Ruminations: Article 5 and the future of Nato
Some thoughts on recent geopolitical suggestions in the US election campaign.
Right, so in so far as Mr Trump’s point is that we should pay our bills he is right. We small people, we who dream of one day having sufficient wealth to live well in this world, don’t we imagine that we will, in this prospective future, powerfully collect our outstanding balance, that we will not be taken for fools, but that we will stand firm and demand our right? And what right is more certain than our right to have our outstanding balance settled?
However, a part from this appeal to the small in us the reality of Mr Trump’s claims is, unfortunately, highly questionable. Far be it for a newly minted man of action to be concerned with such niceties as realities; let us nevertheless look at a few of them:
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Apparently the encounter so vividly narrated by Mr Trump did not feature as its main antagonists a male head of state, as Mr Trump claimed, but rather Mrs. Ursula von Leyen, who was head of the European Commission at the time (Thierry Breton in an interview with France’s LCI television, referred to by Reuters at https://www.reuters.com/world/european-officials-criticize-trumps-nato-comments-2024-02-11/). Probably an insignificant case of memory loss on Mr Trump’s side, no?
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There is no agreement in Nato that all member states should funnel 2 % of their GDP to defence spending. In reality this was a recommendation made in 2014 as a goal to be reached by the end of this year, but surely we are able to discern the difference between a recommendation and a demand? (For more information about the status of the 2 % target, see e.g. https://www.reuters.com/world/nato-allies-agree-spend-at-least-2-their-gdp-defence-diplomats-2023-07-07/.)
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Article 5 of the Nato treaty stipulates that an attack on one member state is to be considered an attack on all. For that reason when USA was attacked on 9-11 her allies in that alliance mistered forces & munitions in support of the invasion of Afganisthan. (You can read more about Nato’s Isaf mission here: https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/topics_8189.htm.) “On September 12, 2001, the day after the 9/11 attacks, NATO met in an emergency session. For the first and only time in its history, NATO invoked Article 5. All 18 of the United States’s allies stated they would support America’s response to the attacks” (https://www.911memorial.org/learn/resources/digital-exhibitions/digital-exhibition-revealed-hunt-bin-laden/international-community-responds). It would show an unprecedented level of ingratitude should the US on a future, say, Russian invasion of Denmark say to the Danes that they feel Article 5 does no longer apply.
The international interstate system is anarchic. For the last 30 years or so it has been dominated by one “super” power. Suggestions that this power will no longer be able to honour its commitments indicates that we are entering a new era, an era in which we will see a larger number of “great” powers dominate, and where the former “super” power will be reduced to one among these.
Posted 12 Feb, 2024. Modified 13 Jan, 2026.
