ITALIAN VIEWS ON NATO GLOBAL PARTNERSHIP -

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 ROME 001182

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

DEPT FOR EUR/RPM

E.O. 12958: DECL: 04/17/2016
TAGS: PREL MARR IT NATO EUN
SUBJECT: ITALIAN VIEWS ON NATO GLOBAL PARTNERSHIP -
SUPPORTIVE OF CONCEPT, CONCERNS ABOUT PRESENTATION AND SPEED

REF: A. STATE 56334


B. USNATO 213

Classified By: POLITICAL MINISTER-COUNSELOR DAVID D. PEARCE, REASONS 1.
4 B AND D.

Summary
--------------


1. (C) Italy has a positive impression of the U.S. concept
for a NATO Global Partnership and is interested in pursuing
it further, but registered concerns about our presentation
and approach, fearing we are moving too fast, without a clear
enough sense of what partners want or expect, or of possible
negative consequences for existing NATO partner bodies in
which the Alliance has invested a decade and which Italy
highly values. Italy would like more clarity on the
institutional and legal framework for the Global Partnership,
and detail on how its objectives differ from/fit with those
of the Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council (EAPC),NATO-Russia
Council (NRC),NATO-Ukraine council (NUC),Istanbul
cooperation Initiative (ICI) and the Med Dialogue (MD).
POLMILCOUNS discussed Ref A NATO Global Partnership points
and Ref B food-for-thought paper with Italian MFA NATO Office
Director Bardini April 18. Bardini said that regardless of
how the Italian government formation process comes out, he is
absolutely convinced that Italy will retain its strong
commitment to NATO as a pillar of its foreign policy,
including NATO's regional partnerships and the proposed
Middle East Security Cooperation Center, and that Italy would
continue to work for a European security and defense policy
that was complementary to NATO. End Summary.


2. (C) On April 18, POLMILCOUNS discussed Ref A points and
Ref B food-for-thought paper on a NATO Global Partnership
(GP) with Italian MFA NATO Office Director Gianni Bardini.
We asked Bardini what impact a possible Prodi-led center-left
Government in Rome would have on Italy's NATO policy,
especially its partnership and outreach beyond Alliance
borders. Bardini replied that Italy's position on NATO was
rock-solid. A center-left government, he assured us, would
not make any changes to Italy's NATO policies, or its support
for the Alliance, including its partnerships, as a central
pillar of Italian foreign policy. He did say that he
expected Rome to pay more attention to the development of the
EU's security and defense capabilities, but that Italy would,
as it always has, continue to insist on complementarity with
NATO. Turning to the NATO GP points and paper, Bardini said
Italy's overall impression of the U.S. concept was generally
positive and that Italy was extremely interested in pursuing
it further. However, he registered some concerns. He
stressed that his critiques were intended as constructive
criticism to strengthen the concept, not to attack it. With
that in mind he offered the following.

"Don't Fix What Isn't Broken"
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3. (C) Bardini noted that the Alliance had worked hard to
build value into its partnership arrangements over the past
10 years, that Italy wanted to preserve the existing
structures, and that Rome would favor an evolutionary
approach to expanding partnerships rather than a more
revolutionary one. "Don't fix what isn't broken." He said
that presenting a concept for a single Global Partnership
suggested something above what the Alliance now has in the
EAPC, Med Dialogue, NRC, NUC and ICI, and worried that it
might make those arrangements irrelevant, or at least appear
less relevant. Italy, he said, was certainly open to doing
more with the countries with which NATO had contact -- with
their expectations in mind, and not imposed by the Alliance.
He cautioned that the Alliance needed to be sure it would not
get a luke-warm reception from the partner countries. That
would, he said, be worse than no innovation at all. However,
in his experience both as Italian DCM at NATO and in contacts
with diplomats in Rome, many potential partner countries,
Japan and South Korea for example, do not have clear ideas
about what NATO could offer them or what they would want from
NATO, nor about obligations, commitments and other
implications of a NATO relationship, and are in a
"wait-and-see" mode. Japan in particular, he said, was not
ready to join this kind of Global Partnership. Bardini said
NATO should intensify contact with potential partners to see
where there are points of common ground before deciding what
a partnership with them would look like.

Strengthen Relations Gradually, Full Partner Buy-In
-------------- --------------


4. (C) Pointing out that NATO already meets with troop
contributing nations (TCN) to exchange information, he
suggested NATO broaden the scope of those interactions as a
first step, to shape a vision of how the relationships might
evolve. He said he was not convinced that it would be enough
just to sit together at 26 plus N. Bardini said Italy fully
agrees that NATO should strengthen its relations with
security providers and consumers, but that this should be
done gradually, with the full agreement, or "buy-in" of the
non-Allies involved. Certainly, he said, there was room to
improve the existing mechanisms, including the EAPC, but he
was concerned that the Global Partnership paper implied
replacing the EAPC, NRC, NUC, MD, ICI and TCN consultations
with something looser but more esteemed. On the EAPC in
particular, he said he could envision more tailored agendas
focused on regional problems, or even widening the EAPC
membership. EAPC membership was, however, an important
objective for Serbia and Bosnia, for example, and a motivator
that might be lost if it appeared to be downgraded. He urged
care not to lose 10 years of building the EAPC's foundations,
but rather to expand it and accelerate its work. He also
suggested looking at NATO's many partnership tools to see if
they all still made sense and whether they couldn't be
streamlined to simplify NATO's partnership toolbox.

Security Providers Forum - Who Qualifies?
--------------


5. (C) Bardini said that putting all NATO partnerships in one
basket risked losing valuable specificity that exists in the
current partner institutions, without knowing what we would
gain in the bargain. He asked who would decide what states
qualified for the Security Provider's Forum (SPF) and based
on what criteria. Bardini saw no problem having 26 plus 1
discussions with high-end providers going well beyond the
current info exchanges, but said we must pulse the potential
partners to see if they are truly interested in a larger,
more inclusive forum. He speculated that if the SPF wanted
to discuss, for example, Iran, it would be very awkward to
exclude from that meeting our EAPC and MD partners who have
longer ties with the Alliance and some of whom are in the
same region. And would we really want to include, say,
Brazil or India should they choose to contribute enough
resources or personnel to qualify for the SPF?

Looking for Clarity on Institutional Framework
-------------- -


6. (C) Bardini asked if we could provide more clarity on the
legal and institutional framework for the Global Partnership,
or a wiring diagram to show how it fits in with EAPC, NRC,
NUC, MD and ICI. He asked how the GP's objectives would
differ from those of the other NATO partner institutions and
how those institutions would fit into the SPF. He also
worried that mixing the many different regions and different
cultures of the various potential GP partners posed a risk,
and reiterated that it was vital any new NATO partner
fully/fully share the goals and objectives of the Alliance
for the partnership. He closed by saying he believed the new
thrust toward broader partnerships had significant value, but
that moving to institutionalize the partnerships with speed
before a political framework was carefully built in the
Alliance and with potential partners could lead to mistakes
that would harm NATO's interests. He did not think many
ministers would be prepared to discuss the GP proposal at
Sofia. (NOTE: FM Fini will not attend the Sofia meeting.)
Bardini asked that we stay in close touch on the GP as our
ideas develop further.
BORG