposition. The three governmentssent such a letter in the stated time frame,stymieing the U.S. request. Turkey itself then asked for consultations concerning its defense needs under ArticleIV of the North Atlantic Treaty.

The United States asked that Turkey's request for assistance be discussed in the Defense Planning Committee (DPC), where France is not a member. TheGerman government was willing to grant the request for assistance to Turkey, and dropped its opposition. TheBelgian government, now isolated, dropped itsobjection. The DPC then granted the request for defense planning, which resulted in the deployment of AWACS,Patriot missiles, and other defensive systemsto protect Turkey.

Consensus in the NATO Decision-Making Process

Consensus in the NAC is generally sought when allied governments must formulate policy on an important strategic issue. Examples include approval ofNATO's Strategic Concept (NATO's document that serves as a strategic guideline), relations with Partnership forPeace countries, the NATO budget,deployment of forces for peace operations, and invocation of Article V. Consensus is clearly differentiated from"unanimity," which NATO does not seek. Unanimity would require an actively stated vote in favor of a measure.

Structure and Process. NATO has a civil and a military structure. The supreme political decision-makingbody, the North Atlantic Council (NAC), sits in Brussels, and is chaired by the Secretary General. Each of the 19member states has a representative on theNAC.

Key proposals for military decisions are made by the Military Committee (MC). A senior European military officer chairs the Military Committee. The MChas 18 members because France withdrew from the alliance's integrated military structure in 1966. France sendsan observer, without a vote, to the MC. France has full representation on the NAC, however, as Paris did not withdraw from NATO's politicaldecision-making structure. The NAC has the authorityto approve all key MC documents.

Normally, any government may have two opportunities to influence a major NATO decision. For example, the MC established a working group at the level ofcolonel to work out the deployment and responsibilities of NATO member state forces to be sent to Bosnia for peaceoperations in the 1990s. The 18representatives on the working group met for eight months, and eventually drafted a document that was approvedby the MC. The MC then sent the documentto the NAC's international staff. Ultimately, all 19 representatives on the NAC refined the document's language,and approved it.

Reaching consensus is therefore a process in which member governments have ample opportunity to provide language to NATO documents and decisions thatreflect national governments' individual views.

The North Atlantic Council (NAC). The NAC achieves consensus through a process in which nogovernment states its objection. A formal vote in which governments state their position is not taken. During theKosovo conflict, for example, it was clear toall governments that Greece was uncomfortable with a decision to go to war. NATO does not require a governmentto vote in favor of a conflict, but rather toobject explicitly if it opposes such a decision. Athens chose not to object, knowing its allies wished to take militaryaction against Serbia. In contrast toNATO, the EU seeks unanimity on key issues. Unanimity characterizes EU decision-making when, for example,new members are invited to join, or revisionsto the Union's governing treaties must be adopted.

At NATO, the "silence procedure" may be used for any decision requiring a consensus. At times, the procedure allows governments in opposition to a measureto avoid confronting other allies around the table during a session of the NAC. The procedure can also providecover for a government from unwanted pressreporting that might characterize its policy as out of step with other allies. By not sending a letter to the SecretaryGeneral within a specified time period, agovernment can avoid the step of stating its explicit objection to a policy if it believes other allies are set on a courseof action. This procedure failed in theeffort to begin defense planning for Turkey when three governments were in opposition. The procedure can be moresuccessful if only one government is put inthe position of having to take the formal step of sending a letter of opposition to the Secretary General, and mayrefrain from doing so to avoid being isolated.

NATO uses the same principle of consensus in the DPC, where 18 members make proposals on such matters as force structure. Normally, the DPC's proposalsare sent to the Military Committee or to the NAC for approval. When France withdrew from the MilitaryCommittee in 1966, it also surrendered its seat on theDPC. NATO in the past has made important preliminary decisions on military operations in the DPC. However,in 1992, when NATO decided to enforce thearms embargo in the Adriatic Sea against the countries of the disintegrating Yugoslavia, France wished to participatein the decision and to send forces as partof the operation. For this reason, NATO transferred the decision to the NAC, where France could play a role. Thispractice set a precedent for subsequentNATO military operations. The NAC made the decisions to establish SFOR, approve the plan for OperationAllied Force in Kosovo, and establish KFOR inthe conflict's aftermath, each time because France wished to participate in these operations. When France (andBelgium and Germany) objected in February2003 to military assistance to Turkey, however, the United States was instrumental in the maneuver to move outof the NAC and back to the DPC to approveAnkara's request for assistance under Article IV. The maneuver raised the question of whether the United States,and other allies, were attempting to avoid orweaken the principle of consensus.

