CIAO DATE: 02/02

Beyond Enlargement: NATO's Role in Russia's Relations with the West

S. Neil MacFarlane
Lester B. Pearson Professor in International Relations,  Director, Centre for International Studies, University of Oxford

Joint Workshop on Europe and Transatlantic Security: Issues and Perspectives
Kandersteg, Switzerland
August 25-27 2000

The Geneva Centre for Security Policy

Introduction

In 1996, ex-NATO Defence College fellow Dmitrii Trenin wrote that "in spite of the numerous public declarations of intention by Russia and the United States, Russia and NATO, and Russia and the European Union, so far no reliable foundation for partnership has been laid." Although the remark is four years old, there is little to argue with here. The proposition remains equally valid today.

Four years ago, one might have asked: so what? Given the state of affairs in Russia, it didn't matter much anyway. However, things are changing. For the first time in ten years, secessionist wars, submarine disasters and fires in television towers notwithstanding, NATO and the West face a pivotal moment in the effort to normalize the relationship with Russia. The executive has secured reasonable control over the legislature. It is moving towards the reestablishment of central authority vis-à-vis the regions. The government is restoring a disciplined and reasonably orderly approach to foreign and security policy. There is increasingly strong evidence of sustained Russian economic recovery. This is a moment, consequently, of both opportunity and risk in the West's relations with Russia. It is an appropriate time to review where we have been, where we are, where we want to be, and what the role of NATO is in getting us there.

First, from the perspective of grand strategy, we should imagine where we want to be in the longer term with Russia. My departing assumption is that long term stability and co-operative security in Europe require a constructive, mutually beneficial relationship with Russia. If Russia returns to political order and economic health, and given its resource and demographic base, it will be one of two major centres of power in Europe. Having it in the tent would be better than having it outside.

The challenge for Western policy with respect to Russia in the last decade was one of containing the political, economic and social effects of turmoil; assisting Russia in stabilising its internal situation and reversing the decline; and attempting to sustain the strategic and arms control relationships. Longer term thinking about the construction of a durable security order in Europe that included Russia was difficult for at least two sets of reasons.

The first concerned Russia itself. The weakness of the Russian state made the Federation an unpredictable and often difficult interlocutor. It is not easy to construct a stable partnership when one partner is incapable of developing and implementing coherent policy. It is difficult to help a country that seemingly is incapable of helping itself.

At a more profound level, the relationship between Russia and the West was complicated by the unsettled nature of post-Cold War, post-Soviet Russian identity. Successful partnership is predicated not only on a capacity to deliver, but also on the partner's understanding of who they are and what they want. Russia has always had difficulty in deciding whether its identity is defined as part of, or in contradistinction to, the West. In the 1990s, Russians were unclear on whether they wanted to be part of a Western liberal-democratic community (the westernizing europeanist tendency), whether their identity was distinct and irreducible to Western (or any other) categories (viz. the Gumilev theory of ethnogenesis), or whether Russian identity was a combination, and therefore a bridge, between Western and non-Western identities (Eurasianism). The continual fractionalism of the post-Soviet political arena rendered it even more difficult for Russia to settle on who it was.

The second set of issues concerned the West. On the one hand, policy towards Russia was only one of a number of vexing issues animating the post-Cold War security environment in Europe. Another, for example, was what to do with those Central European states seeking membership in established Western security and economic institutions and to whom many in the West felt a strong sense of historical obligation. Still another was the necessity of dealing with the conflicts in the former Yugoslavia.

The problem is that these issues were closely related to Russia's relationship with the West. The effort to cope with them discretely had significant negative implications for this relationship. The path chosen to address the security and other needs of the Czech Republic, Hungary, and Poland was the enlargement of Western institutions such as NATO and (potentially) the EU. Many Russians, however, perceived NATO enlargement to be trespassing into areas of traditional Russian influence at a time of Russian vulnerability.

NATO actions in Bosnia-Herzegovina and, more recently, in Kosovo also complicated Russia's relationship with the West. The intervention in Kosovo had a distinctly unfortunate effect in consolidating domestic Russian opinion in an anti-NATO direction.

