Paper prepared for presentation in the AFSOUTH/NDU conference on "Security challenges in the Mediterranean"

 

 

In the last couple of years the West enjoyed an impressive political victory over communism as well as a clear military superiority over Iraq. Thus, temptations to celebrate the many successes of the Alliance are strong though they should be avoided. Political supremacy may be not enough to guarantee a peaceful dismantling of Soviet structures; and military victory in the Gulf left Saddam still grasping his country with an iron fist. Furthermore, no "end of History" has taken place yet, since History, as we know, is still being written with blood in Croatia, Serbia, Montenegro, Moldovia, Nagorni-Karabag, and many other places in Europe.

 

Obviously, the Soviet threat is gone, but risks abound. The Mediterranean region is not different from the mainland in this regard. Three are the main sources of problems in the basin, particularly in its Western part: One is "internal" to the Alliance and it has to do with adapting NATO to counter the emerging military risks in the area, once containment and deterrence of the Soviet forces is not longer a vital mission since there are no Soviets in the area. NATO can pursue the implementation of its new strategic concept, or may debate over how many ships are going to form the STANAVFORMED, but without a common understanding of what the risks are and how to deal with them, even militarily, it can only become progressively irrelevant to the security of its members.

 

The second set of problems emerges from the fact that current military risks in the Western Mediterrenean are very different in nature compared to the traditional Soviet threat to which we were used to. Proliferation of systems of mass destruction is most surely the highest concern in the region. Unfortunately, proliferation is a rather vague phenomenon against which NATO can do very little unless its sovereign members give new formal competences to the organization. Something that is not in today's agenda.

 

Finally, NATO is totally inadequate to deal with problems that are not strictly military ones. Probably the most demanding challenges in the area will be curbing demographics trends in Northern Africa as well as helping this region to take off from economic and social underdevelopment. Containment alone is not an appropriate tool and it will not solve the problems of instability in the region. No carrier or battlegroup will deter effectively people from crossing to the rich North; no combat plane will persuade, or force, immigrants to behave and live like real Westerners; even worst, no nuclear submarine will stop the proliferation of chemical and nuclear weapons.

 

To satisfy the security requirements of its members, NATO should recognize what are the risks and challenges in the region, discerning between military and social problems and military and political actions and solutions. And, above all, NATO has to realize that the South is not the East.

 

 

On mid-October 1991, the remaining units of the still Soviet Fifth Squadra (largely known in the Western defense community as the SOVMEDRON), short of fuel and money to sustain any longer their operations in the Med, left their facilities in Libya and withdrew to the Black Sea ports to be moored.

 

According to some unconfirmed reports, while they were preparing the departure from Tobruk harbor, the Soviet admirals received the unexpected visit of Libyan leader Col. Moammar el Quaddafi. The visit wasn't only to say goodbye: apparently, Qaddafi tried to buy a Yanki class nuclear armed strategic submarine for which he offered 1 billion US dollars. He also showed a strong interest in the acquisition of a nuclear powered attack submarine.

The Soviet officers, tempted as they could be, politely declined Qaddafi's offers, and sailed all their units back home leaving not ship behind.

 

Believe it or not, the story deserves some thoughts since it represents in a very condensed manner the new situation (and problems) developing nowadays in the Mediterranean. First of all, the loss of the traditional East-West axis of reference, perhaps the only one giving strategic entity to the Mediterranean; secondly, the phantom of emerging risks, particularly, the proliferation of systems of mass destruction, surrounded by increased secrecy, opaqueness, and cheating; finally, the spectrum of "a South" more problematic than ever, a Pandora's box on the brink of opening.

 

As a matter of fact, whilst it is obvious that confrontation has been progressively replaced by détente and cooperation in Central Europe (despite the entangled fights going on in several places of the Continent), the Mediterranean seems to remain an area of potential instabilities and risks, aggravated by two factors: the lack of any collective institution for cooperation among the riparian countries, depriving them of a forum where to solve peacefully their differences; and, secondly, by the inadequacies of the old existing organizations, including NATO, to give answers to the emerging problems in the area, either because these are not strictly military ones, or, if so, because the tools used to contain and deter the East are of limited value, if any at all, when directed to the South.