Assessment of the Use of Consensus

Within the U.S. government and in allied governments, there is varied support for preserving decision-making by consensus. Most senior U.S. officialsassociated with NATO affairs contend that they support the principle of consensus, although some acknowledgethat forging consensus in an era when NATOmay go out-of-area is likely to be difficult.

Support for preserving the principle of consensus centers upon a desire to maintain political solidarity for controversial measures. In this view, the consent of19 sovereign governments, each taking an independent decision to work with other governments, is a formidableexpression of solidarity. At the same time,there can be political costs due to the sparring and the time involved in reaching consensus. NATO's decision togo to war against Serbia in 1999 was anexample of such an instance. Military action against Serbia had been postponed for a number of days, whilecivilians were losing their lives in Kosovo. Theallies first made an effort to achieve legitimization for the operation in the U.N., but did not submit the requisiteresolution when Russia signalled that it wouldcast a veto. The allies decided to debate in the NAC the issue of going to war without such a resolution, in the enddeciding that 19 governments consenting tothe use of military force supplied a measure of political legitimacy. Officials involved in that NAC debate say thatthe need for obtaining consensus outweighedthe need for acting quickly.

The Kosovo conflict illustrated some of the difficulties involved in maintaining consensus. Some critics of management of the conflict, including someMembers of Congress, criticized the target-selection process. Press reports indicated that all governments in theNAC had to approve NATO's individualtargets for Serbia. France, in particular, was singled out in press reports for criticism for objecting to specifictargets. In fact, NATO was following a verydifferent procedure for target selection. Member governments, including the United States, wished to be carefulto avoid civilian casualties, particularly in theabsence of a U.N. resolution that might be cited to legitimize the ends used to compel the Milosevic governmentto cease ethnic cleansing. They made adecision before the conflict began, after an initial operational plan produced by the MC, to attack targets in threephases. Each phase marked an escalation overthe previous one; stepping up to the next phase - and not individual targets - required consent from the NAC. PhaseI targets were indisputably militarytargets, such as air defense systems, airfields, and troop concentrations, and there was strong agreement that thesemust be struck. Phase II targets wereinfrastructure, such as bridges and petroleum depots, that might serve both civilian and military usage, and weretherefore more controversial. Phase III targetswere "the more significant targets associated with Serb repression," such as police headquarters involved in ethniccleansing, often located in urban centers suchas Belgrade. According to then SACEUR General Wesley Clark, and to sources interviewed, it was the Pentagonand the White House, as well as the Britishgovernment, that above all raised barriers and sought delays before attacking Phase II and III targets, with Franceand other governments raising occasionalobjections. (2)

The Kosovo conflict underscores the political pressure placed on the NAC in maintaining consensus when military action comes into play, and the fact that theFrench government has often been singled out when disagreements arise. Different governments place varyingdegrees of emphasis on civilian control of themilitary, and on the reactions of their own populations when there are civilian casualties. The United Statesgovernment tends to have more confidence in itsarmed forces in target selection and in making decisions on the battlefield than do most allied governments. Someallies, given the recent history of theirmilitaries stepping into political affairs or using excessive force against civilians, place greater restraints on theirarmed forces. In France, the effort by armyofficers to overthrow President de Gaulle's government in 1960-62, and in Germany, excesses of the Wehrmacht and the Gestapo in the Second World War, arewithin the memory of many leaders and populations, and affect how these governments seek to manage militaryconflict. The diversity of viewpoints in theNAC means that constant negotiation is necessary in providing authority to the SACEUR to plan and execute amilitary operation. Wrangling over precisephrasing of a document can be a means to provide clarity for decision-makers; in contrast, it can also be meant toprovide vagueness that gives political cover toa member government that may give its own interpretation to its populace about the purpose of a NATO decision.

