Jones: Transforming NATO Into 21st-Century Alliance

Sea Power, Nov 2004 by Barnard, Richard C

As commander of NATO forces, Gen. James L. Jones leads the transformation of its military while trying to assure its many publics that the 55-year-old alliance is the wave of the future. Formed in 1949 to counter the Soviet Union, and considered by some a legacy of the past, NATO today has forces from Bosnia to Kabul and the northern reaches of Afghanistan.

Jones talks enthusiastically about helping struggling democracies in northern Africa and deploying even more troops far outside NATO's traditional boundaries. Meanwhile, NATO is dumping its antiquated command structure; closing bases; creating a NATO Response Force of 25,000 troops deployable worldwide; and, in Operation Active Endeavor, deploying a naval force in the Mediterranean Sea to track down terrorists and piece together a maritime surveillance picture of the region.

Funding is a perennial problem, however, and bringing together the forces of 26 alliance members for joint efforts such as creating a multinational logistics system is slow going.

Jones, a former Marine Corps commandant, views NATO's performance in Afghanistan as a prologue to its future. He points with pride to its efforts to ensure peaceful elections in that war-weary country, and said in an interview with Editor in Chief Richard C. Barnard that new members of NATO, such as Poland and the Baltic states, "bring a real joy to the alliance that I find extremely motivating."

There has been a lot of talk about transforming NATO. What does it mean, in practical terms?

Jones: It means we are literally freeing ourselves from our 20th-century Cold War reactive mentality that was perfectly logical and perfectly necessary. And we are transforming into something that is more useful in terms of what we are likely be expected to do in the 21st century. We are just seeing the first examples of this with the NATO mission in Afghanistan; the NATO mission in Iraq that is now taking place; and with Operation Active Endeavor, a maritime mission. It is really the best example of NATO's contribution to the war on terror right now because it is classic counterterrorism.

There is the NATO Response Force, which is probably the closest thing to the expeditionary strike group concept that the American [forces] are adopting. So all of these things should be welcome news for the United States because it is graphic evidence that this wonderful alliance is in fact moving in the right direction, albeit slowly for a lot of people.

What is the reaction from your commanders?

Jones: Generally enthusiastic. The mandate is based on the Prague summit in '02. The summit was very visionary and it gave those of us who wear the uniform the legitimacy for making changes of this magnitude. Since then, the NATO Response Force has gone from concept to reality.

The meeting in Prague changed the course of NATO. But was the Prague summit related to 9/11?

Jones: Absolutely. The reason all of this happened at Prague was that the alliance was generally not pleased with its inability to offer anything beyond NATO AWACS [Airborne Warning and Control System] and a few other things in its Article 5 declaration of support to the United States.

Was NATO on the way out of business, in your opinion? Does that overstate the case?

Jones: It might be a little bit of an overstatement, but NATO was certainly structured for the wrong business. And what the Prague summit did was kind of tell everybody to sit up and pay attention because you're dangerously close to being, in business terms, noncompetitive. The transformation is about being more competitive in your marketplace, which is very serious: weapons of mass destruction, radical movements of fundamentalism in areas closer to Europe. In Africa, there are clear signs of Islamic fundamentalists taking root and fomenting all kinds of problems for the future.

You're worried about it?

Jones: Africa is a "now problem" in terms of the next 10 years or longer. We are already inaugurating some initiatives in Africa to change things and to help countries help themselves. There are some struggling democracies down there. Our dependence on resources from the Gulf of Guinea is growing exponentially. We would be well served as a family of nations to go in there and help Africans transform themselves: help with education, help with jobs and industry, and help stabilize the region.

Tell us about Iraq. What mission are you taking on?

Jones: We've found some specific areas in which a NATO training mission can be helpful without being redundant [to the work of forces already there]. Specifically, we're proposing a site where we can emphasize quality training of future leaders of the Iraqi army, and also senior staff non-commissioned officers. It has not yet been approved by the North Atlantic Council, so I can't be definitive on it. We're also proposing that NATO do some training at the senior officer level, helping the Iraqis ... develop their equivalent of the joint staff.

That is very different from NATO's work in Afghanistan.