NATO’s role in a transatlantic strategy on
China
New Atlanticist by Ian Brzezinski
01 June 2020
On the eve of the NATO
Summit in London last December, the Alliance’s Secretary General Jens
Stoltenberg addressed the need for a collective response to China’s emergence as
a global power. “This is not about moving NATO into the South China Sea,” he
stated, “but it’s about taking into account that China is coming closer to
us—in the Arctic, in Africa, investing heavily in our infrastructure in Europe,
in cyberspace.” At the summit, NATO heads of state diplomatically declared that China has
become a concern: “we recognize that China’s growing influence and
international policies present both opportunities and challenges that we need
to address together as an Alliance.”
Indeed, it is
hard, if not impossible, for NATO to avoid China. Beijing presents a full
spectrum challenge to the transatlantic community—a challenge whose potential
mirrors, if not surpasses, that once posed by the former Soviet Union. China’s
$14 trillion economy is expected to soon surpass that of the United States, and
Beijing exercises that might in a predatory fashion around the globe, including
in the United States and Europe. China threatens to boycott companies and
countries that criticize its policies, leverages its debt instruments against
poor nations, and is buying up critical infrastructure around the world. Its
acquisition of European ports has raised concerns of top NATO commanders who
warn that such ownership could adversely affect the Alliance’s ability to use
those facilities in times of crisis.
China is a
technological challenge to the West. It is a leader in 5G communications,
artificial intelligence, hyper-sonic weapons, and quantum computing. It has
demonstrated repeatedly that it is willing to exercise that prowess against
Western interests and security. Chinese cyber espionage and disinformation
campaigns have become part of daily life for all NATO allies, including both
their governments and private enterprises.
Beijing’s
military is a major driver behind China’s technological edge and is developing
and exercising global reach. China’s $260 billion defense budget has a
purchasing power estimated to equal or exceed 70 percent of that of the US defense
budget. China’s military cooperation with Russia continues to expand
and the two exercise not only in the plains of Central Asia but in the
Mediterranean and Baltic Seas. Chinese military forces are the pointy of end of
the spear Beijing uses to undermine the rules based international order. Its
maritime claims and aggressive activities in South and East China Seas stand
among its more prominent actions.
And, China’s
leadership relishes its role as an ideological challenge to the West and the
latter’s practice of liberal democracy. China usesits economic, technological,
and military power to promote globally its form of national authoritarianism.
Beijing even asserts that its political model has provided the most adept and
agile response to today’s coronavirus epidemic.
So how should
NATO should respond to China’s growing global assertiveness? What should be
NATO’s China strategy?
When
considering this issue, it is important to recognize that the foundation for a
relevant NATO role in a transatlantic China strategy has long been established.
For decades, the Alliance has been operating around the world. NATO has led the
International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan since 2003. Its naval
forces have patrolled against pirates off the shores of Africa, commencing with
operation OCEAN SHIELD in 2008. As a member of the Coalition to Defeat ISIS, NATO
provides training to military establishments across the Middle East. And, on a
daily basis the Alliance addresses terrorism, cyber-threats, disinformation,
and other global issues.
Most relevant
to addressing China are the Alliance’s long-standing relationships with key
democracies of the Indo-Pacific region. NATO established Global Partnerships
with Korea, New Zealand, and Mongolia in 2012, Australia in 2013, and Japan in
2014. These relationships are predominantly consultative, but most of these
partners have contributed to NATO missions, including in Afghanistan.
As the
transatlantic community’s lead instrument for security collaboration, NATO can
contribute to the former’s relationship with China in three important ways. As
a multinational security forum, it can foster among NATO allies and partners a
shared awareness of China’s capacities and activities that generate risk to and
opportunity for the North Atlantic community. NATO has long served as an
important forum through which its Allies and partners share intelligence data
and assessments needed to foster and facilitate collaborative action.
Second, NATO
can help develop and promulgate a transatlantic security strategy and posture
regarding China. That strategy’s objectives should include the development of a
cooperative relationship with China as well the dissuasion of China from
undermining the interests of the transatlantic community. The latter would
define the appropriate role and means for the Alliance to contribute to
deterrence and when necessary defense against Chinese aggression that imperil
those interests.
Third, NATO’s
civilian and military capacities should be used to facilitate the defense and
security component of a Western strategy addressing China—including in the
tasks of engagement, deterrence, and defense.
