The Western Alliance: Drift or Harmony?

Abstract

I A number of factors have led, in the past couple of years, to an acute sense of crisis among the members of the Atlantic Alliance and to heightened tensions within it.' Of those, the recent report of the Directors of the American, French, German and British Councils or Institutes of International Relations constitutes an excellent survey.2 Clearly, the three fundamental considerations are: a new awareness of the fact that the world has become a single strategic stage, and that the security of the members of the Alliance can be threatened by events occurring outside its geographic area, especially in the Middle East and Persian Gulf region; the unfavorable evolution of the military balance in Europe, because of the relentless modernization of Soviet conventional forces and of the development of new Soviet middle-range nuclear weapon systems that are both mobile and highly precise; and the collapse of the SovietAmerican detente. In this essay, I will concentrate on what I deem essential: the different reactions to these events within the Alliance, and the causes of these divergences. I will then suggest certain ways to restore harmony.