NATO and Terrorism Now That Essay

In fact on page 86 Pane insists that NATO's counter-terrorism strategy "seems to be oscillating between the WM (War Model) and ECJM (Expanded Criminal Justice Model)." The problem is of the 19 nations in NATO, many members see the ECJM model as the best role for NATO and others (the most recent members) prefer the U.S. approach, a more vigorous pursuit of the insurgents.

Pane concludes by saying that the "…philosophical divide between west Europeans and the Americans within NATO over counter-terrorism strategy will persist and in all probability grow wider as NATO digs deeper in Afghanistan" (p. 86).

Meantime the Atlantic Council published an article in June, 2010, that states in no uncertain terms that "Today's NATO is not the NATO of the Cold War…nor is it even the NATO of just a decade ago" (Gorka, et al., 2010, p. 1). The article goes into NATO's original mission in some detail, mentioning that it was originally designed to "…deter a Soviet invasion of Western Europe, to keep U.S. forces on the continent and to keep West Germany" on the right track to democracy after WWII.

Gorka mentions that NATO has problems because there are nations that do not share the "political and moral values" of NATO, albeit "none of these" (Cuba, China, etc.) pose a conventional military threat to NATO.However they may pose an "unconventional challenge" to NATO and hence NATO should be better prepared for those potential unconventional challenges, presumably including terrorism. What is known by alert observers is that Afghanistan is a very difficult war to fight, and coordination between NATO and the other parties involved there is vitally important to keep the Taliban from re-taking control, as they did when Osama bin Laden was allowed to train his terrorists there prior to 9/11.

Works Cited

Gorka, Sebastian, and Lindley-French, Julian. (2010). NATO, Terrorism and Irregular Threats.

Atlantic Council. Retrieved Nov. 3, 2010, from: http://www.acus.org/print/11383.

Rane, Prasad P. (2007). NATO's Counter-Terrorism Strategies in Afghanistan. Strategic Analysis, 31(1), 73-91.

Valasek, Tomas. (2001). NATO's New Roles: A Vision From Inside the Alliance. Center for….....