In all of these respects, Western choices in dealing with more or less urgent issues other than Russia have produced negative effects in the Western relationship with Russia. Western decision-making displays a tendency to discount the long term in the effort to handle the complexities of the moment.

A second complication in Western policy is that the eastward orientation of the transatlantic community is not the only significant, nor necessarily the most important, regional or global aspect of Western security policy. The multiple security preoccupations of Western states make the development of coherent policy towards Russia more difficult.

Underlying these specific aspects of the West's approach to Russia is a more fundamental problem. Just as Russia has had difficulty in developing a consistent sense of what it wants in its relationship with the West, it is not entirely clear what the West really wants in its relationship with Russia. On the one hand, we appear to want Russia to reform economically and to enter the global economy and on the other, we impose restrictions on Russian trade in their most competitive industrial sectors while gradually tightening barriers to the freedom of movement of Russian citizens.

We wish Russia to play an integrated role in security issues, but we disempower those security institutions in which Russia has equal status (e.g. the UN and the OSCE) and build up the roles of those institutions (e.g. NATO and the EU) in which Russia does not, and is not likely to, enjoy full equality. The impression that is left is that we seek to draw Russia into our networks but on our terms, to avoid enfranchising Russia in such a way that our flexibility of decision-making and policy would be significantly constrained.

Turning to NATO's role in the West's relationship with Russia, the organisation suffers from a number of historical and structural disadvantages. In the first place, NATO is a holdover from the Cold War, during which its principal purposes were to deter and to defend against Soviet attack in Central Europe. Given this background, and its continuing collective defence function, it is no surprise that NATO is perceived by many in Russia as an unattractive basis for the construction of a post-Cold War security order.

Moreover, given its origins in collective defence rather than collective security, it is by definition not fully inclusive. The outsiders are disenfranchised when NATO makes decisions about post-Cold War security issues. Russia is one of the excluded.

This said, NATO has one key advantage: capacity. As demonstrated in Bosnia and in Kosovo, it can do things that other institutions cannot do.

In short, we face a dilemma - those institutions possessing legitimacy from a Russian perspective lack capability; and the institution possessing the capability lacks the legitimacy to act outside the collective defence role.

Several attempts have been made since 1991 to bridge this gap, amongst them the creation of the NACC, the PfP, the EAPC and the conclusion of separate agreements defining NATO-Russia and NATO-Ukraine relations. These institutional frameworks have played a valuable role in improving lines of communication between NATO and Russia, in confidence-building and, somewhat less clearly, in the transfer of Western norms and practice regarding political-military co-operation and civil-military relations.

The experience of joint operations in the former Yugoslavia has given Russian forces the opportunity to experience direct participation in operations with NATO forces, to learn NATO procedures on the ground, and to interact regularly in the field with NATO structures. This, arguably, also has confidence-building effects while laying an experiential basis for future, more effective collaboration.

However, this opening falls well short of Russian expectations. The Founding Act and the PJC do not address Russian aspirations for an effective say on NATO out-of-area operations in situations where Russian interests are perceived to be engaged, as in the former Yugoslavia. Arrangements for Russian participation in peace enforcement have fallen short of Russian status objectives. The fixes on these questions have been sufficient to bring Russia in, but they have left a bitter taste. And the vulnerability of these arrangements to political disagreement was evident in the case of Kosovo, where the NATO decision to engage brought PfP co-operation with Russia to a halt, and caused the withdrawal of Russian representatives from NATO structures in Brussels and Mons and the closure of the NATO liaison office in Moscow.

This brings me to a brief consideration of NATO's role in the future of the West's relationship with Russia. There is considerable uncertainty over the probable direction of Russia's policy towards the West with the recent arrival of a comparative unknown as President of Russia. Given Mr. Putin's background, and the intensity of anti-NATO opinion in Moscow after Kosovo, one might have expected substantial further deterioration in the Russia-NATO relationship. Instead, Russian representatives have returned to NATO headquarters and resumed their activities in NATO organs. The President has avoided confrontational rhetoric vis-à-vis NATO and has demonstrated an open-minded attitude on the further development of relations. In a broader sense, in public statements he has emphasised the importance of constructive relations with the West. Reflecting perhaps his career experience as well as his roots in St. Petersburg, he has embraced a Western-oriented conception of Russian identity.

