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How would you redesign NATO - if at all?

Has NATO expanded too far?

  • Yes

    Votes: 40 63.5%
  • No

    Votes: 13 20.6%
  • Maybe, but it should stop where it is

    Votes: 10 15.9%

  • Total voters
    63
Can they not describe it as a training exercise - getting ready for stand off type situations with Russian, Chinese, or Iranian forces in the violent peace that we can expect in the immediate future?

Nature abhors a vacuum, hence the forces in Eastern Europe, NATO air policing, standing naval forces, and major exercises like this year's Steadfast Defender.
It's not that major.
 
The work of 'chasing ground' to maintain NATO relevance, and keep a lot of people in jobs, continues.

'Nato must embrace a “global outlook”, forging new partnerships with democracies around the world to counter the rising challenge from China, the head of the military alliance has warned.

'Jens Stoltenberg said that while Nato would remain a regional alliance between Europe and North America, the evolving nature of military threats meant it should work “even more closely” with existing farther-flung partners, including Australia, Japan, South Korea and New Zealand. Stoltenberg said the alliance should also “reach out to potential new partners” in the “community of democracies” including Brazil and India.

'His suggestions follow a non-military initiative endorsed by President Biden and Boris Johnson to expand the G7 into a new alliance of ten democratic countries. India, South Korea and Australia have been invited to the G7 in Cornwall in June to discuss the D10 (Democracy 10 nations) initiative. Nato was one of several western groupings put under strain by the ambivalence of President Trump towards traditional alliances bound by democratic values. Trump, however, succeeded in pressing some members to increase military spending with his threats to withdraw from the alliance.

'In Stoltenberg’s address to Chatham House, the first policy speech since the US election, he spoke of the need to protect Nato’s values of “freedom, democracy, the rule of law”. “These values are not abstract notions, they are at the very core of who we are,” he said. “We got a shocking reminder of this as we watched the attack on the United States Congress. That was not only an assault on the heart of American democracy but also on the core values of Nato.”

'He emphasised the need to secure Nato members’ infrastructure and supply lines so they are not dependent on countries with different outlooks. This should include screening foreign investment and control of critical infrastructure and assets as well as examining supply lines for basic staples including fuel, food and medicine to ensure they were not vulnerable to hostile powers. “These are not just economic decisions, they are crucial for our national security,” he warned. “We should never trade short-term economic benefit for our long-term national security.”

'Under Trump, Washington sought to elevate the so-called Quad, an informal alliance between Japan, India, Australia and the United States, into an “Asian Nato ” with the aim of containing China. Britain is considering whether it should join. Military experts, however, are sceptical that the alliance could expand to that level and potential members such as South Korea are hesitant.

'Stoltenberg named China and Russia as possible sources of technological threats to Nato and stressed the need for member states’armies to keep one step ahead of emerging disruptive technologies being developed by those countries.'


Nato seeks new allies to push back against China
 
The work of 'chasing ground' to maintain NATO relevance, and keep a lot of people in jobs, continues.

'Nato must embrace a “global outlook”, forging new partnerships with democracies around the world to counter the rising challenge from China, the head of the military alliance has warned.

'Jens Stoltenberg said that while Nato would remain a regional alliance between Europe and North America, the evolving nature of military threats meant it should work “even more closely” with existing farther-flung partners, including Australia, Japan, South Korea and New Zealand. Stoltenberg said the alliance should also “reach out to potential new partners” in the “community of democracies” including Brazil and India.

'His suggestions follow a non-military initiative endorsed by President Biden and Boris Johnson to expand the G7 into a new alliance of ten democratic countries. India, South Korea and Australia have been invited to the G7 in Cornwall in June to discuss the D10 (Democracy 10 nations) initiative. Nato was one of several western groupings put under strain by the ambivalence of President Trump towards traditional alliances bound by democratic values. Trump, however, succeeded in pressing some members to increase military spending with his threats to withdraw from the alliance.

'In Stoltenberg’s address to Chatham House, the first policy speech since the US election, he spoke of the need to protect Nato’s values of “freedom, democracy, the rule of law”. “These values are not abstract notions, they are at the very core of who we are,” he said. “We got a shocking reminder of this as we watched the attack on the United States Congress. That was not only an assault on the heart of American democracy but also on the core values of Nato.”

'He emphasised the need to secure Nato members’ infrastructure and supply lines so they are not dependent on countries with different outlooks. This should include screening foreign investment and control of critical infrastructure and assets as well as examining supply lines for basic staples including fuel, food and medicine to ensure they were not vulnerable to hostile powers. “These are not just economic decisions, they are crucial for our national security,” he warned. “We should never trade short-term economic benefit for our long-term national security.”

'Under Trump, Washington sought to elevate the so-called Quad, an informal alliance between Japan, India, Australia and the United States, into an “Asian Nato ” with the aim of containing China. Britain is considering whether it should join. Military experts, however, are sceptical that the alliance could expand to that level and potential members such as South Korea are hesitant.

'Stoltenberg named China and Russia as possible sources of technological threats to Nato and stressed the need for member states’armies to keep one step ahead of emerging disruptive technologies being developed by those countries.'


Nato seeks new allies to push back against China
Genuine question: NATO was formed to address physical aggression against member states. That translates as the Soviet Union/Warsaw Pact.

What relevance has it outside that? By that I mean that yes, there are joint working structures as a result but should the answer continue to be NATO?
 