 

 

The only system for collective security and common defense operating in The Mediterranean was, and still is, the Atlantic Alliance. Nonetheless, NATO was embraced by only a few Mediterranean countries (France, Greece, Italy, Portugal, Spain, and Turkey), though NATO could count also with the permanent presence of US and British forces as well as, in the last years, the more sporadic of German, Belgium and Dutch naval units.

In fact, NATO never was a Mediterranean security system. On the contrary, the Mediterranean basin represented in the allied planning just a subsystem whose stability was closely related to what could happen in other theaters of operations strategically more relevance (like the Central Front, for instance). The region remained through the years the backyard of NATO despite the reiterated litanies of the Mediterranean allies, particularly the western ones who tried to attract attention to this problem time and again.(1)

 

Furthermore, the notions of subsidiarity and dependency were reinforced by the American vision of the Mediterranean as a transit area towards zones considered formally by NATO as "out-of-area", but where the US and the Western community have clear interests. The support value of the Mediterranean for force projection, patently visible during the israeli-arabs wars, was even highlighted during the Gulf war.

 

Different countries, different situations, different interests... maybe that is why when talking about the Mediterranean it was always a common place to say that the region suffered from lack of homogeneity, diversity in the defensive efforts, and weak collective commitments among the allies (with the exception of links between the US and the different NATO regional members bilaterally established).

 

Being this basically true, such approach tended to blur an even more basic fact: Since 1949 did exist indeed a strong cohesive factor allowing, despite of diversities of all classes, the multilateral commitment among countries so disparate as Portugal, Spain, France, Italy, Greece, Turkey, the US and the UK. What is more, despite national particularities, the collective link proved to be a permanent one for more than four decades. Obviously, this cohesive cement was the common perception of a clear and present danger, the Soviet threat. In the Central Front, in the northern waters, but also in the Mediterranean Sea.

The deployment of the Soviet fleet in the Mediterranean in its aims, history, and capabilities has been systematically studied by several authors elsewhere,(2) and there is no need on this paper even for a brief summary of it. After years of showing the flag, the Fifth Skadra showed under Gorbachev a clear trend towards reducing its size as well as its activities in the Med, and finally went home. Gone with the USSR, and no sign point, up to now, to a reintroduction of the Russian fleet in the region.

 

The Soviet fleet is something of the past, left to historian and strategic archeologists. More important, despite the fact that the soviet fleet is not sunk, but reflagged under the Russian banner, the image it is projecting is totally different. Otherwise, how can be explained the Western relief at the sight of the carrier Admiral Kutnezov crossing the Bosforus Straits (de facto violating international agreements), and sailing freely through Mediterranean waters in order to avoid being taken by Ukrainian authorities?

 

Will the Southern part of NATO survive the welcomed loss of the shared threat? Will NATO survive in the Mediterranean without one of the bearings of the compass, precisely the one who was behind its birth, the East?

 

 

No single western leader dares to call for the dismantling of NATO today, seeing the organization as an assurance before unwelcomed developments. Furthermore, the decision to establish the STANAVFORMED points to its institutional reinforcement. The question is not, then, whether to keep NATO or not. The Alliance will be among us for many years to come. The right question should be, instead, if NATO has a significant role to play in the Mediterranean, once the East-West confrontation has vanished.

 

According to the dominant official view, the answer is a definitive yes. It cannot be otherwise. This approach has been brilliantly exposed by the former Commander in Chief of NATO Southern Region forces, Admiral Jonathan T. Howe, talking about NATO during the Gulf war.(4)

 

According to Admiral Howe, the contribution of NATO during the crisis in the Gulf, prior to the outbreak of hostilities, clearly shows that the Alliance does not need the Soviet enemy to exist. He is right. Firstly, because the so called operation Southern Guard can and should be assessed as a allied success: in a week after Kuwait invasion, NATO deployed some AWACS to Turkey; days after, strengthening of regional intelligence gathering means took place; on September 14 was authorized the activation of the on-call naval force in the Mediterranean whose activities were kept for more than six months; on December 17, following Turkish petitions, units from NATO mobile Airforce were deployed on Turkish soil to reassure Turkey and to increase the deterring effect before Saddam who, at the time, could have been tempted to open a diversion front with Turkey; etc.

