NATO's Level of Ambition in Light of the Current Strategic Context

In the last two decades, NATO's operations have exposed significant shortcomings in the organization's military capabilities. The Alliance has relied on the U.S. to provide either the bulk of the forces or the majority of the critical capabilities or both. In 2006, the Alliance established its level of ambition to indicate the number and size of the operations that the organization must be able to perform to meet its challenges. However, the Alliance has failed so far in developing the capabilities required to reach that goal. At the operational level, the main issue for the Alliance has been the ability to build and sustain a strong coalition, with enough forces and capabilities to carry on the mission. As an organization, its recurrent challenge has been to keep the members committed to both providing the resources needed for every operation and developing the critical capabilities that the Alliance requires. In 2010, the Alliance approved a new strategic concept to ensure that the Alliance continues to be effective against the new threats. However, this agreement does not foresee a revision of the level of ambition. In addition, the U.S. has issued a new strategic guidance that suggests a reduction in American participation in NATO. Therefore, the question today is if NATO is able to reach its level of ambition without relying extensively on U.S. military capabilities.

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