By Walter Landgraf
(FPRI) — On July 9-11, the heads of state and government of NATO’s 32 allies will convene in Washington to discuss the most pressing issues facing the alliance and provide strategic guidance for its activities.
The NATO summit in Washington comes at a crucial time for the alliance. For starters, it marks NATO’s 75th anniversary, which is a remarkable feat deserving of commemoration. Alliances historicallybreak uponce the external threats they were formed against disappear. NATO on the other hand has transformed itself in the post-Cold War era, expanding both its functions and its membership. Nevertheless, the birthday celebration will likely be modest, as NATO faces a host of immediate challenges. Maintaining allied political cohesion on continuing the flow of Western military aid to Ukraine in the fight against Russia is among the biggest concerns.
The Ghost of Summits Past
The Washington summit will also be the first such meeting on US soil since the May 2012 Chicago summit. That occasion was notable for reasons which remain salient today. It was the first NATO summit after Vladimir Putin’s return to the Russian presidency following a four-year hiatus as prime minister from 2008 to 2012. It was also the last NATO summit before Russia’s annexation of Crimea in March 2014. That was a shocking move, as it was the first annexation of territory in Europe by a major power since World War II. In response, NATO returned to focus on the task ofterritorial defenseand defense spending among the European allies began trendingupwardafter many years of decline.
The Chicago gathering also happened at the end of a series of noteworthy practical achievements by NATO and Russia on military and technical issues. This included logistics cooperation supporting deployed US and NATO forces, as Russia provided crucial access to ground and air resupply routes to and fromAfghanistan. While NATO might not have treated Russia equally during the US-led “reset” of relations — a major factor leading to the policy failure — this sort of cooperation seems inconceivable today given the current crisis over Ukraine. The allies have never accepted Russia’s persistent claim that NATO’s enlargement to the east threatens Russian national security. This is because doing so would acknowledge that enlargement could be interpreted as something other than the peaceful extension of a community of democracies, as NATOasserts.
Moreover, the Washington summit’s 2024 iteration invokes more distant memories of a previous NATO summit held there. On April 23-25, 1999, the leaders of NATO’s 19 members convened in the US capital to mark the alliance’s 50th anniversary. The meeting coincided with several developments that have made a lasting impression on the NATO-Russia relationship and the making of the European security landscape. The allies welcomed three new members — the Czech Republic, Hungary, and Poland — to their first summit meeting. This was only the beginning of an expansion process framed as central to achieving the idealistic goal of a Europe “whole, free, and at peace.” Russia opposed their membership but was given a special bilateral council with NATO as compensation. NATO also announced the creation of the Membership Action Plan to guide countries towards achieving membership, initially granting the status to nine candidates. Finally, the Washington summit took place just one month after NATO launched air-strikes against Serbian military forces that lasted nearly three months. Russia opposed this move against one of its traditional allies, while the United States and its European allies justified it as a humanitarian mission. However, NATO’s use of force lacked a United Nations Security Council resolution authorizing the intervention. Already by early 1999, these developments encapsulated NATO’s post-Cold War interpretation of an expanded geopolitical reach.
A Summer Surprise?
The dramas swirling around previous US-based NATO summits could lead one to believe that the 2024 Washington summit might involve similar splashy announcements or geopolitical shock events. NATO could, for example, finally invite Ukraine to join the alliance, honoring the commitment made in the April 2008 Bucharest summit declarationpledge. For its part, the European Union kicked off formal accessiontalkswith Kyiv on June 25th — though it is unlikely Ukraine will join the club for the foreseeable future. Or Putin could be planning to upstage NATO’s 75th anniversary by launching asurprisemilitary offensive timed to coincide with the summit. Yet, the prospects of either development coming to pass seem dim: The necessaryunanimous agreementwithin NATO on extending an invitation to Ukraine does not currently exist and the window for Russia’s gains this summer might beclosing. Given this current situation, the allies will likely do what they can in Washington while mitigating the risk of conflict escalation. This means maintaining the current level of military support to Ukraine and simultaneously showing Western resolve and solidarity in opposing Russia.
NATO’s Next Steps
There are a few things NATO should do right now to continue to help Ukraine defend itself against Russia. First, it should bring the existing US-led Ukraine Defense Contact Group, an ad hoc framework made up of nearly 50 countries which has been organizing the transfer of military aid to Ukraine since spring 2022, under the direction of NATO. Placing this effort within NATO would provide military planners and policymakers in Kyiv with longer-term predictability while minimizing the risk of gaps in aid delivery. There are alreadysignsthis will be announced at the summit. Putting NATO in charge now could also safeguard military assistance against the possibility that a Trump administration might withhold future aid to bring Ukraine and Russia to the negotiating table. As a presidential candidate, Trump has previously boasted he could end the war intwenty-four hoursafter returning to the White House.
Second, the allies should make a collective, long-term financial pledge to Ukraine under the existing Comprehensive Assistance Packagemechanism. NATO announced the creation of this package at the July 2016 Warsaw summit, which brought over forty separate non-lethal defense and security reform initiatives under one umbrella. Ahead of the Washington summit, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg has been trying, thoughreportedlyfailing, to muster alliance consensus on allocating annual funding for both non-lethal and lethal military aid to Ukraine. Doing so would enable Ukraine to assume that funds and arms will keep flowing in the future rather than be treated as a variable. Steady NATO funding is critical to Ukraine’s long-term acquisition and force structure planning efforts. Much of the existing aid involves government-to-governmenttransfersinto Ukraine, such as the long-awaited supplemental appropriation by the United States in April 2024. This form of aid is less reliable because it can fall victim to countervailing domestic political pressures.
While these are small steps that fall short of giving Ukraine what it really wants — a security guarantee by virtue of NATO membership and backed by US power — they are nonetheless significant. Institutionalizing the provision of defensive aid to Ukraine will help it to repel Russia’s invasion over the long term. By making these moves at the Washington summit, the NATO allies can signal a deeper commitment to Ukraine’s security and political solidarity with one of NATO’s closest partners, on the one hand, while also projecting alliance cohesion and steadfastness in the face of continued Russian aggression, on the other. Mark Rutte, the incoming NATO secretary general, will have plenty of priorities on his to-do list when he takes the helm this fall. Institutionalizing the flow of military aid to Ukraine should be a box that has been ticked already.
- About the author: Lieutenant Colonel (Retired) Walter Rick Landgraf, Ph.D. is a Senior Fellow in the Foreign Policy Research Institute’s Eurasia Program and the Managing Editor of the Texas National Security Review.
- Source: This article was published by FPRI