 

Furthermore, Admiral Howe could also add the relevant contribution of several NATO members during operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm. As a first sight, it seems that once you enter real crisis situation, even peacetime footnote countries behave good and well. Lets note, for example, the Spanish Government secret authorization to the US, allowing B-52 to take off in direct combat missions against Iraq from Spanish bases, contrary to the public will, and, more relevant, contrary to the stated policy concerning the use of Spanish facilities by American forces.

 

One can add as well the argument common nowadays in SHAPE and NATO headquarters in Brussels,(5) that the experience granted by years of practicing common operational procedures within NATO proved decisive in the field, and you have the whole picture: NATO is in better shape than ever.

 

But Admiral Howe and NATO officials are right only to some extent. To begin with, it is highly possible that another Gulf war-type situation, with such a strong and global political and military implications involving so many countries, will not materialize again. History is not bound to repeat itself, and future crises may well appear less clear cut and affect NATO members unevenly. It is not necessary, for instance, to spend a long time in NATO-Brussels to realize that an aggression against the two Spanish cities in Northern Africa, Ceuta and Melilla, is not perceived as a vital threat to Western security though such a contingency will affect vital interests of Spain.

 

Secondly, despite the success, we cannot forget the clouds formed among NATO countries during the conflict, and not all between the US and its European allies. Some countries, including Spain, doubted that an Iraqi attack against Turkey could be interpreted as an attack against the whole Alliance according to article 5 of the Washington Treaty.

 

More notably, deterrence, the main strategic tool in the life of NATO, dramatically failed before Saddam Hussein who, unimpressed by the allied build-up, and disregarding the potential costs of his action, chose the road to war.(6) Traditionally, theories about deterrence failures put the emphasis in the lack of communication, wrong signaling, in sum, misunderstandings and miscalculations on capabilities and political will from the opposing actors.(7) Is that what happened with Saddam? I believe not. I think simply that the strategic language, framework, and rationality so typical in the East-West confrontation are not present in the Arab culture. At least, it seems to me that they are irrational factors distorting any costs-benefits "orthodox deterrence" logic.

 

Ken Booth warned us years ago against ethnocentrism in our strategic analysis, and claimed to pay attention to differences in national cultures and approaches. A dozen of books have been devoted to this since then. But is not only a matter of national cultures. Containment through deterrence, the backbone of NATO strategy, is what is presently under a severe crisis. It is possible to deter a cool and rational enemy who is planning to attack you, it has proved impossible to deter positively fights that are marginal to the central balance or motivated by feelings alien to the western strategic logic (like the religious ones).

 

It is also possible to question the real value of deterrence between democracies and no democratic States. On the one hand, leaders democratically elected encounter public opinion constraints when considering available options even against an opponent, while similar limits are almost inexistant to dictators; on the other hand, democracies pivot on moral values making escalation or indiscriminate use of force highly rejectable, options not always foreclosed to non democratic rulers. President Bush and Miterrand stated unilaterally during the Gulf War that they would not use nuclear or chemical weapons against Iraq; many people rejected the bombing of Iraqi forces withdrawing from Kuwait to Bassra after seeing the crude images on TV. Would they support any president to threaten someone with nuclear devastation? Would they do it convincingly?

 

NATO, as Pierre Lellouche says, is essentially right in its concept, a collective insurance, but deadly wrong in its approach.(8) To have the forces and to move them around, whether they are rapid reaction, rapid intervention, highly trained and fully equipped, or not, is not sufficient anymore. If NATO wants to have a true meaning in the post-1989 security system, it should start looking at the world from a different angle.

 

 

Perhaps nothing better to show the progressive friction between the old security arrangements and the emerging risks than the issue of nuclear proliferation.

Despite the fact of being signatories of the NPT, some of the North African countries have been giving clear indications of their will to posses nuclear weapons. Apparently, one of the lessons they learnt from the Gulf war was that they could never compete with the Western powers in the field of conventional weapons. The only military means to avoid an humiliating defeat, such as the one inflicted upon Iraq, are the ones which frighten most the westerners, mass destruction systems and, in particular, nuclear weapons. It is not too difficult to reach the conclusion that the nuclear arsenal of the US meant nothing to Saddam Hussein. Nevertheless, just a single nuclear device in the hands of the Baghdad dictator would have forced a totally different reaction from the West.

