North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO)

IN RESPONSE to NATO's initial proposal for adapting the Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CFE) Treaty, Russia released its own working paper on April 22. While both proposals advocate placing national limits on parties' heavy conventional weapons, the Russian "basic elements" of adaptation goes further than the NATO proposal toward strengthening constraints on NATO, and also gives Moscow more flexibility in stationing conventional weapons.

French President Jacques Chirac, since his election victory in May 1995, has led the way toward fundamental reform of French defense policy. He has, among other things, conducted a "final" set of nuclear tests, removed one leg of France's strategic nuclear triad, decided to move toward smaller but more flexible professional military forces, and changed France's role in NATO. In the process, Chirac has incurred the wrath of both the Gaullists in the governing coalition and the opposition socialists. Do the Chirac reforms add up to a violation of Gaullist principles, as his domestic critics charge, or will they simply produce a Gaullist defense posture in disguise, as some Americans fear?

On February 24, the Clinton administration released its "Report to the Congress on the Enlargement of NATO: Rationale, Benefits, Costs, and Implications." The study, conducted by the Department of Defense (DOD), estimated the cost of NATO enlargement will total $27 billion to $35 billion over a 13 year period, beginning in July 1997, when the alliance is expected to extend invitations to new members at a NATO summit in Madrid.

In conjunction with its March 26 annual luncheon, the Arms Control Association (ACA) held a panel discussion on the arms control issues facing President Bill Clinton following the outcome of the Helsinki summit, including NATO expansion, future strategic arms reductions and prospects for Senate approval of pending arms treaties. Panelists included:

Spurgeon M. Keeny, Jr., ACA president and executive director;
Jack Mendelsohn, ACA deputy director;
John Rhinelander, vice chairman of the ACA Board of Directors; and
John Steinbruner, senior fellow at the Brookings Institution.

The following is an edited version of the panel's remarks.

REASSURING Moscow that NATO's expansion will not threaten Russian security interests has become one of the main alliance objectives in negotiations to adapt the 1990 Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CFE) Treaty to post Cold War Europe. On February 20, NATO proposed replacing the now obsolete group structure of the treaty with national limits and reducing CFE equipment levels as two basic elements for adaptation of the accord.