NATO can make a significant difference - positively or negatively - in defining the future of Russia's relations with the West at this pivotal moment. Further enlargement could tip the balance towards a more confrontational and unilateral Russian perspective, with potentially negative effects for the non-Russian NIS. This possibility is particularly evident in the Baltic Republics, where the Russians have drawn a very clear line. Substantial increase in NATO activity in the CIS could considerably enhance Russian perceived insecurity in its immediate vicinity. New un-mandated enforcement actions by NATO in the Balkans - e.g. in Montenegro or Macedonia - could destabilise the NATO-Russian and the Western-Russian relationship further. Not only would they increase uncertainty within the Russian political elite concerning the intentions of the Western allies, but they would foster a domestic political climate in which it would be difficult for Russian leaders not to react negatively.

Ultimately - and more positively - the stabilization of NATO's relationship with Russia depends, I suspect, on reform of NATO's decision-making structures as they relate to the out of area use of force, and/or change in NATO's relations with other European institutions where Russia as a member plays a fuller role. Within NATO, such a reform could involve the separation of collective defence decisions, which would remain within the Council, from peace enforcement decisions, which could be broadened to include Russia (in the PJC context) and other EAPC states. The problem with this option is that it is a recipe for inaction in peace enforcement in instances where Russian and Western interests diverge.

In addition, the NATO commitment to seek mandates from the OSCE and UNSC for the use of force in peace enforcement could be made more explicit. This could be combined with a restructuring of the OSCE to create the equivalent of a regional security council. Again, however, this would mean the surrender of NATO's capacity for independent action in this sphere in the face of Russian opposition.

In addition, it may be an appropriate moment to rethink the Western position towards the CIS. The "organisation," if one can call it that, has traditionally been ignored if not vilified in the West, because it has been perceived as a potential instrument of Russian hegemony over states whose sovereignty and autonomy we seek to enhance, and because, quite simply, it does not work. However, it appears to be the only game in town at the sub-regional FSU level. Moreover, Russia is placing new energy into it, particularly in areas of counter-terrorism and narco-trafficking. Russian initiatives in these areas are being welcomed by some CIS states, such as Uzbekistan, that previously displayed little enthusiasm for the organisation. Ironically, these are interests that we share and, to the extent that Russia is successful, we will enjoy the benefits. Cooperation with the CIS is, however, a delicate proposition and would, presumably, be conditional on Russian respect for OSCE norms in the field of sub-regional security. Selling out the non-Russian CIS states, is, I assume, not an acceptable option.

Overall, the price of bringing Russia in may not be worth the return in terms of integrating Russia more fully into an equitable structure of regional security. But it is worth asking just what such a judgement really means. Those entertaining such a position are really saying that they wish to retain the capacity for intervention in areas of Russian concern without Russian approval, and that partnership with Russia where it counts is unequal partnership. That may be a defensible position, but it is, none the less, a recipe for continuing and deepening Russian hostility towards the Western alliance. This could well be problematic not only in the Eastern European region and in the transatlantic relationship as a whole, but also in a broader array of issues (terrorism, WMD and small arms proliferation, transnational crime) where Russian co-operation, if perhaps not essential, is desirable.

In short, the various middle ground options for NATO-Russian relations that we have been exploring over the past decade have not performed terribly well in addressing the strategic objectives of the West in Eurasia, because they do not address fundamental Russian concerns about equal treatment. "Satisfying" Russia may require institutional changes that diminish NATO's capacity for autonomous action where it perceives Western interests to be threatened. However, sustaining this capacity for independence means keeping Russia out when it counts and is a recipe for the gradual alienation of the only substantial power in Europe outside the Alliance and for the drawing of new lines of exclusion and confrontation across Europe. As Russia recovers, that is an increasingly unattractive prospect.