 

In the midst of the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, King Hassan of Morocco, who aligned himself with the antiiraqi coalition even sending troops to fight for a free Kuwait, made the point very clear:

 

India and Pakistan have their own bomb. Why nobody said anything to them? The Israeli have their bomb too, even worst, they have not signed the NPT... so, everything is allowed to some but forbidden to others? If some have the atomic bomb why leave the others unarmed? If Iraq wants to build its own nuclear weapon, while she has in front of her someone who possesses 200 nuclear warheads; se has the right to do it. Either it is allowed for everyone or it is forbidden for all. It is not possible to have double standards. Even more, this is an aggression against the Arabs. Everyone can have its little bomb except the Arabs...(9)

 

Take the example concerning most Spain currently, Argelia. Since last year it is widely known that Argelia is building a large research reactor at Ain Oussera (200 km.south from the capital) helped by Chinese people. Confronted to the very evidence in the form of satellite pictures, Argel leaders admitted the construction of a 15 Mw power plant, though they claimed it to be exclusively for peaceful uses. In fact, the then Argelia Prime Minister, Mouloud Hamrouche, tried to give reassurance to his neighbors in a special interview to Le Monde:

 

Why to underline today the military uses of the atom? I have the impression that someone is trying to present us like monsters decided to kill the rest of the world. No one says that we enter the nuclear field in order to develop our country...(10)

 

Being truth that there are overlapping areas between civilian and military nuclear research, several factors lead to disbelieve denials of seeking the bomb made by Argelian leaders. First of all, it should be remembered, the Western world knew of the argelian research facility not directly from Argel or Beijing, but from pictures taken by a surveillance satellite; secondly, though Argelian leaders say the plant would have 15 Mw power output, analysis of the satellites photographs make the installation to look, at least, twice as big and powerful. Anyway, 15 Megawatts are enough, according to all experts, to produce the plutonium needed for a bomb in just one year; in the third place, recent information about a parallel building of a reprocessing center near the nuclear research plant, cannot but add more suspicions and doubts about the Argelian true will.

 

True, Argel authorities agreed on ad hoc inspections by an IAEA team who did find nothing to suspect from Algeria, thus confirming the peaceful use of the atomic energy claimed by argelian leaders. Why then, are we still highly suspicious?

 

Two reasons can explain it. First of all, Algeria energy surplus. Algeria may suffer from many goods shortages but not in the field of energy. Argelia has plenty of energy due to her huge reserves of natural gas which, in fact, is her main economic asset, representing almost 98% of its exports revenues. Thus, a nuclear plant seems to be a very expensive way to obtain a marginal output of energy power. Obviously remains the question of acquiring scientific knowledge. But, in a country that had not signed the NPT, one could ask nuclear knowledge and expertise for what?

 

Secondly, the recent experience with Iraq. After several inspections conducted by UN teams, many evidences were found on the secret efforts of Baghdad to build as fast as possible a nuclear arsenal of its own, despite being signatory of the NPT and, more troublesome, having accepted in the past regular inspections by the International Agency of Atomic Energy which did find nothing. The only conclusion to be reached is that "against a determined cheat, existing safeguards are alarmingly inadequate"(11) to say the least.

It is patent today than Iraq was on the verge of being nuclear because Saddam turned, first, his civilian installations towards military research and production, concealing it from the rest of the world community; and secondly, he was able to do it successfully thanks to the existence of a growing nuclear black market against which legal measures are proving dramatically inefficient.

 

In fact, all major findings on proliferation in the last years came from intelligence sources, be it on nuclear, chemical or ballistic missiles issues. It is nor surprising. There is no other way to deal with problems involving several countries, dozens of firms, puppet dealers, and multiple bank movements, in just one single deal. The chemical plant of Rabta in Libya or the Iraqi supergun intercepted in German, British and Spanish customs are good examples.

