On 4 April 1949, the foreign ministers of 12 countries signed the North Atlantic Treaty in Washington, D.C.
NATO’s founding member countries were: Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, the United Kingdom, and the United States.
Today, 32 countries are members of NATO, two of them from North America (the US & Canada) and 30 from Europe (including Turkey).
Article 5 of NATO forms the bedrock of NATO security. It states that an armed attack against one or more NATO members is considered an attack against all, obligating members to assist the attacked party.
In its 76-year history, Article 5 has been invoked only once: following the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States.
However, NATO is now facing a new challenge. A challenge that none of the 12 founding members, or the 20 other states that joined later, anticipated.
What if one of the NATO member states attacks another member state from the bloc?
Who should the remaining 30 member states support then? Is each member state free to decide its support on the basis of its self-interest?
U.S. President Donald Trump’s threat to take over Greenland, an autonomous province of the Kingdom of Denmark, by financial or military means, is forcing NATO member states into precisely this dilemma.
Incidentally, Denmark and the US are both founding members of NATO.
However, if statements by European leaders are anything to go by, one thing is certain: any military attack by the US on Greenland will mean the end of NATO, as we know it today.
Earlier this week, the European Commissioner for Defence and Space warned that any armed aggression against Greenland would mean the end of NATO.
“I agree with the Danish prime minister that it will be the end of NATO, but also among people it will be also very, very negative,” Commissioner Andrius Kubilius told Reuters at a security conference in Sweden.
Furthermore, just the apprehension of a US attack on the territory of a European country is triggering collective anxieties in Europe, and can cajole Europe, and the European Union (EU) into doing something that it has avoided doing for the last seven decades, enshiring a collective defense agreement in the EU charter, modeled on the lines of NATO’s Article 5.
Time For European NATO?
The EU is primarily considered a political and economic alliance, unlike NATO, which is primarily a collective defense treaty.
However, the EU already has in place a system that can be improved to better resemble NATO’s Article 5 collective mutual defense clause.
Article 42(7) of the Treaty on European Union (TEU) is the EU’s mutual assistance clause. It is part of the Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP) framework introduced by the Lisbon Treaty in 2009.
The clause reads: “If a Member State is the victim of armed aggression on its territory, the other Member States shall have towards it an obligation of aid and assistance by all the means in their power, in accordance with Article 51 of the Charter of the United Nations. This shall not prejudice the specific character of the security and defence policy of certain Member States.”
Further, it adds, “Commitments and cooperation in this area shall be consistent with commitments under the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation, which, for those States which are members of it, remains the foundation of their collective defence and the forum for its implementation.”
It creates a binding obligation for all EU member states to provide “aid and assistance by all the means in their power” if another member state is subject to armed aggression on its territory.
However, unlike NATO’s Article 5, it does not automatically treat an attack on one as an attack on all.
There is no automatic trigger for a collective military response in either clause; however, under NATO’s Article 5, there is a stronger expectation of a collective response. Whereas, under TEU Article 42(7), the obligation is to “aid and assistance,” which may or may not take the form of a military response.
Furthermore, it explicitly respects the neutrality or special security policies of certain states, such as Austria, Ireland, and Malta. There is no neutrality clause in NATO.
Clearly, there is a lot of wiggle room in the technical language of both treaties.
However, where NATO stands out is in its emphasis on collective defense framing, achieved through voluntary agreements, defense policy frameworks, regular war drills, and common defense objectives, such as the recent commitment to spend around 5% of GDP on defense.
NATO member countries have widely adopted (through voluntary agreements) Standardization Agreements (STANAGs), managed by the NATO Standardization Office (NSO).
These are not binding treaty clauses but formal agreements where member nations commit (fully, partially, or with reservations) to implement common standards to enable: Compatibility of weapons systems, Interchangeability of weapons and ammunition, and Commonality in designs and procedures.
For instance, STANAG 4172 mandates that member countries use the 5.56×45mm NATO cartridge as the standard small-arms round. There are various STANAGs in place about artillery (155mm), fuzes, propelling charges, and inductive fuze setting.
These measures ensure that NATO forces can share ammunition, spares, and logistics in joint operations and during emergency situations.
NATO countries also participate together in numerous war drills, synchronizing their war philosophies and tactics.
Due to these reasons, NATO appears to be a much more potent force.
However, EU countries can easily sign similar agreements on standardization and on the interchangeability of weapons and ammunition.
Notably, 23 of the 28 EU members are also part of NATO, and have already achieved a high degree of standardization and interoperability of weapons systems.
Besides, the EU is also considering raising a European Army, sourced from member countries.
A Joint European Army For European NATO
The European Commissioner for Defense and Space, Andrius Kubilius, has called for the creation of a 100,000-strong European Union army for its own defense and to replace US troops in Europe if necessary.
During his speech at a security conference in Sweden on January 12, Kubilius said, “If the Americans leave Europe, how will we create a ‘European Pillar of NATO’? Who will be the European SACEUR (Supreme Allied Commander Europe – ed.)? What about the capabilities of the European command and control, the European staff? Most importantly, how will we replace the 100,000 US regular military forces that are the backbone of military power in Europe?”
He proposed creating a 100,000-strong European army and a European Security Council, composed of key permanent members and several rotating members.
Notably, the idea of creating an EU army is not new. In 2017, representatives of 23 of the 28 EU member states signed a declaration establishing the Permanent Structural Cooperation on Security and Defense (PESCO). Later, the rest of the EU members, except for Malta, joined the structure.
In 2018, French President Emmanuel Macron warned that “Europeans cannot be protected without a real European army.”
In 2022, following Russian missile attacks, the EU began building a unified air and missile defense system.
The EU is also financing joint weapons procurement for the first time.
The EU’s €800 billion “ReArm Europe” plan is a major initiative to boost European defense spending by unlocking significant national and EU funds, facilitating joint procurement, and streamlining regulations to strengthen the defense industry.
Furthermore, EU countries are calling for the deployment of a joint European force to protect Greenland against armed aggression.
Patrick Sensburg, chairman of the German Reservists Association, has called for a European brigade to be stationed in Greenland.
In an interview with Bild, he said that Europe must demonstrate a serious presence in the region.
Meanwhile, Kubilius said the EU could provide more security for Greenland, if Denmark requested it, including troops and military infrastructure such as warships and anti-drone capabilities.
“That’s for military people to say what Greenland or the Arctic defence needs. Everything is possible,” he said.
He also suggested that the EU countries could use NATO structures to create the European pillar of NATO.
“It will be a very big challenge to be ready to defend Europe, being independent, being without the United States,” he said.
“The question would be how we can use in that case NATO structures, how they can be, you know, become a basis for the European pillar of NATO.”
- Sumit Ahlawat has over a decade of experience in news media. He has worked with Press Trust of India, Times Now, Zee News, Economic Times, and Microsoft News. He holds a Master’s Degree in International Media and Modern History from the University of Sheffield, UK.
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- He can be reached at ahlawat.sumit85 (at) gmail.com
