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New NATO, old Europe


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By John Metzler
SPECIAL TO WORLD TRIBUNE.COM

Friday, April 2, 2004

UNITED NATIONS Ñ In an extraordinary turn of political fate and fortunes, seven former communist countries have joined the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). Given the tumultuous context of their post-war history, the accession of the Baltic countries and other ex-East Bloc states to NATO is nothing less than extraordinary.

In a White House ceremony, President George W. Bush stated, ÒAs witness to some of the great crimes of the last century, our new members bring a moral clarity to the purposes of our AllianceÉthey understand our cause in Afghanistan and in Iraq because tyranny for them is still a fresh memory.Ó

The enlargement of NATO to 26 members, stands as an important symbolic step which has far more to do with EuropeÕs new political architecture than its security structure. NATOÕs new states; Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia, and Slovenia have gained the ultimate defense insurance policy and guarantees for prosperity. In turn the new members fill out the map pieces offering geographic cohesiveness, lines of communication, and continental collective security.

Though new pieces of the Euroland political puzzle board have been added, nonetheless NATOÕs European center of gravity remains in France and Germany; to assume that new members have the military political or economic clout to challenge the traditional power structure is preposterous. Politically though, as we witnessed through BulgariaÕs strong support in the UN Security Council during the countdown to the Iraq war, the new members offer Washington political advantages. Equally Poland has played a strong and positive military role in helping the American coalition in Iraq.

Wisely established by American leadership in 1949 as a defense treaty and bulwark against Soviet expansionism, NATO evolved into the most successful military alliance in history. It kept the peace which in turn allowed for unparalleled West European prosperity. EuropeÕs economic renaissance would have never been possible in the wake of WWII had it not been for the firm bonds of the Atlantic Alliance, anchored in an American security commitment.

Yet part of the NATO expansion is more an affair of the heart than of the mind.

In 1999, NATO first moved eastwards accepting the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland. In one sense this was a belated mea culpa for FDRÕs political perfidy at Yalta in 1945 where the U.S. allowed these countries to fall into StalinÕs communist sphere.

Now the once forsaken Baltic states Ñ Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania Ñ once part of the Soviet Union, have joined the Atlantic Alliance. To have imagined that the Baltics would first regain their independence from Moscow, later reinforce their sovereignty through United Nations membership in 1991, and now to have been admitted to the NATO military alliance has shown an amazing political transformation.

Equally, on May 1st, another ten countries will be admitted into the European Union, moving the EU frontiers eastwards to Hungary and into the eastern Mediterranean.

EU enlargement from the current 15 to 25 countries will boost the population to 455 million but likewise will inherit countries with 14 percent unemployment rates. Still the eastward expansion will offer older EU members easier access to lower labor costs and production facilities. Already economies like Latvia and Lithuania boast 6 percent growth well beyond the Old EuropeÕs anemic economic growth.

Still neither NATO nor the EU is a glorified social club Ñ there are implicit defense commitments to its members to safeguarding these far flung frontiers. Both the new NATO and EU members, extend the borders of the Old Europe to new oft unstable regions and volatile geopolitical fault lines. Now NATOÕs frontiers face Ukraine, Belarus, and Russia itself. Bringing the divided Greco/Turkish Mediterranean island of Cyprus extends the EU frontier to the doorstep of the Middle East, and Malta puts the EU off the shore of North Africa.

Naturally in the wake of the Iraq war, thereÕs been a persistent political rift between Washington and what is often derisively described as the ÒOld Europe,Ó namely France, Germany, and Belgium. As the new NATO members have a decidedly pro-American tilt, this may offer a win/win opportunity for U.S. policy.

John J. Metzler is a U.N. correspondent covering diplomatic and defense issues. He writes weekly for World Tribune.com.




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