 

The dissolving CIS is going to make even easier for potential proliferators to acquire the expertise and weapons of mass destruction they want, of which the nuclear are just one family. Thus, a threefold effort should be launched by the western allies: to strengthen their intelligence on the region; tighten their control over national firms on highly sensible exports; and finally, to agree in common signals and actions to "persuade" tempted proliferators to abandon their aspirations.

 

Without clear reassurances against proliferation in Northern Africa, those in the region who have no nuclear, chemical and ballistic missiles capabilities cannot and will no longer place their safety in a multilateral regime unable to find a collective solution. National options cannot but erode further collective structures.

 

It is commonly accepted that there is a solid North-South axis crossing the Mediterranean. The reality is quite the contrary: the image of the South is rapidly and paradoxically fading away. Strategically, the interest shown by the Western powers to the Moghreb countries was due, essentially, by the bipolar world in where we were living. We were there either to compensate the Soviet presence or to prevent it. Now that the East-West confrontation has disappeared, the international value of those countries becomes progressively diminished; politically, the fate of the CIS and Central European new democracies focus the world attention; economically, the refloating of the ex-soviet economies and the attempts to stabilize the East are taking most, if not all, the aid efforts done by the rich countries; furthermore, the economic situation of many developed countries is being eroded, forcing them to pay more attention to domestic problems.

 

All in all, it is possible to say that far from paying more attention to the South, now that we do not have to face the threat from the East, the West is still looking East. Primarily because there is a clear and heavy Soviet mortgage: we can not allow the former USSR to implode; but a mental strategic inertia must also be mentioned: it is a painful reconvertion to start dealing with diffused and vague military risks and no military threats.

 

Definitely, in the Moghreb, beyond the problems of proliferation of mass destruction weapons, non military factors can mix-up creating a highly explosive cocktail.

 

 

It is not necessary to fully embrace the thoughts of Malthus or Haushofer to perceive that there is a relation between one's country population and its global power, however subtle or thin it might be.

 

According to UN studies and projections,(12) in 1950 Spain had 27'9 millions souls, Egypt 20'3, Morocco 9, and Argelia 8'8; in 1988 Egypt was first, with 50'3 millions, Spain came after, with 38'9, and then Argelia, 23'9, and Morocco, 23'5; moderate projections give the following picture in the year 2025: Egypt, 90'4 millions; Argelia, 50'6; Morocco 40'0; and Spain 38. A totally different picture indeed as it can be seen in the graphic!

 

As a matter of fact, the average population growth in the Moghreb countries runs in the level of 3% a year, while in the EC is just 0'8%, well below the replacement rate. The disparity in birth rates between the rich North and the poor South explain the fact that in the year 2025, EC countries will have 326 millions people (only two more than the 324 millions of today!) while North Africa will double its human potential, from the current 184 millions to 350 millions, surpassing the North.

 

Even more dramatic, the increasing weight of the youth: two thirds of argelian people are under 25 today. As an average, active population looking for the first job in the Moghreb will increase 4% a year in the coming decade, and beyond that the following years. That will mean that in the first years of the coming century, roughly 1 million of young people will demand a job every year! This flood of potential labor force will require an economic annual growth around 10%, far away from the actual 0% of today and the most optimistic expectations for the coming years.(13)

 

Actually, the economic performance of the Moghreb cannot but worsen as time goes by. A very inadequate policy of industrialization during the 70's and 80's, linked to a wild urbanization, led to the abandonment of agriculture and to a total dependency of basic goods imports. At the same time, full EC membership of Greece, Portugal and Spain contributed directly to a severe crisis in the Moghreb traditional export trade, making even less effective the agricultural sector. Furthermore, foreign investments decreased substantially in the last three years. The only possible result was a rocketing foreign debt (with a very heavy annual service payment) aggravated by the sustained effort in military spending, which increased during the 80's by a 5% a year.

 

Thus, lack of expectations together with poor conditions of life, will have one immediate consequence: emigration. The problem here is that we are not talking about emigration in the scale we are used to in Europe. If just 1 out of ten decide to head North, that will represent 18 millions of young North African people moving into Europe, a volume that could reach 50 millions if we consider the rest of Africa. That is, a truly human flood that, no doubt, can cause major social dislocations in host countries.

