Global Security Newswire - NATO Sets Basis for Tactical Nuclear Cutbacks, But Path Remains Uncertain. PrintShareEmailTwitterFacebookLinkedIn By Elaine M. Grossman Global Security Newswire WASHINGTON -- At a summit meeting in Portugal late last week, NATO laid the groundwork for reducing the number of U.S. short-range nuclear weapons based in Europe, but deferred into the future any decision to do so (see GSN, Nov. 22). Following significant post-Cold War cutbacks in deployed forces and a reduced reliance on nuclear arms in NATO's defense strategy, "we will seek to create the conditions for further reductions in the future," the alliance said in a new "Strategic Concept" released in Lisbon. "This is a very bland consensus document that manages to straddle both moving toward a world without nuclear weapons and retaining NATO as a nuclear alliance," said Miles Pomper, a senior research associate at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies.
"That will ensure political people in capitals, rather than NATO bureaucracy, are in [the] driver's seat," Pomper said. Après le sommet de Lisbonne (3) : quel calendrier pour l'Afghanistan ? Official text: Engagement actif, défense moderne - Concept stratégique pour la défense et la sécurité des membres de l’Organisation du Traité de l’Atlantique Nord adopté par les chefs d’État et de gouvernement à Lisbonne, 19-Nov.-2010. 19 Nov. 2010 Préface Nous, chefs d’État et de gouvernement des pays de l’Alliance, sommes déterminés à ce que l’OTAN continue de jouer son rôle unique et essentiel, qui est de garantir notre défense et notre sécurité communes. Le présent concept stratégique guidera la prochaine phase de l’évolution de l’OTAN, afin qu’elle continue d’être efficace dans un monde changeant, face à de nouvelles menaces, forte de capacités nouvelles et de partenaires nouveaux : Il reconfirme l’engagement pris par nos pays de se défendre mutuellement contre une attaque, y compris contre les menaces nouvelles qui pèsent sur la sécurité de nos citoyens.
Il engage l’Alliance à prévenir les crises, à gérer les conflits et à stabiliser les situations postconflit, notamment en travaillant plus étroitement avec nos partenaires internationaux, au premier rang desquels les Nations Unies et l’Union européenne. Tâches et principes fondamentaux L’environnement de sécurité La défense et la dissuasion La porte ouverte. Ce qu’il faut retenir du sommet de l’OTAN. Nicolas Gros-Verheyde / Défense (doctrine politique) / Le secrétaire général AF Rasmussen à la conférence de presse finale (Crédit : OTAN) Du sommet de l’OTAN, qui s’est déroulé vendredi et samedi 19 et 20 novembre à Lisbonne, on peut retenir sept éléments principaux pour les alliés et l’Europe. • Un nouveau concept stratégique. Il a la valeur d’un « concept »
. • Le coup d’envoi à la réforme des structures. . • La sortie de l’Afghanistan. . • Le Bouclier anti-missiles. . • L’OTAN n’a plus d’ennemi. . • La réconciliation avec la Russie. Concernant l’UE, l’attitude de l’OTAN est ambivalente. Lire également : inShare0 Défense UE, OTAN / 0 Comment. Après le sommet de Lisbonne (1) : "l'Otan restera une alliance nucléaire" Après le sommet de Lisbonne (2) : un bouclier antimissile qui pose beaucoup de questions. Gén. Abrial : « Une alliance plus légère, plus efficiente ». Le « vrai » débat commence. Nato's tactical nuclear weapons: the new doctrine | World news.
There is a debate underway among nuclear folk over whether Nato's new strategic concept, adopted in Lisbon, is a glass half-full or half-empty from the point of view of disarmament. Front and centre are up to 200 American B-61 bombs stored in six bases in five European countries. The tactical weapons have long served a symbolic rather than a military purpose in the post-Cold War world, and three of their host nations - Germany, Netherlands and Belgium - have been pushing for their removal as an expression of Barack Obama's self-declared mission to pursue gradual but determined disarmament. Nobody expected the new strategic concept to sweep them away, but many arms control advocates anticipated that it might at least open the door a crack for their future departure. So did it? Two nuclear policy experts have since weighed in, suggesting that the doctrine is not nearly as bad for disarmament as it could have been, and that it does leave room for further steps.
Who's right? NATO Moves Ahead With Missile Shield. PrintShareEmailTwitterFacebookLinkedIn NATO members on Friday approved plan to establish an integrated and enhanced shield against missile threats, Reuters reported (see GSN, Nov. 18). The program includes a U.S. plan to deploy a radar base and land- and sea-based missile interceptors around Europe. Obama administration officials said the missile cover -- to be fielded in phases from 2011 to 2020 -- would have the ability to target long-range missiles and ICBMs, Reuters reported. The plan to integrate European antimissile capabilities alongside U.S. missile defense systems is expected to cost $280 million. "It offers a role for all of our allies," President Obama said at the NATO summit in Lisbon, Portugal. "It responds to the threats of our times. " "We look forward to working with Russia to build our cooperation with them in this area as well, recognizing that we share many of the same threats," the U.S. president said.
