The Influence of ESDP on NATO and Transatlantic Relations

“New Europe”, Aspects of the EU Enlargement

Abstract

The European Union launched the European Security and Defense Policy (ESDP) in 1999, which was constructed within the framework of the Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP). The EU learned lessons from the two ethnic conflicts in the Balkan Peninsula in the 1990s and realized that the EU could not play any significant role in post-cold war conflict resolutions without reliable and autonomous military means. This realization was the main incentive for the EU to start ESDP.
Decision-makers in the United States were afraid of the development of an autonomous ESDP because they thought that it would mark the beginning of the decoupling of transatlantic relations and feared that NATO might be marginalized as a consequence.
This article focuses on the consequences of ESDP to see if it might compete with NATO in the foreseeable future and harm transatlantic relations. This was accomplished by comparing the military dimensions of the emerging ESDP with NATO: goals and missions, mechanisms of operational planning and force planning, and procurement policies.
The goals and missions of ESDP are vaguely defined as the “Petersberg missions”: humanitarian and rescue tasks, peacekeeping tasks, and tasks of combat forces in crisis management, including peacemaking. There is intentional ambiguity concerning the high end of the tasks, but missions of ESDP surely are far less robust than those of NATO.
The institutions and mechanisms of ESDP's operational planning and force planning are carefully managed within the framework of mutual cooperation with NATO. The so-called “Berlin-plus” arrangement was introduced to avoid unnecessary duplication of the assets and capabilities of both organizations. This arrangement functioned well in ESDP missions in Macedonia (2003) and Bosnia (2004-present). Likewise the EU-NATO Capability Group was established to coordinate and harmonize the EU's military capabilities with those of NATO.
European procurement cooperation is necessary for EU members to improve their military capabilities. The newly established European Defense Agency is expected to smooth the various national obstacles for the common procurement and institutionalize procurement cooperation among EU member states. In order to obtain full interoperability with the U. S., transatlantic procurement cooperation is essential. EU-U. S. procurement cooperation, however, is a delicate issue because the U. S. keeps strict regulations on exporting sensitive technologies, even to its European allies.
Consequently, in military and defense terms, there seems to be no serious danger of ESDP inflicting damage on transatlantic relations and marginalizing NATO. Rather they would reinforce each other and one might say it even constitutes a unique division of labour: the EU would concentrate its abilities on the lower end of crisis management while NATO would be engaged in the higher end of the intervention ladder.
This article takes the position that the sharp political rift of Euro-Atlantic relations after the Iraqi war will not go further. On the contrary, steady and quiet mechanisms for mutual cooperation in military dimensions between ESDP and NATO are being established behind the harsh political battle-ground, and this trend will continue in the near future.