HUNGARY'S NON-PAPER ON NATO'S NEW STRATEGIC CONCEPT

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 BUDAPEST 000103 SIPDIS DEPARTMENT FOR EUR/CE JAMIE MOORE, RPM E.O. 12958: DECL: 02/18/2015 TAGS: MOPS MAPP NATO PREL HU SUBJECT: HUNGARY'S NON-PAPER ON NATO'S NEW STRATEGIC CONCEPT Classified By: Political Officer Jon Martinson, reasons 1.4 b and d. ¶1. (SBU) The MFA's NATO Office Director, Eszter Sandorfi, provided PolOff a copy of the following Hungarian Non-paper on NATO's new strategic concept Februray 19. ¶2. (C) The non-paper text, dated February 2010, follows: Begin text -------------- -------------- Core principles, collective defence and new threats -------------- -------------- - The Strategic Concept must clearly reaffirm our common commitment to collective defence, as enshrined in Article 5 of the Washington Treaty, as the core purpose of the Alliance. Article 5 is, and must remain, the most effective guarantee we have for maintaining peace in the Euro-Atlantic area. - We must maintain our preparedness to conduct our core mission (through, among others, contingency planning, joint exercises and an effective NATO Response Force - NRF),even as we continue to assert that the Alliance does not consider itself to be any country's adversary. - Security challenges in the decade to come will entail scenarios not originally perceived under Article 5. Given the broad range of new security threats, we should maintain a degree of strategic flexibility sufficient to keep responses to unforeseen challenges open. - The formulation of NATO's general approach to new threats should recognize that there will be instances when the Alliance should not or cannot be the primary forum for action. -------------- -- NATO's political role in Euro-Atlantic security -------------- -- - We must preserve and enhance the Alliance as the foremost political embodiment of the transatlantic community. The principles of the indivisibility of our shared security and solidarity among all allies must guide our thinking about the role of the Alliance in an increasingly complex global security environment. - NATO remains the central pillar of the Euro-Atlantic security structure. While discussions on how to enhance interaction among the structure's components can be useful, there is no room to call into question NATO's place within the architecture. - As the very concept of security continues to expand, an ever broader range of issues, such as cyber defence and energy security, will require our political attention. In this regard, Alliance solidarity should be further reinforced through the essential role played by political consultations, as defined in Article 4 of the Washington Treaty. - Besides their defensive and deterrence value, military capabilities remain a potent political symbol of the indivisibility of Alliance security. NATO's nuclear policy should continue to play a key role in this regard. A potential Alliance missile defence architecture would also be a powerful political demonstration of how NATO can respond collectively to new threats. -------------- -------------- Enlargement, the Western Balkans and Partnerships -------------- -------------- - We must continue to uphold our firm commitment to NATO's open door policy. While the European landscape has changed dramatically in the last 20 years, the basic idea behind Article 10 of the Washington Treaty has lost none of its relevance. The purposes and principles of enlargement as defined in the 1995 Study on NATO Enlargement remain valid. - We must stress that the accession process is performance- and merit-driven. States that have gone through the process must be assured that the final decision on membership rests exclusively with the allies themselves. - We need to send a clear positive message to the Western Balkans, particularly with regard to the open door policy. BUDAPEST 00000103 002 OF 002 Attending to "unfinished business" in the region means that NATO will continue to have an important role to play in terms of maintaining and consolidating security and stability. In the end, those countries fulfilling the stringent requirements for membership should be able to join the Alliance. - The interconnectedness and complexity of many modern day security challenges means that NATO and Russia can and should work together on a range of issues. We should, therefore, continue the process of enhancing our relationship, keeping the channels of political dialogue open, while focusing on pragmatic and tangible cooperation in those areas where we can further objectives related to genuine common interests. At the same time, Alliance solidarity and cohesion must be upheld, and reciprocity emphasized, in our dealings with Russia. - Deepening NATO-EU ties must remain on the Alliance's agenda. We must capitalize on the essential benefits to be reaped from enhanced NATO-EU cooperation, which range from a more efficient allocation of limited resources to enhancing coordination in responses to security challenges. - NATO's various partnership structures will become increasingly relevant as security challenges continue to assume a global nature. A shared vision and shared interests with respect to common challenges should continue to form the basis of our partnerships. Recognizing the role partners have already played in contributing to Alliance operations, we should remain open to deepening these relationships. -------------- Capabilities -------------- - In order to address the entire spectrum of future challenges, the Strategic Concept should give renewed impetus to the transformation process. In terms of guiding the process, the 2006 Comprehensive Political Guidance remains highly relevant. - As the Level of Ambition of the Alliance expresses the ultimate guidance for capability development, its determination merits our highest political attention. Since military capabilities provide the Alliance with a specific tool for achieving its core objectives, it is credible military capabilities that form the foundations of credible political ambitions. - The complex and costly nature of required capabilities limits the vast majority of member states from developing or acquiring the full range of assets individually. The Alliance must therefore adopt innovative solutions to overcome potential shortfalls. We should, in particular, put a strong emphasis on the potential advantages of multinational co-operation in the field of capability development. It is also important to find the right proportion between the different funding mechanisms the Alliance presently employs. - The new Strategic Concept should also reinforce the requirement to further strengthen a coherent, coordinated and mutually reinforcing capability development between NATO and the EU. End text KOUNALAKIS