"Today marks a fresh start in NATO-Russia relations," Rasmussen said. Summit Overview on Missile Defence. Nuclear Weapons Aspects of the Strategic Concept. Over the next few days NATO Monitor will take a look at different aspects of the Strategic Concept, starting with a first take on the nuclear aspects of the new paper. The new Strategic Concept has both similarities and striking changes on nuclear policy with the Concept agreed at the 1999 Summit in Washington DC.
It reflects, as do most NATO documents, the divergent positions of member states trying to come to a consensus. Thus, the the Preface to the Concept says that it: .. commits NATO to the goal of creating the conditions for a world without nuclear weapons – but reconfirms that, as long as there are nuclear weapons in the world, NATO will remain a nuclear Alliance. Some have expressed disappointment at this, seeing it as a statement of the status quo. However, it is necessary to look at the policy as a whole, and to differentiate between tactical and strategic nuclear weapons, to see the possibility for change built into the new Concept. On nuclear forces the concept now says: 16. Experts Call NATO Strategic Concept 'Missed Opportunity to Reduce Role of Obsolete Tactical Nukes from Europe' For immediate release: November 19, 2010 Media contacts: Daryl G. Kimball, ACA in Washington DC (202-277-3478); Oliver Meier, ACA in Berlin (+49 171 359 2410); (202-463-8270 x107); Paul Ingram, BASIC in London (+44 7908 708175; Anne Penketh, BASIC in Washington DC, (202-570-6701).
(London/Berlin/Washington, D.C.) U.S. and European nuclear arms control and security experts criticized NATO's new "Strategic Concept" (PDF) as a conservative, backward-looking policy, a missed opportunity to reduce the number and role of the 200 forward-deployed U.S. tactical nuclear bombs and engage Russia in a dialogue on removing all tactical nuclear weapons from Europe. Under NATO's long-standing "nuclear-sharing" arrangements some 150-200 forward-deployed U.S. tactical nuclear bombs are based in five European NATO countries-Belgium, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, and Turkey. "The failure of NATO leaders to shift its policy on 'nuclear sharing' could create rifts within the Alliance," warned Dr. NATO Strategic Concept: One Step Forward and a Half Step Back » FAS Strategic Security Blog. By Hans M. Kristensen The new Strategic Concept adopted today by NATO represents one step forward and a half step backward for the alliance’s nuclear weapons policy.
The forward-leaning part of the nuclear policy pledges to actively try to create the conditions for further reducing the number of and reliance on nuclear weapons, recommits to the ultimate goal of nuclear disarmament, and reaffirms that circumstances in which the alliance could contemplate using its nuclear weapons are “extremely remote.” But the strategy fails to present any steps that reduce the number of or reliance on nuclear weapons.
Even so, there are important changes in the document that hint of things to come. The Role of Nuclear Weapons The new Strategic Concept does not explicitly reduce the role of NATO’s nuclear weapons. And the formulation in the 1999 Strategic Concept that “NATO’s nuclear forces no longer target any country” is gone from the new document. US Nuclear Forces in Europe The Role of Russia The Future. Turkey Suggests It Won't Block NATO Defense Shield. .:Middle East Online ميدل ايست أونلاين. A proposed $280 million NATO missile defense system upgrade is straining relations between the United States and Turkey in the run-up to this week’s NATO summit in Lisbon. Turkish officials say they will only agree to having radar components of the system on Turkish soil if NATO abstains from identifying any potential target of the system and promises not to share intelligence with non-NATO members.
The Turkish demands reflect a mounting divergence in US and Turkish foreign policy with Turkey no longer signing up to Western policies simply to align itself with the West but instead making cost-benefit analysis a key element of its decision-making. As a result, Turkey is demanding a quid-pro-quid for its accommodation of the proposed missile defense shield upgrade that threatens to put it between a rock and a hard place. To fill the void, the report calls for an informal dialogue that would allow the EU, Turkey and Russia to build a new European security architecture from the ground up. Russia Not Ready to Accept NATO Missile Defense Offer. PrintShareEmailTwitterFacebookLinkedIn Russia is not dismissing a NATO offer for collaboration on missile defense operations but is also not prepared to agree to the proposal, a high-ranking diplomat told Interfax last week (see GSN, Sept. 27).
The NATO offer lacks several crucial elements, Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Grushko said. "It is an important and far-reaching proposal, which we treaty very seriously," Grushko said. "Moreover, many of its elements are in tune with Russia's initiative to create a European missile defense shield. " "However, it is not clear today what the architecture of such a hypothetical missile defense system will look like, who will control it and how, what means it is expected to involve and in what direction it will develop," he added. "We hope that in the end we will be able to agree upon parameters that would allow us to find concrete cooperation arrangements," the diplomat said. Grushko called for a "stage-by-stage approach" to address the differences.