The following
are five actions NATO could undertake as part of its approach to China, none of
which would require it to undertake a significant reprioritization of its
current mission sets and all of which would support the aforementioned:
The Alliance should offer to establish a NATO-China Council. This would mirror
the NATO-Russia Council whose roots date back to 1997. Its establishment would
recognize and respond to the realty of China’s growing influence and reach.
This forum would spur Alliance members to more seriously and comprehensively
address in a coordinated manner the challenges posed by China. Its
establishment would underscore that this dimension of great power competition
is not between China and the United States but between China and the
transatlantic community, one bound by shared values, interests, and history.
And this forum could be used to identify and foster opportunities for
constructive collaboration with China, such as counter-piracy operations.
Second, NATO should deepen its engagement with its Pacific
partners, Australia, New Zealand, the Republic of Korea, Japan, and Mongolia. The consultative
dimension of these relationships should be complemented with more regular and
more robust military exercises (especially air, maritime, and special forces
exercises) and operations, including those designed to ensure freedom of
navigation. Such events under the NATO flag would be a useful complement to US
maritime and air exercisers in the Pacific that have long featured the
participation of European allies. Past US RIMPAC exercise series, for example,
have included military aircraft, ships and staffs from Canada, Denmark, France,
Germany, the Netherlands Norway, and the United Kingdom. In less tense times,
China even participated in RIMPAC events.
Third, the Alliance should establish in the Indo-Pacific, perhaps
in one of the region’s partner countries, a Center of Excellence (COE) and
integrate officers and NCOs from selected partners into the Alliance’s Command
Structure. Both initiatives would help increase the Alliance’s
understanding of the Indo-Pacific region, institutionalize its presence in the
region, and deepen these partners’ familiarization with NATO missions,
structures, and protocols.
The Alliance should also establish a small military headquarters
element in the Indo-Pacific region, perhaps embedded in the COE or in United
States Pacific Command to help facilitate and coordinate NATO exercises and
operations. It, too, could contribute to Alliance’s awareness of developments
in the region and, if the opportunity emerges, Alliance collaboration with
China.
These
initiatives will take effort to launch and execute. Some allies
will balk at adding additional missions to NATO and their own military forces
when resources are already strained. But the aforementioned will not generate
onerous costs and can build upon European, US, and Canadian military operations
in the Pacific that are already the norm.
Moreover,
European attitudes toward China have significantly hardened. Eighteen months
ago, many Europeans were content to regard China as an economic partner,
notwithstanding its authoritarian political system and aggressive conduct in
the Pacific. That has since changed as Europe has experienced with increasing
frequency Beijing’s diplomatic and economic belligerence toward those that
criticize its actions and policies. In March 2019 the European Union formally
described China as a “strategic competitor,” “an economic competitor,” and “a
systemic rival promoting alternative models of governance.” Beijing pugnacious
conduct during the coronavirus pandemic has only reinforced this new European
perspective.
Beijing will
likely balk at the offer of a NATO-China council as it will oppose an increased
NATO presence in the Indo-China, especially one that fosters deeper
political-military collaboration among the region’s democracies. Even NATO
Partners in Asia may balk at elevating their relations with NATO out of a
desire to avoid further complicating relations with China.
NATO may have
to initiate its China strategy on its own, leveraging the territories Allies
control in the Indo-Pacific and conducting its own operations and exercises in
the region. That will demonstrate the commitment and determination necessary to
earn the confidence and support of its partners for a more active Alliance
presence in the region. China will then also be likely to demur, realizing that
having regular communication with the world’s most powerful military alliance
can be important means to avoid conflict, promote peace, and facilitate
mutually useful cooperation.
A NATO strategy
for China alone will be not a sufficient solution to the West’s increasingly
tense relationship with Beijing. A coherent and effective transatlantic
strategy for China will have to be comprehensive, one that leverages the full
complement of diplomatic, economic, technological, social, and military
capabilities and dynamics that define geopolitical power. For it to have
maximum success it will have to combine the capacities of both Europe and North
America and be reinforced through collaboration with community’s democratic
partners in the Indo-Pacific.
As the
institution that effectively marshals the military capabilities of the
transatlantic community and one that has established relationships with the
leading states of the Indo-Pacific, NATO is well positioned to foster that
collaboration. Such NATO engagement would help underscore that Beijing’s
belligerence risks provoking a geopolitically costly reaction from a vibrant
and unified global coalition of democracies. NATO’s potential role in a
transatlantic strategy regarding China should not be underestimated.
Ian Brzezinski is a senior fellow in the Transatlantic Security
Initiative. Follow him on Twitter @IanBrzezinski.
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