NATO Needs Shake-Up Amid Russia Threat, U.K. Panel Says
By Thomas Penny Jul 30, 2014 7:01 PM ET
NATO forces should be positioned continuously in the Baltic states and the alliance needs to reorder its command structures if it’s to deal with the threat posed by Russia, a panel of U.K. lawmakers said.
Russia’s use of “ambiguous attacks” in Ukraine, including the deployment of irregular militia and information warfare, shows the need for the North Atlantic Treaty Organization to redraw its tactics, the cross-party House of Commons Defence Committee said in a report. The alliance should also consider the implications of non-conventional warfare for Article 5 of its founding treaty, which provides for collective self-defense, the lawmakers said.
“The risk of attack by Russia on a NATO member state, whilst still small, is significant; we are not convinced that NATO is ready for this threat,” the committee chairman, Conservative lawmaker Rory Stewart, said in an e-mailed statement today. “NATO needs to re-examine its capabilities and organizational structures. It must put itself again into a position to carry out its core responsibilities of protecting its member states.”
The next NATO summit in Wales in September should be used to agree on improvements to the alliance’s rapid-reaction force, the permanent stationing of military hardware in the Baltic states, a greater focus on assessing and predicting the threat from Russia and the re-starting of large-scale military exercises, the panel urged.
“Events in Ukraine this year, following on from the cyber-attack on Estonia in 2007 and the invasion of Georgia by Russia in 2008, are a ‘wake-up call’ for NATO,” the report says. “The NATO alliance has not considered Russia as an adversary or a potential territorial threat to its member states for 20 years. It is now forced to do so.”
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http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-07-30/nato-needs-shake-up-amid-russia-threat-u-k-panel-says.html
