Europe still lacks a serious substitute for the collective might of the Western alliance.
There is nothing like the threat of nuclear Armageddon for focusing minds. That, at least, was true for Nato over the decades from its foundation in 1949. During the Cold War the alliance had a common purpose (collective defence), a common space (the North Atlantic) and a common adversary (the Soviet bloc).
The fundamentals were simple. So they were, too, when from 1989, after the Berlin Wall fell, states in central and eastern Europe joined Nato. Yet on 3 December, as its leaders gathered in …read more
Source:: New Statesman
