NATO summit 2-3 April 2008

G. Brown and N. Sarkozy met again, this time in Bucharest, for the annual NATO summit. The main topics on the agenda were the NATO operation in Afghanistant (France confirmed its commitment of 700 more troops) and enlargement. Croatia and Albania, already conducting Membership Action Plans (MAP), were formally accepted as candidates for membership of NATO. Macedonia (or FYROM)'s application was blocked by Greece because of the long-running dispute about the use of the name Macedonia. As for Ukraine and Georgia, both candidates to MAP, there was no agreement on their application: France, Germany, Italy and Spain, in particular, were opposed to it, whereas the US, and to a lesser extent the UK, supported it. The final declaration nevertheless left the door open for them in the future.
Perhaps more important in the perspective of the European security and defence policy (ESDP), Bush confirmed the positive signals already sent by the US ambassador to NATO about ESDP, which the US administration now officially supports. This is a big shift in US policy, which paradoxically leaves the Brown government in limbo. Indeed, although Blair was at the origin of the St-Malo summit in Dec 1998, the present British government was resisting French plans for strengthening the EU capacity for military planning. It will be interesting to see whether this changes in the near future. In the meantime, this is a 'victory' for the French government, which contemplates re-joining the NATO integrated command in 2009.
Two other conclusions can be drawn about the politics of this summit. First, as Timothy Garton Ash showed in the Guardian, the Bush administration was very clumsy and failed to achieve a consensus among allies about enlargement - although he did manage to get support for his anti-missile defence in Europe. Second, the Greek veto illustrates the problems that an organisation based on consensus meets when it expands. During the cold war, NATO had 16 members and was 'glued' together by a clear common threat. With 26 members and expanding, with a multi-faceted threat open to debate, it is now much more difficult to achieve unanimity.