NATO and the Transatlantic Relationship

by Jordan Evans-Kaplan (University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign)

This blog post was written for the course "Current Issues in Global and EU Affairs", which took place from February 11-May 9, 2019.

NATO Military Spending by member state GDP.
Image Credit: Creative Commons

The EU has always been and will likely always be the most key strategic partner to the US regarding NATO. However, the future of NATO remains cloudy amid a disruptive US presidency, and critiques of NATO on both sides of the Atlantic. Despite opposition and naysayers, it is quite an achievement of the European project that NATO has managed to exist this long, as it represents a solution to a problem from a bygone era. Created as a bulwark against Soviet aggression, this strategic partnership has stood the test of time since its creation in 1949 and remains the cornerstone of US-EU military cooperation. But what does the future hold for this critical component of transatlantic integration?

NATO’s key role has always been European Defense and transatlantic security cooperation, however, modern politics within the US and EU have challenged this role. On the US side, apathy and lethargy regarding NATO have increased after President Trump’s critiques of nations not meeting the 2% GDP threshold. However, the number of nations meeting this mark has only increased over time. In 2014, only three nations met the threshold of 2% ofnational GDP, the United States, the United Kingdom, and Greece. In 2019, this is up to seven NATO nations, including Estonia, Poland, Latvia and Lithuania. On the other side of the Atlantic, France has issued their own responses, despite being on the precipice of the 2% target. In response to these spending critiques and threats if non-payment continues, Macron stated that “we must have a Europe that can defend itself on its own without relying only on the United States.” This push towards a new European military represents a concern to scholars of transatlantic integration, as these policies are staunchly divergent from NATO and the United States.

It is quite interesting to note that despite the broad cooperation found in NATO, and the importance it holds in Europe, several European nations have opted for neutrality. These countries include Austria, Finland, Ireland, Malta, and Sweden.  In many ways, NATO represents a sort of transatlantic barometer, a measure of not only the strength of the transatlantic relationship but as an evaluation of cooperation's value in geopolitics. Following the Cold War and shifts in geopolitical goals, security cooperation took on a different flavor. As the power politics of nation-states took a backseat to addressing terrorism and non-state actors, cooperation became downsized and focused on peacekeeping. Examples of this new role include the missions in Kosovo, and the NATO Training Mission- Iraq in which NATO provided training and assistance to Iraqi security forces in hopes of crafting a sustainable internal security structure capable of fending for itself. As a result, the trend in NATO seems promising as we approach the future, despite resentment and a souring political dialogue. When viewed as a whole, the number of nations meeting spending targets has only increased, and security partnerships have deepened in dealing with insurgent groups and instability. The geopolitics of tomorrow are less clear-cut, less driven by the bold, national power politics of yesterday’s era, and more demanding of transatlantic integration. While NATO handled the threat of Communist incursion with relative ease, today it battles a much more formidable opponent: Transatlantic politics.