France’s own strategic approach stresses that its forces must adapt further to the new dimensions of military operations overseas and to asymmetric warfare. French forces will maintain a robust capacity for overseas military operations within the framework of NATO-led operations, but not exclusively so. Hence, the commitment undertaken in France’s new military financial law to undertake major investments in force protection and intelligence, as well as recognition of the urgent need to close the gap between European forces on strategic transportation and tactical air mobility. This requires, despite the current economic crisis, maintaining substantial military investment and a much greater degree of intra-European cooperation.
The International Assistance Security Force mission in Afghanistan has more than confirmed the importance of better coordination of civilian and military activities in stabilization and reconstruction, an area where the EU has a major role to play, because it has already begun to develop the necessary tools. Therefore, there is no need for NATO to duplicate those functions; instead, it must learn to cooperate more closely with them.
All these changes are essential if we want to prevent NATO from gradually deteriorating into some kind of “Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe in uniform” and eventually ending up as just another talking shop for Western democracies and like-minded countries.
Benoit d’Aboville was French ambassador to NATO from 2002 to 2005 and a member of the National Commission of France’s White Paper on Defense and National Security (2007-2008).
Copyright: Project Syndicate
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