BLOGS AND ANALYSIS
Raimonds Rublovskis
NATO SMART DEFENSE INITIATIVE AND FURTHER DEVELOPMENT OF LATVIAN MILITARY CAPABILITIES. THE ROAD TO CHICAGO 2012.
06.01.2012.
NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen has announced an ambitious ‘’Smart Defense’’ agenda for the next summit of NATO in May 2012. The very definition of ‘’Smart Defense’’ initiative goes to the core of entire NATO defense and force planning systems. NATO Secretary General calls for better spending and better investment for money available, to help NATO nations to preserve capabilities and to deliver new ones. It means that NATO must prioritize, specialize, and seek multinational approaches and solutions. Taken all this together-this is Smart Defense.
One could emphasize several reasons behind this new NATO initiative. Certainly, severe global economic crisis is the main reason with direct negative impact on NATO defense budget. Vast numbers of NATO countries are not able to sustain benchmark of 2% of GDP allocated to defense needs. It means that majority of NATO members will not be able to reach further defense transformation and modernization levels. It brings up another very important point. The military budget and military capabilities gap between the United States and European members of NATO will increase and reach an unacceptable level.
Taking into account that Latvia has one of the smallest military budgets within NATO in both- percentage of GDP and real money investment level, NATO ‘’Smart Defense’’ initiative is of utmost importance for this country defense system and military capabilities.
One could assume that there will be both- the challenges and the opportunities for Latvia to adapt new initiative bearing in mind severe defense budget cuts since 2008. The main dilemma for Latvia within NATO
‘’Smart Defense’’ initiative would be either continue to maintain classic military force structure including Land Forces, Navy, Air Forces, SOF, Combat Support and Combat Service Support structures or transform Latvian National Armed Forces into highly specialized set of military capabilities which will have added value to NATO future operations.
The first option seems to be very difficult to maintain and sustain in the future. One could assume that defense budget of Latvia will not be increased in the years to come; therefore current force structure of LNAF certainly will not be able to possess and deliver modern combat capabilities.
If one has to follow the definition of Smart Defense, it is all about to set the priorities, to specialize, and to enhance multinational approach to deliver modern combat capabilities.
What would be Latvian way to comply with Smart Defense initiative? Certainly, the second option will require fundamental changes of tasks and force structure of Latvian National Armed Forces. The new NATO initiative could provide Latvia with the opportunity to develop and deliver military capability which will have high added value to NATO. One could assume that it means that Latvia has to set priority list of specialized capabilities. It also means several points to follow. Firstly- in that case Latvian defense budget will not be able to sustain current force structure and, subsequently, it should undergo fundamental transformation. Secondly, military capability of high added value for NATO means that this goal cannot be reached only by Latvia, it should be very proactive cooperation among three Baltic States as well as enhanced cooperation between the Baltic States and Nordic States within Baltic-Nordic cooperation framework. It would require substantial force structure changes in those countries. At the same time the United States will remain the most important strategic partner of Latvia in order to achieve goals which could be set by NATO ‘’Smart Defense’’ initiative.
Finally, one could find out some conclusions. It is quite obvious that NATO ‘’Smart Defense’’ initiative will be one of the key issues in NATO Chicago Summit in May 2012. This initiative will provide the opportunity for NATO to maintain current military capabilities and find the ways to deliver new capabilities. Within the framework of Smart Defense initiative, Latvia has the opportunity to set priority list in order to provide NATO with high added value military capability. This option will require fundamental changes within Latvian National Armed Forces structure and tasks.
