NATO and Interorganizational Cooperation

Abstract

Working with other multinational security organizations has become an important aspect of NATO’s vocation. Changes in the international security environment since the end of the Cold War as well as since 9/11, and the operations the Alliance has conducted have been among the core drivers of recent attempts to strengthen links with other organizations. During the Cold War, NATO faced an existential threat in the Soviet-led Warsaw Pact which had territory, actors and intentions that could be analysed and capabilities that could be matched or surpassed. Since the end of this block confrontation, security challenges have increasingly become characterized by their diffuse, less than existential nature, by the multitude of actors involved ranging from state to non-state and by their transnational deterritorialized nature. This trend predates 9/11, but, nonetheless, the terrorist attacks of 9/11 and the response they provoked are the clearest illustration of the new environment and hence can be considered a catalyst of existing trends. 9/11 was an asymmetric attack on a powerful country, carried out over great distance by non-state actors using an international network of supporters and a safe haven in a failed state. Even though the combination of factors enabling the 9/11 attack to be successful will remain rare, fighting the perpetrators and trying to create conditions to prevent a similar attack has demonstrated beyond doubt the need to bring together all available instruments of security policy, ranging from military and civilian to political, economic and even cultural means. Because it would be unrealistic to expect a single organization to combine all necessary tools, for every actor in this policy arena, including NATO, the need to work with others has increased as a result.