Our inquiry
16. In this report, we seek to offer a comprehensive
analysis of the Atlantic Alliance, its role, purpose and prospects.
We consider what role NATO should play in the future of UK and
European defence and whether the Alliance has a viable, long-term
future. We examine the way in which NATO manages its operations
and consider whether the Alliance is militarily configured and
financially resourced to handle situations like Afghanistan, and
the lessons of NATO's operational deployments. We consider the
impact of NATO's performance in Afghanistan on the future of the
Alliance and analyse the progress made to date in improving NATO's
military capabilities. We highlight the capability gaps which
remain and consider how these can best be addressed. We consider
the existing division of risk within the Alliance and the issue
of national caveats and address the challenges of Alliance burden-sharing
and defence spending. Also considered is the issue of NATO enlargement,
the challenges that have confronted new members and the prospects
for, and implications of, further enlargement. NATO's relationship
with the European Union is examined alongside the respective roles
of NATO and the EU. We analyse the role of, and prospects for,
the European Security and Defence Policy and will consider what
implications a growing role for the European Union in defence
and security might have for the long-term future of NATO. Finally,
we examine the implications of the Lisbon Treaty for NATO and
European defence.
17. Our report focuses primarily on NATO and examines
the development of the ESDP largely in the context of discussing
the NATO-EU relationship. Although we offer some observations
about the impact of the Lisbon Treaty on the ESDP and NATO, our
report should not be taken as a report on the Treaty itself. Other
Select Committees of the House of Commons have conducted such
inquiries. The Foreign Affairs Committee published a report on
the Foreign Policy Aspects of the Lisbon Treaty on 20 January
2007 and the European Scrutiny Committee published a report on
The European Union Intergovernmental Conference on 27 November
2007.[8] The House of Lords
European Union Committee is also conducting an in-depth analysis
of the foreign policy and defence aspects of the Lisbon Treaty.
18. Our predecessor Committee held an inquiry into
The Future of NATO in 2002. Its report examined the key
developments in NATO in the build-up to the NATO Summit at Prague
in November of that year which dealt in particular with the issues
of NATO enlargement and partnerships. The report also considered
the implications of the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001
for the future role of the Alliance and American attitudes towards
NATO. Our report does not seek to duplicate this work. Significantly,
our predecessor's report, published in July 2002, predated NATO's
decision to take command of the ISAF mission in Afghanistan in
August 2003. This decision has important implications for the
future of the Alliance. Our current report devotes considerable
attention to what NATO's command of ISAF might mean for the future
of the Alliance.
19. As part of our inquiry we visited NATO Headquarters
and European Union institutions in Brussels, in March 2007, and
held discussions with the NATO Secretary General, Jaap de Hoop
Scheffer, and International Staff, and senior NATO and EU military
officers and diplomats. We also visited the United States and
Canada, in May 2007, to hold discussions with our Congressional
and parliamentary counterparts, senior government ministers and
officials, and representatives of defence and foreign policy think
tanks. In October 2007, we visited Georgia, a prospective member
of the Alliance, and Turkey, a longstanding Alliance member but
not a member of the EU, to hold discussions about their respective
aspirations and concerns about NATO. In smaller groups, between
February and May 2007, we also visited Berlin, Copenhagen, The
Hague, Paris, Prague, Madrid, Rome, and Warsaw to meet ministers,
other parliamentarians, military officers and officials, as well
as defence and foreign policy opinion-formers, to elicit their
opinions about the future of NATO and European defence. We believe
our visits have greatly informed our inquiry. A complete list
of the visits undertaken as part of this inquiry is set out at
Annex B.
20. On 19 June 2007 we took oral evidence from Martin
Wolf, Senior Columnist for the Financial Times; Sir
Paul Lever, Chairman of the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI)
Council and former HM Ambassador to Germany; Charles Grant, Director
of the Centre for European Reform; and Dr Rob Dover, Lecturer
in Defence Studies at King's College London. On 9 October 2007
we held an evidence session with Dr Dana Allin, Senior Fellow
for Transatlantic Affairs at the International Institute for Strategic
Studies (IISS); Professor Michael Cox, Professor of International
Relations at the London School of Economics (LSE); Dr Jonathan
Eyal, Director of International Security Studies at RUSI; Dr Robin
Niblett, Director of Chatham House; and Dr Mark Webber, Senior
Lecturer in Politics at the University of Loughborough.[9]
On 20 November 2007 we took evidence from General Sir Jack Deverell
(Rtd), former Commander-in-Chief, Allied Forces North (AFNORTH),
NATO; Lieutenant General Sir Rob Fry (Rtd), former Director of
Operations at the MoD; Daniel Keohane, Research Fellow at the
European Union Institute for Security Studies; and Colonel Christopher
Langton, Senior Research Fellow at the IISS. Finally, on 8 January
2008, we took evidence from Rt Hon Des Browne MP, Secretary of
State for Defence, Mr Andrew Mathewson, Director of Policy for
International Organisations at the MoD, and Mr Hugh Powell, Head
of Security Policy Department at the Foreign and Commonwealth
Office (FCO). We received a wide range of written submissions,
details of which can be found on page 120. We are grateful to
all those who participated in our inquiry.
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