NATO at 60:Introduction

No special edition of any journal can hope to capture the rich tapestry of NATO's history, or the contributions of all its members, or the complexity of debates, past and present, about the alliance's purpose, leadership, burdensharing, and strategy. What the editors of this journal edition have done is to strike a balance between historical and contemporary - and empirical and theoretical - insights. We have also, in reflection of the IJ's home, sought to foreground debate about one of NATO's lesser-profiled members, Canada. In undertaking this task, we drew substantially on the highly successful NATOsponsored specialist panel at the Transatlantic Studies Association annual conference in Dundee in 2008 and are grateful for the assistance of Rima Berns-McGown, managing editor of International Journal, in the final manuscript preparation.The edition begins with Joel Sokolsky's and Joseph Jockel's consummate explanation of how and why successive Canadian leaders managed skilfully to embed membership in NATO at the heart of Canada's foreign and defence policy. They also argue that it was the Canadians more than anyone else who set out to make NATO something more than a defence pact. The resulting community of allies that gradually emerged has benefited Canada over the years and helped it to craft a defence policy that has had broad domestic appeal, while allowing it to work closely with its behemoth neighbour and its European friends, but without being over-beholden to anyone. Just as NATO more broadly construed was intended to keep the Russians out, the Americans in, and the Germans down, it was a success for Canada because the government managed to keep Ottawa in, costs down, and criticism out.Ben ZyIa tackles a more specific issue with regard to Canada, namely, claims that its contribution to NATO has declined more than other members' since the end of the Cold War and that it is now in danger of being dubbed a free-rider. He demonstrates that this is not the case. First, he argues that the indicators upon which this conventional wisdom is built are inadequate. Second, by introducing other, more appropriate and sophisticated indicators of burden-sharing, Zyla produces some rather surprising results, none of which could be interpreted to indicate a relative decline in Canada's burdensharing since the early 1990s.Oliver Bange examines in detail the way in which West Germany came to agree with its allies within NATO not to go down the nuclear weapons route. He examines the origins of the problem in the 1950s, once NATO war games indicated potential early use of nuclear weapons on German soil. Germany's consequent dilemma was how to square a circle that would maximize nuclear deterrence, maintain the US nuclear umbrella, and ensure that US/NATO strategy would not end up with a nuclear war regionalized in Europe. The high point for Germany is the nonproliferation treaty; the low, or danger points, came with controversy in NATO over the neutron bomb and the dual-track decision in the late 1970s and early 1980s. According to Bange, the underlying reason for NATO's success in keeping Germany nonnuclear is a series of successful compromises and agreements through multilateral, multisocietal, and multi-institutional frameworks. And while recognizing the specifics of the German example - not least Germany's ability to produce nuclear weapons and appropriate delivery systems on short notice - he sees much potential in similar approaches for dealing with contemporary problems.If Bange's contribution is optimistic about NATO's role in enabling a non-nuclear Germany, Benjamin Schreer's article pointedly reminds us that Berlin today is very different from Bonn during the Cold War. For much of NATO's life, West Germany, and later Germany united, has generally followed the lead of the US. However, Schreer identifies in contemporary German policy what he calls a new pragmatism in recent years and suggests that this may be more than just a temporary reaction to unpalatable US unilateralism under President George W. …

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