 

True, EC countries are moving to a more restrictive immigration policy. Spain alone rejected more than 60 thousand visas last year as a result of the agreements reached in the EC (something which created diplomatic disputes with Morocco and Argelia, particularly), despite the fact the we allowed a 15% increase in immigrants. Nonetheless, against these measures runs the expectacular increase in illegal entrances. The illegal population in Spain now is being estimated slightly below half a million (a 4% of the Spanish labor force).

Up to now, the numbers involved in migrations towards Europe were socially and economically acceptable. The trends emerging from the South, particularly when linked also to the potentials for mass migration from the East, present a totally new face to the problem. As the IISS affirms: "we are leaving in an era in which fundamental political and economic changes in the international system result in large-scale movements of people which affect political, economic and strategic developments worldwide."(14)

 

Failing to recognize that emigration is not anymore a humanitarian issue but a security problem will only feed xenophobic and radical movements in our countries as illegal emigrants will continuously evade police controls. Failing to reconcile nationals' interests, Easterner emigrants, and Moghreb population pressures can only make social coexistence impossible, and political life difficult.

 

 

A world of poverty, a life without expectations, rejection from the North, competition from the East... all ingredients for popular discontent that could endanger the fragile political systems in the area.

 

The regimes of North Africa, not fully representative governments in our western democratic tradition, were able to gain some social legitimacy mobilizing people under the banner of panarabism and regionalism (something which, by the way, resulted in clashes between neibors all seeking to be accepted as the only and possible true regional leader). Paradoxically, the Gulf war did little, if anything, to the strengthening of the idea of panarabism in the region, taking into account the split among prowestern, neutral, and pro-Iraqi governments. In fact, the young Union of the Arab Moghreb (UMA) endured a heavy damage from that experience. Today, with Libya facing international sanctions, Argelia ruled by a military Junta, and Morocco trying to obtain unilateral concessions from the EC, the UMA is actually dead as King Hassan told recently the Spanish Foreign Minister.(15)

Nonetheless, the war had a powerful impact on the people. It should be remembered how in a country like Morocco, allied with the anti-Iraqi coalition, that sent troops to fight alongside western forces, the king had to march ahead of a massive antiwestern demonstration, just because of the popular rejection of the use of force against Iraq.

 

One single party system, strong repression of opposition groups, pushed many to express themselves through religious movements. In fact, the only existing opposition lye now in fundamentalist movements, like the FIS in Argelia.

 

The evil's alternative is that the more steps are taken towards democratization, the stronger the radical seems to be. There it is the Argelian democratic experience, having to be aborted by a coup in order to safe Argelia from becoming a new theocratic State like Iran.

How can the Western countries reconcile their demands on human rights and political freedom in the area without destabilizing existing governments? Should we forget, for the sake of realism, the lack of democratic institutions and the perennial violation of human rights?

 

 

Though everyone believes that economic development will mean stability for the region and, thus, it should be the first priority in the area, it is surprising to see the fragmentation of economic help to the Moghreb as well as its final little impact.

 

To begin with, the total inadequacy of the international Aid mechanisms must be pointed out: First of all, the insufficient resources devoted to the area. As an average, the EC member devote the 0'56% of the GNP to economic development Aid (while US 0'21 and Japan 0'32), an amount irrelevant to face the social challenges in the area. This can be illustrated by the fact that despite the EC allocates 5% of its own budget to international Aid, EC help is distributed among 68 countries and more than 550 million people, and the Moghreb is not the preferential area. As a matter of fact, only Tunisia has a place (the 13) among the first 15 beneficiaries of the EC help.

 

Secondly, the fragmentation of the Aid itself, coming from a disparate number of sources, no one having a clear preponderance. 20 years after the establishment of the EC Global Mediterranean Policy, and with more than one year of the Renewed Mediterranean Policy, the EC Aid only reaches the 17% of the total received by the area. Furthermore, due to particular historical, cultural, psychological reasons, every country has its own preferences about where to allocate aid funds. Thus, though nobody seems to spend money in Argelia now, the UK still is the main source there; the EC in Morocco, despite the fact that everybody wants to help this country; Germany and France in Mauritania; EC and other multinational agencies in Tunisia. Spain devotes just the 0'1 of its GNP to development Aid, so, it does not deserve even to be mentioned here.(16)

 

Thirdly, the very limited scope of the EC policy, not only in terms of funds, but also in terms of what the Mediterranean Policy leaves aside, mainly the debt problem. Since the EC share of North Africa debt is very small (being its member States the creditors), it offered exclusively technical aid to manage the debt payments. Equally, EC has proved impotent before the challenges of emigration, treating it like the 60's limited emigration or as if they could preserve the continent through police controls.

