Event Summary
MSC Transatlantic Defense Roundtable Washington DC 2024
NATO at 75: Adapting Transatlantic Security Cooperation
On July 11, 2024, the Munich Security Conference, in partnership with the Atlantic Council, organized a roundtable on transatlantic defense in Washington, D.C. Around 40 decision-makers and leading experts from government, parliament, the military, the private sector and academia came together for discussions on how to adapt transatlantic security cooperation.
75 is a biblical age for a military alliance, and few would have thought that NATO would live to see this day when it was established in 1949. Still, the Alliance has reinvented itself time and again, now counting 32 member states and safeguarding the lives of approximately 1 billion people. Despite its successes, NATO faces severe threats from without and from within that decision-makers need to tackle.
Present at the Re-Creation? Future-Proofing the Alliance
In the first session, participants began by highlighting that NATO was founded after two devastating world wars to prevent a third. They agreed that organizations like NATO should not be taken for granted, yet they were also candid about the challenges NATO faces in the future. Adversaries are currently emboldened, advancing their authoritarian worldviews and cooperating more effectively against NATO’s interests. At the same time, some members of the Alliance still seem hesitant to take action that clearly shows NATO’s resoluteness. For instance, some participants expressed dismay about the restrictions placed on the Ukrainian government regarding the way it can use weaponry provided by the US and European countries. To them, this signals anticipatory obedience and is further proof that some member states have not sufficiently shifted their mindset to deter aggression in this new era of confrontation.
Aside from the outside threats to NATO, participants sounded the alarm over democratic backsliding in some member states of the Alliance. As cohesion is essential, anti-democratic tendencies threaten the credibility and strength of NATO. To prevent an erosion of the Alliance from within, some participants called for stronger mechanisms to punish member states if they undermine NATO’s core values. Others preferred that sanctions, when necessary, be imposed by institutions like the EU, leaving NATO to focus solely on military matters.
Not all is bad. Participants acknowledged that much progress has been made in the past few years, with NATO revamping its force posture and with member states increasing their defense budgets significantly. Still, participants were concerned that current levels of defense spending would be insufficient to meet the challenges NATO faces. They called for greater amounts of overall investment, prioritization in spending, and stronger interlinkages between the defense industrial bases of European and American allies. They did point out that especially the EU and the US, rather than NATO as an institution, have significant leverage to harmonize and standardize defense industries and that this power should be wielded more decisively. Overall, participants agreed that forging closer cooperation and better understanding between the private sector and governments are crucial to future-proofing the Alliance.
Shifting World, Shifting Burdens? Reassessing the Transatlantic Division of Labor
The second session revolved around the issue of burden-sharing within the Alliance. Participants discussed how a fair division of labor between Europe and the US could look like. The debate revolved around the proposition that the US should focus on the Indo-Pacific while European NATO countries take responsibility for deterring Russia and keeping Europe safe. Some participants raised concerns about the feasibility of such a division of labor, citing Europe’s current lack of military capability and perceived lack of strategic clarity. Others argued that the US should remain a military and diplomatic leader in both theatres to best safeguard its interests. European participants expressed a degree of confusion about Washington’s expectations from its European allies in the Indo-Pacific, especially in the military realm. Others pointed out that the division of labor could extend beyond military might to include diplomatic and economic power, which Europe could bring to the table in the Indo-Pacific.
The event concluded with a reception and a symphony concert on the occasion of the 75th anniversary of NATO in the Library of Congress.
