NATO

Andrew Bowie Excerpts

Wednesday 20th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Bowie (West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to speak in this debate, in which there has been such agreement on the importance of NATO’s contribution to the world since its formation nearly 70 years ago.

The North Atlantic Treaty Organisation has been the pivotal organisation and the bond that has held together the freedom-loving nations of Europe and North America, maintained peace in the west of our continent and contributed to peacekeeping and nation-building exercises around the world. In many ways, its name is something of a misnomer, for as we sit here today, there is not an inhabited continent on this earth—from the plains of Afghanistan to the Balkans or the seas off east Africa—that does not have some form of NATO or NATO allies present, enhancing the security of the region and defending our common interests.

As has been said, the threats that face our country and our allies are increasing in scale and scope. In 1946, three years before NATO was formed but in a speech that certainly encouraged the Truman Administration to commit to sharing the burden of keeping Europe whole, free and at peace, Churchill famously spoke of the iron curtain descending across Europe, of the then Soviet sphere and of increasing measures of control from Moscow. Today, although the aggressor remains, the threats have evolved, not to the exclusion of conventional warfare as we know it—the experiences of Ukraine and Crimea are testament to that—but with the added constant state of cyber and information warfare permanently raging around us. That is a war we cannot afford to lose.

Once again, it is clear that a shadow has fallen upon the scenes so lately lightened. Countries that for almost three decades were thought to be free from outside control and free to determine their own destiny in Europe and the world face the threat of political interference, propaganda and ultimately invasion from the east once again. NATO, the transatlantic alliance and the special relationship not just between ourselves and the United States but between all the free and democratic countries of Europe and the United States are needed more than ever before.

One, of course, can understand the frustrations of the United States. It has contributed more than any country to the peace and security of a continent that, in the last century, cost it nothing but blood and money. Churchill remarked in that same speech in Missouri all those years ago that twice in his lifetime he saw America send several million of its young men across the Atlantic to fight the war against its own wishes and traditions. The American people today, having witnessed nearly a decade of constant war and of caskets returning from far-flung corners of the globe, of course wonder why it is fair that they contribute so much in dollars and men and women to an organisation in which, of 29 members, with all but two on the continent that it was created to defend, only five contribute anything like the 2% of GDP spend on defence required, when the United States, in contrast, contributes 70% of NATO’s budget on its own.

In response to that, I would turn back to the speech in Illinois in 1946. Churchill, in trying to convince another reluctant US President about the merits of collective defence, said that America, while having awesome power, also has

“an awe inspiring accountability to the future.”

It is vital that America must not feel that sense of duty alone. Sadly, too often, in its contribution to a peaceful Europe and the defence of our common interests around the world, America has felt that alone. Two years after Churchill’s speech, President Truman said, on the signing of the Brussels treaty:

“I am sure that the determination of the free countries of Europe to protect themselves will be matched by an equal determination on our part to help them do so.”

It is time that the free nations of Europe recaptured that spirit and recommitted themselves to spending what is required to defend themselves. Now, more than at any time since the cold war, Europe needs NATO, and it is up to us to make that case to our allies.