Blog AnalysisNATO

NATO is dead? She went into intensive care. Let's wait for his resurrection...

 (B2) "Thebrain dead NATO », Emmanuel Macron's 'good word' has people talking in the corridors of Brussels both at the Alliance and at the European Union. Since the publication of theinterview in The Economist everyone, in the diplomatic and media ranks, questions and questions each other. One more trumpery or a deeper thought?

Allied military training of Iraqi forces in Iraq (US Army photo by Spc. William Marlow)

A tempo to watch closely

Noteworthy clarification: this interview was made not yesterday, but on October 21, in the midst of the Turkish offensive. President Macron's anger is not fake. He said it clearly, shortly before, on Friday, at the end of a tense European Council. Furious to have learned of the American withdrawal by a tweet and of the Turkish offensive which threatens European security, President Macron says aloud what the others are thinking quietly (read: The heavy fault of the West and NATO in Syria ). But few react. We must therefore set the bar higher. The interview is coming out now, at a tempo that doesn't just happen by chance. One month before the London NATO summit, the French president would have liked to bring the subject to the agenda that he would not be taken there otherwise. The goal is reached.

A little European Trump side

On the form, Emmanuel Macron understood that alongside the great sentences, well turned, literary, sometimes bombastic, in a media panorama where everything is written in 140 characters, shock formulas were needed. He does not use Twitter like Donald Trump does. But the result is the same: to hit the mark, to have a sentence understandable by all, which forces everyone to position themselves, provoke if necessary, or get angry (a little). In fact, he is European Trump. In any case, he wins: we listen to the message. And everyone is positioning themselves on their message.

  • Attacking NATO is also quite easy. Easier than attacking the United States. The Alliance here plays the role of lamplighter, formerly devolved to the Union or the European Commission. Curious reversal of circumstances.

The 'everything is fine at NATO' is a decoy

Basically, the word 'brain death' is probably very strong. But you have to wake the dead. Whether " NATO on the military side works, and even works very well to use the comment of a European diplomat, it is not the same at the political level. The meeting of defense ministers proved it. The sort of sluggishness that gripped the Alliance after the Turkish offensive in Syria, and the American abandonment of the Kurdish allies, is extraordinary to say the least.

  • If NATO is weakened, it is not by Emmanuel Macron's good word, it is by its lack of role on the Middle Eastern scene in recent months.

A major political defeat for the West in Syria

Let's be clear. In Syria, NATO suffered a major political defeat. More than the Turkish offensive, it is the role of chief peacemaker given to Russia, and the operation to de-demonize Iran, which are extraordinary in their speed. Petrified, NATO could not say a word about the Sochi agreement. Its hereditary enemy, its reason for always being, Russia, is in the process of taking the advantage on the borders of the Alliance, on its southern flank. This, in direct connection with one of the member countries of the alliance, a historical centerpiece in this strategy of limiting Russia (the former Ottoman Empire), and with the tacit consent of the 'dad' of the Alliance (the UNITED STATES). In Moscow, you can very well rub your hands. The Alliance has surrendered without a fight.

  • Donald Trump will hardly be able to reproach this word to his French counterpart, who had described the Alliance as 'obsolete'. He also matched the action to his word. In the Syrian affair, at no time has NATO really been put in the loop. She was faced with a fait accompli.

A Russian strategy to circumvent the Alliance

If we take two minutes away from the news cursor, we can only be struck by the Alliance's lack of strategy. According to a good old hackneyed military recipe, Russia succeeded in fixing its adversary on a given territory: Europe from the North-East to the Black Sea. The Alliance, overjoyed to regain a leading role, rushed headlong into a presence that was ultimately quite static, very 'old school', with infantry maneuvers, land exercises, and noisy demonstrations of tanks and weapons. planes not far from Russia. Meanwhile, Moscow has occupied the ground in Syria and placed its pawns in Egypt, Libya, the Central African Republic (or even in Mali or Burkina Faso tomorrow). She made a turning movement reversing, to her advantage, the Kennan doctrine of containment used by the post-war Americans to limit the Soviet breakthrough. The Moscow-Tehran-Damascus-Beirut axis (+ Ankara and Cairo if necessary) is now becoming an essential part of the Southern Mediterranean zone. Faced with this, NATO is paralyzed.

  • Talking about 'brain death' is undoubtedly daring, but if we stay in medical terminology, we are faced with a beautiful stroke (cerebral vascular accident). And it needed an electroshock to try to wake up the patient.

The battle of ancients against moderns

The fundamental question is whether this message will have an effect. In the short term, we can say that the shock has worn. On the one hand, no one can ignore the subject any longer. The taboo is lifted. The question will have to be addressed. On the other hand, when we look at the reactions that have occurred on both sides, in Washington, Berlin or elsewhere, we can clearly see how embarrassed they are in fact. Certainly the French president seems isolated. But most of the interventions, to justify NATO, are made (literally) in the past, borrowing from History... It is only necessary to see the language of Merkel or Stoltenberg. Difficult to do otherwise on the eve of the celebrations of the fall of the Berlin Wall.

  • Thirty years later, the era of triumphant Westernism and the end of the Cold War seem a bit outdated. Emmanuel Macron is replaying the battle of the ancients vs the moderns that brought him to power in France.

A limited risk of counterproductive effect?

In the medium term, the presidential message seems more risky. It plays and overplays the role traditionally assigned to France. That of a patented pain in the ass who groans, blocks, imposes his vision, undoubtedly brilliant, but not very consensual. There is a risk that we will not make a gift to the French when the day comes. France also seems a bit isolated. But immediately comes an answer: who in the ranks of European leaders is, today, in a position to oppose frankly and, above all, to impose themselves?...

Objective: a updating of the Alliance?

In fact, the French president has free rein. He can advance a pawn, as in chess, even if it means getting caught, because behind, he still has pieces. The ambition of the French president is not to sign NATO's death. On the contrary, it is to push to a updating of the Alliance, to a change of focus, to accepting a more important place for Europeans in political (and military) leadership. Basically, if we could dare, it is a perestroika that Emmanuel Macron calls for.

  • As a keen observer of the European diplomatic scene explained, even in a secular republic like France, " it is not impossible to believe... at the resurrection ».

(Nicolas Gros-Verheyde)

Nicolas Gros Verheyde

Chief editor of the B2 site. Graduated in European law from the University of Paris I Pantheon Sorbonne and listener to the 65th session of the IHEDN (Institut des Hautes Etudes de la Défense Nationale. Journalist since 1989, founded B2 - Bruxelles2 in 2008. EU/NATO correspondent in Brussels for Sud-Ouest (previously West-France and France-Soir).

s2Member®