Altering or abandoning the principle of consensus at a moment when NATO may accept new members poses other problems. For candidate state governments,the prospect of such a change raises the question of whether the United States and other current members lackconfidence in the candidates to participate in thefull range of allied decision-making. Representatives of some of these governments also express displeasure withthe tendency of some Administration officialsto divide the continent into an "old" and "new" Europe, even if the characterization is meant to favor them. Sucha division suggests a possible marginalizationof France and Germany, and of an alliance where member states are set against each other, implicit for some in anyabandonment of the consensus principle. Some officials view any prospective effort by the United States to move away from the consensus principle as aversion of U.S. "unilateralism," in whichWashington might pressure weaker or small-state governments to follow its lead, an issue raised when the BushAdministration sought support of several alliedgovernments in the coalition against Iraq.

Suggestions for Alteration of NATO Decision-Making

The political complexities inherent in NAC and MC debates mean that there is no simple fix to improve NATO decision-making. At the same time, some U.S.officials believe that the growing necessity for out-of-area missions indicates a clear need to develop a new processto permit participation under NATOauspices by willing allies in such operations. (3)

Some U.S. officials, without enthusiasm, suggest an EU model, where member states' votes are weighted, based on their populations. This form of "qualifiedmajority voting" (QMV) gives greater influence to the largest countries, but small states may still band together toblock an initiative. Critics of adopting suchan approach for NATO point out that the alliance is a mutual defense organization, where supreme national interestssuch as the survival of a country and thelives of a government's soldiers are at issue. In such circumstances, they believe that the EU's mechanistic approachto decision-making over less momentousissues is inappropriate for NATO. The EU is different in nature from NATO. The EU must grapple with issuesinvolving the sharing of national sovereignty ona wide range of issues. As a result, extensive deal-making has been part of the EU (earlier, the EuropeanCommunity) since its origins, but has not beenprevalent in NATO. Nonetheless, QMV in NATO could lead, as it often does in the EU, to faction-building orextended horse-trading.

However, one system used in elements of EU decision-making is drawing interest from those in NATO who support coalitions of the willing and capable. Forissues that involve only selected governments, the EU has devised "committees of contributors." In this concept,governments that wish to participate in aproject receive general approval from a principal EU governing body to proceed among themselves, while the othergovernments take a general interest and aresponsibility that might involve oversight. An element of the concept involves "constructive abstention," in whichgovernments with interests not directlyaffected stand aside and permit action by those with interests that are directly in play.

A "committee of contributors" in NATO might follow a similar outline, and might appeal especially to governments that are both NATO and EU members. Countries on the committee for a military operation, for example, would be those willing to contribute troops andother assets. The committee would formulatea general plan for operations, and submit it to the NAC for a "blessing." The NAC might allow the committee touse NATO assets, such as AWACS and theplanning staff. The NAC, in effect, would endorse the right of committee members to act in their own interests, butnot specifically endorse the operation itself. Committee members among themselves could then make key decisions, possibly based on consensus, such as howmuch authority to delegate to SACEUR forcontingency planning and target selection. The committee would keep the NAC informed on a regular basis. Shouldthe NATO Response Force (NRF),comprised of 25,000 troops, be fully developed for "expeditionary" operations beyond the Treaty area, "committeesof contributors" could be a means tostreamline decision-making and keep it within the ken of interested governments.

Such committees could serve to avoid the recent maneuver of having to go to the DPC, since that step is effective only for sidelining France. France, after all,has been involved in virtually all key NATO military operations, and might in the future wish to participate inmissions. France's forces constitute a largecomponent of the Eurocorps, one of the high-value multinational military formations available to NATO. France,with Britain, has the only other continental"expeditionary" military able to serve in high-intensity conflicts. The "committees of contributors" might isolatesmall countries such as Belgium, which inrecent times has increasingly criticized NATO as a "toolbox" of U.S. policy, and opposed out-of-area operations,but has only minimal military capability tocontribute in any event.

Some officials who have served at NATO make a contrary argument to the possible usefulness of "committees of contributors." They believe that smallcountries such as Belgium might insist that any out-of-area mission be decided by the NAC as a whole, since assets(AWACS, intelligence) being used wouldbelong to NATO as a whole, and would thus be assets for which, in part, each country pays.