 

Maybe what is lacking from the North is not simply more money but a vision, a global perspective and understanding about what do we want from and with North Africa. In September 1990, hosting a CSCE meeting in Mallorca (Spain) on environmental problems in the Mediterranean, the Spanish Foreign Affairs Minister called for a mutual understanding between North and South which should materialize in a process of continuos dialogue, in a Conference for the Mediterranean.(17)

 

Thus, taking advantage of the bigger room for diplomatic maneuver allowed by the new international atmosphere, the Italian and the Spanish governments prepared a common project calling for the establishment of a CSCE in the Mediterranean, the so called CSCM. The proposal was made public the first week of October 1990. The goal was the introduction in the region of a scheme of cooperation inspired by the CSCE, that is to say, not a body to deal with specific crises but a framework for "adopting a set of norms and regulations to which the States of the region would have to abide in order to solve the present crisis and avoid future ones".(18) In other words, the CSCM will pursue a code of political behavior accepted by all participants, which will rule out the threat to use, and the actual use, of force as a tool to solve disputes in the area.

 

Comprehensive in scope, the proposal, based in the dominant view of security as a condition dependent on non-military factors, recognizes that "economic cooperation will assume major relevance in the CSCM context". Furthermore, the security dimension of the CSCM will deal almost entirely with "the political aspects of security", timidly aiming, at most, to increase transparency and information on each other's intentions.

 

Although the CSCM proposal was very interesting in its global concept, I believe it was wrong in its basic approach. First, the fathers of the proposal failed to recognized the changing political and economic world and European environment: to increase economic Aid for development in the area when nobody had surpluses in their economies, or when the East was calling for massive and immediate survival help, was just an exercise of wishful thinking; secondly, even if vast amounts of dollar were available to the region, the historical record shows that economic help does not guarantee, automatically, a more peaceful environment; and finally, avoiding the issue of conditions and controls on how to spend the aid, the CSCM followed the traditional path of the Aid of the 60's and 70's which did not improved population standards of life, but just helped to build more sumptuous palaces for leaders and more powerful armed forces.

 

More risky probably, the proposal also failed to recognize the changing military environment in the region. Obviously, any balance of forces in the region gives a clear advantage to the North, even after taking into consideration the fast growth in number and capabilities in the South. But this is not sufficient anymore. As seen above, proliferation is in today's agenda, though for the more deadly weapons it is taking a highly secretive route. Pouring dollars without taking safeguards in that respect is like giving them the rope to hung us up and high.

 

Having said this, it is not surprising that after being accepted by the so-called 4+5+1 nations, the first meeting of the CSCM has been recently postponed sine die.

Tough the Spanish-Italian CSCM proposal was based upon many wrong assumptions, the concept deserves further exploration if we really want to overcome the divide between North and South. It is indeed a large one in cultural, economic and societal terms, but a very thin one in geographical ones. We are either under the range of their hands or their bombs. That is an unavoidable fact.

 

 

Thus, cooperation with North Africa is not longer a moral issue. The combination of overpopulation and underdevelopment will have a direct impact on the security of our nations. The Moghreb is just 14 Km. from Spanish shores. It will be impossible to build new architectures and orders without bearing that in mind.

 

Can NATO be of some help? To some extent. NATO can and should increase its intelligence gathering and surveillance on Northern Africa, for instance engaging some of its AWACS. It also should encourage regular intelligence sharing among its members; equally, NATO may support new air defense programs in order to strengthen passive as well as active point defenses, particularly in the area of advance antiair systems, like the Patriot. Ideally, it should pursue a program for antiballistic missiles defenses. Nonetheless, the measures that NATO officials could propose and adopt are essentially passive with little impact on problems like proliferation where NATO has no formal capacity to act. Maybe NATO could coordinate the effort of its members to stop illegal transfers to third countries.

