Rediscovering geography in NATO defence planning

Mattelaer, Alexander

doi:10.1080/14702436.2018.1497446

Cited by 16 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 26 publications

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“…Balancing regional concerns in threat assessment, scenario development, and operational and defense planning is an evergreen challenge for NATO as a political alliance. Given that different allies experience threats differently, 'rediscovering the early principle that allies should concentrate on those tasks for which they are the most geographically suited' (Mattelaer 2018) holds particular promise. If national public opinion is indeed responsive to threat perceptions in general, it is likely that such opinion is even more inclined to support higher defense spending that is focused on more proximate threats.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Threats and the Public Constraint on Military Spending

DiGiuseppe,

Aspide,

Becker

2023

Brit. J. Polit. Sci.

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The public places an important constraint on funding security in Europe, and austerity risks making the constraint tighter. Several recent studies show that curtailing military spending is a popular way to reduce debt in Europe. Yet it remains unclear if military spending aversion persists when threats are salient. We fielded an original survey experiment in Italy weeks before the Russian invasion of Ukraine to examine how information about security threats influences military spending preferences and fiscal trade-offs. We found that information about threats increases support for military spending. To validate the survey experiment, we recontacted and remeasured our respondent's preferences three weeks after Russia's invasion and find evidence consistent with our initial experiment. Our findings suggest that, while public opposition to military spending remains high in Italy, external threats dampen the public's opposition to military spending, even under high debt burdens.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Threats and the Public Constraint on Military Spending

DiGiuseppe,

Aspide,

Becker

2023

Brit. J. Polit. Sci.

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“…The empirical expression of Europe's contemporary significance in NATO exists in two forms. The first is a "rediscovery of geography" in defence and force planning (Mattelaer 2018). NATO has returned to Europe over the last decade owing to Russian machinations in Georgia and Ukraine (and, by extension, an implied threat to the Baltic States) and turbulence in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region (with knockon effects for Turkey, Italy, Greece and NATO's other southern members).…”

Section: A Return To the European Pillarmentioning

confidence: 99%

Hedging their bets? The case for a European pillar in NATO

Ringsmose

Webber²

2020

Defence Studies

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President Donald Trump has adopted a critical position on NATO, raising concerns of an American abandonment of its obligations to Europe's defence. The severity of Trump's position is unusual, but some of his concerns are of long-standing and likely to be voiced in some form by his successor in the White House. American criticism and equivocation has led the European allies to engage in various forms of hedging. Some of these strategies are designed to keep the US attached to NATO; others bypass the alliance-cultivating either bilateral links to the US or a strengthening of EU defence cooperation. Hedging, whatever its form, is potentially damaging to alliance effectiveness and cohesion. In that light, NATO's interests are better served by a strategy which builds upon the NATO-EU relationship and which advertises the benefits of European effort within NATO itself. To that end, we argue in favour of a reformulation of an old but much misunderstood idea-that of NATO's "European pillar." Here, existing contributions to European defence provided by the allies through NATO are crucial. Such an arrangement need not, therefore, entail any elaborate institutional engineering, but it does require political and strategic clarity.

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“…The EU Foreign Affairs Council (Defence) also underscored the importance of Military Mobility in June 2018 and developed a number of "Military Mobility pledges" ( §18, Council of the European Union 2018a). Similar language was adopted by NATO in the July 2018 Brussels Summit Declaration ( §17 -18, NATO 2018;Mattelaer 2018). This strong overlap between the EU and NATO wording was due to the work of EU member states and NATO members on echoing the work of the EU in NATO (Interviews, EU member state official, April 2021; EEAS official, May 2021).…”

Section: The Policy Stream and Policy Transfersmentioning

confidence: 96%

“…As experienced during recent major military exercises, such barriers can thus lead to delays, disruptions, higher costs and increased vulnerability. (European Commission 2017, 1) The work on Military Mobility issues is thus clearly linked to the deteriorating security situation in and around Europe since 2014 (Interviews, European Commission official, February 2020; EU official, May 2021; European Commission officials, May 2021; member state official, January 2023; member state officials, January 2023; European Commission officials February 2023; see also Mattelaer 2018). These developments follows the problem stream, with focusing events -that is, Russia's annexation of Crimea and the worsening security situation around Europe -as the starting point.…”

Section: The Problem Streammentioning

confidence: 99%

The New Role of the European Commission in the EU’s Security and Defence Architecture: entrepreneurship, crisis and integration

Håkansson

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In recent years, the European Union (EU) has strengthened its foreign, security and defence policy in a remarkable way. Several new supranational security and defence initiatives have been launched and implemented, which have given the European Commission a new and central role in European security and defence policy. These swift developments are puzzling, since foreign policy and security and defence policy have long been understood as the ‘last bastions of sovereignty’ for EU member states and have thus been regarded as the least-likely cases for supranational integration. This thesis shows how the Commission has been the central driver behind these changes; it does so by conducting three focused case studies/articles to explore and explain the evolution of a new and enhanced role for the European Commission in EU security and defence cooperation during the period 2014–2023. By researching the establishment of the European Defence Fund, the EU Military Mobility project and the new policies and initiatives developed after Russia’s full-scale war of aggression against Ukraine in 2022, this dissertation analyses new competences for the European Commission within EU security and defence policy. This dissertation conceptually and analytically builds on diverse strands of integration literature, drawing on neofunctionalism, the Commission’s policy entrepreneurship and agenda setting, and crisis pressure to retrace in detail these three important empirical processes. The main contribution of this dissertation is to show how the European Commission’s initiatives and strategies have been indispensable in the strengthening of EU integration within security and defence.

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Rediscovering geography in NATO defence planning

Cited by 16 publications

References 26 publications

Threats and the Public Constraint on Military Spending

Threats and the Public Constraint on Military Spending

Hedging their bets? The case for a European pillar in NATO

The New Role of the European Commission in the EU’s Security and Defence Architecture: entrepreneurship, crisis and integration

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