Genuine question: NATO was formed to address physical aggression against member states. That translates as the Soviet Union/Warsaw Pact.

What relevance has it outside that? By that I mean that yes, there are joint working structures as a result but should the answer continue to be NATO?

Personally, I don't believe so. As you've said, NATO was formed to operate within a defined geographical boundary, and that hasn't changed. What has changed is that the threat from the Soviet Union/Russia has significantly diminished, so to be seen to still be relevant internally, and at the behest of the USA, NATO has positioned itself as the 'coalition broker' for US global interests, and will continue to do so, as turkeys will never vote for Xmas while ever there's a gold-plated pension at the end of a career in the International Staff.
 
Funny that, as an aside. There are two aspects which I find some what quaint.
The first is that the assault on the capitol is being directly equated with our notions of democracy ( or at least how it obtained in 1944) but it was at least an attack on another Capitol- a spiritual one in the form of the British crown- that formed the American version of it.
Trump has merely proved that the Americans havn't got it quite right.


The second is that Stoltenberg seems to have a wish harking back to the time when the Commonwealth/Empire with global reach could be used for control. I find the thought that Britain could be having a renaissance because of Brexit, with use of the commonwealth as somewhat thought provoking.

In the end Allies come and go with individual need.
 
Personally, I don't believe so. As you've said, NATO was formed to operate within a defined geographical boundary, and that hasn't changed. What has changed is that the threat from the Soviet Union/Russia has significantly diminished, so to be seen to still be relevant internally, and at the behest of the USA, NATO has positioned itself as the 'coalition broker' for US global interests, and will continue to do so, as turkeys will never vote for Xmas while ever there's a gold-plated pension at the end of a career in the International Staff.
There is no gold-plated pension for international staff, except those on legacy contracts who are a diminishing breed.

The NICs don't drive NATO, the politicos and military do. They do run it though.
 
There is no gold-plated pension for international staff, except those on legacy contracts who are a diminishing breed.

The NICs don't drive NATO, the politicos and military do.

That is not my experience.

Anyone who cracks 10 years on a NATO International Civilian contract is home and hosed for pension, health care and other benefits, but many stay on to build the new extension, much like Brit mil ex-pats out in the Gulf.

While the PermReps certainly express the views of their nations in the NAC and steer the overall Alliance direction, it is very much the PO and IS who make the running.
 
That is not my experience.

Anyone who cracks 10 years on a NATO International Civilian contract is home and hosed for pension, health care and other benefits, but many stay on to build the new extension, much like Brit mil ex-pats out in the Gulf.

While the PermReps certainly express the views of their nations in the NAC and steer the overall Alliance direction, it is very much the PO and IS who make the running.
NATO no longer provides a pension for its international civilian staff. There used to be one, but it was binned in (I think) 2005/6. There is a savings and investment fund into which NICs employed since 2006 put some money each month (8% of gross salary), but when one retires this is handed back and you make your own plans and decisions what to do with it. There are some age and length of service based riders to this, but essentially that is it. There are very good survivor benefits for death in service.

The private health plan is very good and extremely wide-ranging compared to others I have seen. I can choose to keep this cover when I retire (If I am over 55 and have more than 10 years NATO service) for a monthly contribution equivalent to 1% of my final monthly salary. That is more than worth it for the optical, aural and dental benefits alone, never mind private healthcare and queue-jumping.

The nations set the direction, the milreps give guidance and approval, but the NICs do all the planning and generation of policy, organisation and development of orders. Senior Officers have the final say. I sometimes attend meetings (Or VTCs nowadays), during which serious plans are being made, where everything comes from the NICs and the small number of mil in attendance use it as a learning experience. All NATO exercises and non-warfighting deployments are planned this way. All of them. But that is kind of the point. In a national mil organisation, the people work their way up through the CoC into positions of influence and power. This is not the case in NATO where people are just posted into slots in which they mostly have no experience or real understanding. That knowledge resides within the NICs and I would say they are more forward-thinking than their military equivalents.
 
That is not my experience.

Anyone who cracks 10 years on a NATO International Civilian contract is home and hosed for pension, health care and other benefits, but many stay on to build the new extension, much like Brit mil ex-pats out in the Gulf.

The pension is summed up here (and it been like that for ages)
Its a generous contribution but if your pension value falls, its not NATOs problem,


In general the NICs have **** all influence over what NATO is going to do.
 
I'd have thought there is a very good case for privatising NATO probably along the lines of the successful railway privatisation in the UK. The way to go is to have a logistic/support organisation pulling together all the existing infrastructure required to conduct operations successfully and to support the teeth arms. Much of this work does not involve actual fighting and would be an excellent candidate for civilian outsourcing thus freeing actual soldier for fighting. Many of the UK outsourcing companies would be able to demonstrate their proven track record in supporting the fighting man.

The actual operations would be carried out by fighting elements on a franchise basis. This would allow the more effective armies to compete on a level-battlefield basis and thus the competition would drive the quality of destruction to higher levels than is currently being achieved.

The relations between the fighting elements and the Logistic Tail (better name required - something more diverse) is a area requiring attention but over the life of NATO many of the potential difficulties are well recognised and should be easily codified into strong and effective Service Level Agreements. Given our long experience this is an "Oven Ready Deal" which should be the most effective improvement in structure and operations that this organisation has faced in its history.

Change is essential if we are not to accused of fighting the last war.
 
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