Where NATO has little to do, if anything, is in the realm of economic aid to the Moghreb countries. It is not, and it cannot be, the most suited organization for that. True, cooperation is not an easy task, but NATO should not step into it simply because security now is not exclusively dependent on military factors. NATO is a defensive alliance, a military pact, and it should remain so. It has a role to play in the defense of its members. It is not the time to expand its activities to other fields where other organizations perform more efficiently. It is the time to ask itself if the military tools that NATO can count on to conduct its duties are adequate to meet the challenges of tomorrow. This is even more urgent when talking about security in the periphery of the Continent.

 

Henry Kissinger always said that there are two ways to talk about NATO: one, to celebrate the many successes of the Alliance over the years; the second, to regret the many unresolved problems. When solutions to the problems we are facing cannot be found clearly, the temptation to take the first approach is really high. But it will be the wrong approach.

 

As history and strategy show, self-complacency is the harbinger of disaster.

 

 

1.- See among others: Armellini, Antonio: "La dinamica dei sub-sistemi" in the monography La sicurezza nel Mediterraneo. Roma 1987; de Gigantesco: "Considérations sur la stratégie navale de l'Occident en Méditerranée" in Stratégies navales et defense de l'Europe. Paris. publisud/FEDN 1988; and Bardají, Rafael L:"The Iberian peninsula as the Western Key to the Mediterranean Sea". Madrid, GEES 1988.

2.- See among other the classic works of MaccGwire, M. et al.: Soviet Naval policy. Objectives and constraints. New York, Praeger 1975; and Understanding Soviet Naval Developments. Washington, Office of the Chief of Naval Operations, different editions; bu also Mccormick, Gordon: "Soviet strategic aims and capabilities in the Mediteranean" in Adelphi Papers 229; and Bardají, Rafael L: "Naval Arms Control: the view from the Kremlin". Madrid, GEES 1991.

3.- I take the concept from Snyder, Jed: "Challenges for NATO's Southern region in the 1990s", paper presented at the 14th NATo College annual simposium. Washington, April 18 and 19, 1991. Nonetheless I use it here linked to the broader scope of the end of the East-West axis in the region and so entirely under my only responsibility.

4.- Howe, Jonathan: "NATO and the Gulf crisis" in Survival May/June 1991.

5.- Interviews by the author in SHAPE and Brussels, Frebruary 1991 and February 1992.

6.- Onbe of the rare arab account of Saddam views can be found in Heikal, Mohamed: Illusions of Triumph. London, Harper Collins 1992.

7.- See the classical works of Schelling, Thomas: The strategy of conflict. Cambridge (Mass), Harvard University Press 1960; and George & Smoke, R.: Deterrence in American Policy. New York, Columbia University Press 1974.

8.- Lellouche, Pierre: "The european disorder", paper presented in the Conference Europe against Europe, organized by the Spanish European Journalists Association. Toledo, February 5, 6 and 7, 1992. Se also his brilliant book: Le nouveau monde. De l'ordre de Yalta au désordre des nations. Paris, Grasset 1992.

9.- Le Monde, August 16, 1990.

10.- Le Monde, May 17, 1991.

11.- The Economist, March 14th, 1992. "Bombs for all?"

12.- United Nations:World populations prospects Estimation and projections 1989. New York, UN 1989.

13.- See Toumi, Mohsen: "Performances de l'Algerie, de la Libye, du MAroc, de la MAuritanie, de la Tunisie. Tableaux macroeconomiques". Unpublished paper, November 1991.

14.- IISS: Strategic Survey 1990-1991: "Mass migration and international security", pag. 37-38.

15.- El Pais, March 16, 1992.

16.- For an account of the Spanish Aid see Lorca Corrons, Alejandro: "España y la cooperación euromagrebi: ¿Un motor de desarrollo?". Unpublished paper. Madrid, November 1991.

17.- Fernández Ordóñez, Francisco: "Palabras de apertura", Palma de Mallorca, September 24, 1990.

18.- Italian-Spanish non-paper on the CSCE. Rome, October 10, 1990, pag.2.