The means at NATO’s disposal are unequaled military might backed by the United States. But what end, 30 years after the end of the Cold War, should the alliance pursue?
Formed in a treaty signed by 12 North American and European states in 1949, NATO was meant to defend Western Europe against the threat, real or perceived, of Soviet aggression. After the fall of the Eastern bloc and dismantling of the USSR, the alliance’s mission evolved into humanitarian interventions and terrorism fighting, first in the Balkans, then in Afghanistan and Libya.
As the Cold War drew to a close, such European leaders as Czechoslovakia’s Vaclav Havel wanted all military alliances — Eastern and Western — out of Europe. But President George H.W. Bush argued Europe could not do without the U.S. security umbrella. NATO not only stayed in Europe, it also expanded to the east as the Warsaw Pact dissolved.
In this episode of History As It Happens, as Russia threatens to invade eastern Ukraine eight years after it annexed Crimea, historian Andrew Bacevich discusses NATO’s strategic drift and the ultimate folly of its post-Cold War eastward expansion.
The Russian threat is “minor and wildly exaggerated,” said Mr. Bacevich, the president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft in Washington, who a decade ago called for the U.S. to leave NATO by 2023.
“The larger interests of the United States would be served if we allowed NATO to become a European alliance rather than one in which the assumption is the United States must play a leading role,” said Mr. Bacevich, who has argued that the territorial integrity of Ukraine is not a vital U.S. national security interest.
To listen to the full interview with Mr. Bacevich, download this episode of History As It Happens.
