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NATO 20/2020

NATO 20/2020 Podcast

NATO 20/2020 is a weekly podcast that explores 20 bold ideas to push NATO to be more visionary, more capable, and more self-evidently valuable to the security of more people.

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Modernize the kit and the message

by H.E. Dame Karen Pierce DCMG

NATO will only remain successful over the next seventy years if it modernizes its capabilities, takes command of emerging technology, and harmonizes its strategic messaging.

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Open a bank

by Max Bergmann and Siena Cicarelli

NATO can fund critical defense investments by bringing the necessary financial tools in house.

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Design a Digital Marshall Plan

by the Hon. Ruben Gallego and the Hon. Vicky Hartzler

NATO allies, led by the United States, must cooperate in securing national 5G communications systems in Europe and beyond against malign Chinese influence.

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Rethink and replace two percent

by Derek Chollet, Steven Keil, and Christopher Skaluba

NATO’s two percent metric is reductive and politically fraught but offers lessons for better ways to measure burden sharing.

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Build an Atlantic-Pacific Partnership

by James Hildebrand, Harry W.S. Lee, Fumika Mizuno, Miyeon Oh, and Monica Michiko Sato

NATO is the only institution capable of organizing transatlantic and transpacific stakeholders to address China’s political, military, and information threats.

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Disband the NATO Response Force

by John R. Deni

Replacing the NRF with a plug-and-play interoperability model increases the chance that NATO will employ its high-readiness forces.

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Build resilience for an era of shocks

by Jim Townsend and Anca Agachi

NATO needs a fourth core task to protect allied populations from nontraditional threats like COVID and climate change.

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‘Game out’ decision making

by AM Sir Christopher Harper, KBE, RAF (Ret.)

In an era where the distinction between peace and conflict is increasingly complex, NATO should retain its competitive advantage by using synthetic environments and virtual worlds to support rapid, efficient, and effective strategic decision making.

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Digitalize the enterprise

by Jeffrey Reynolds and Jeffrey Lightfoot

If NATO is to unlock new frontiers of innovation and harness emerging technology, digitalizing how it does business is the key.

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Listen to women

by Lisa A. Aronsson

Twenty years after its creation, NATO should affirm the strategic significance of the Women, Peace, and Security Agenda and define what it means for an era of great power competition.

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Ramp up on Russia

by Amb. Alexander Vershbow

NATO needs to increase the costs for Russian aggression while building back crucial dialogue if there is any prospect for improved relations with Moscow.

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Put NATO back in the narrative

by Bridget Corna and Livia Godaert

NATO can recapture the imagination of allied publics by telling its own story better and in new ways to new audiences.

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Seek membership for Mexico

by Christopher Skaluba and Gabriela R. A. Doyle

Mexico’s membership in NATO may be the key to keeping a rapidly changing America invested in European security.

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Supersize cyber

by Safa Shahwan Edwards, William Loomis, and Simon Handler

NATO should adopt a digital .2 percent policy whereby member states commit to spend .2 percent of their gross domestic product on cybersecurity and digital defense modernization.

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Christen a carrier strike group

by Michael John Williams

Using the HMS Queen Elizabeth and HMS Prince of Wales as its backbone, a NATO carrier strike group is an opportunity for high-end interoperability under European leadership.

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End the Russian veto on Georgian accession

by Luke Coffey and Alexis Mrachek

Admitting Georgia to NATO without extending an Article 5 guarantee to Abkhazia and the Tskhinvali Region can fulfil the promise of the Bucharest Summit.

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Threaten decisive nuclear retaliation

by David Gompert and Hans Binnendijk

NATO should thwart Russian use of nuclear weapons by threatening certain retaliation.

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Revitalize NATO’s grand strategy

by Amb. Timo Koster and Ivanka Barzashka

Collective strategic analysis is the pathway to a more inclusive, transparent, and systematic process for creating NATO’s next strategic concept.

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Set NATO’s sights on the High North

by Jim Danoy and Marisol Maddox

Security in the Arctic is waiting on no one. NATO needs a strategy for defense and deterrence in the High North before it is outflanked.

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Reimagine the Washington Treaty

by Damon Wilson and Will O’Brien

Reexamining NATO’s founding charter can be an exercise in creating an Alliance fit for a new geopolitical era.

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Issue spotlight

Binnendijk and Vershbow in Defense News: Needed: A transatlantic agreement on European strategic autonomy

New Atlanticist Sep 23, 2021

The US can’t fix Afghanistan, but it can still fix NATO

By Richard D. Hooker, Jr.

Now is not the time for Europe to raise its defense spending or for NATO to extend its reach beyond Europe—especially into the Indo-Pacific region. Rather, it’s time to get back to the core focus of NATO.
Afghanistan Crisis Management
Binnendijk and Vershbow in Defense News: Needed: A transatlantic agreement on European strategic autonomy

UkraineAlert Sep 9, 2021

Why Ukraine must join NATO

By Adrian Hoefer

Given the Kremlin’s hostile revisionism, Ukraine’s membership in NATO is in the long-term interest of the US and its allies. As Moscow expands its hybrid war on the West, Ukraine is an asset.
Eastern Europe International Organizations
Binnendijk and Vershbow in Defense News: Needed: A transatlantic agreement on European strategic autonomy

TURKEYSource Aug 27, 2021

What Afghanistan’s fall means for the future of NATO and Turkey

By Atlantic Council IN TURKEY

Former Turkish Ambassador Alper Coşkun joins the Atlantic Council IN TURKEY to discuss the implications of recent developments in Afghanistan to the NATO alliance and the future of Turkey’s foreign policy and engagement with Afghanistan.
Afghanistan Conflict

Visualizing burden-sharing data

NATO allies contribute to a variety of missions. Here’s a look at how each country chips in.

The NATO alliance conducts a variety of missions on land, sea, and air. Here is a breakdown of how each country has been contributing to a selection of these missions.

Despite COVID-19 pandemic, NATO defense spending continues to rise

Even in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic, NATO allies have continued to increase their defense investments.

In-depth reports on NATO’s agenda

In-Depth Research & Reports

Jun 11, 2021

The case for a Comprehensive Approach 2.0: How NATO can combat Chinese and Russian political warfare

By Kathleen J. McInnis, Clementine G. Starling

Kathleen J. McInnis and Clementine G. Starling outline how NATO’s Comprehensive Approach program can serve as a model to counter political warfare at the strategic level.

Cybersecurity Disinformation

Issue briefs and reports

Mar 22, 2021

The China plan: A transatlantic blueprint for strategic competition

By Hans Binnendijk, Sarah Kirchberger, James Danoy, Franklin D. Kramer, Connor McPartland, Christopher Skaluba, Clementine G. Starling, Didi Kirsten Tatlow

China presents the United States and its partners with the most serious set of challenges they have faced since the Cold War. To manage this challenge, transatlantic nations need a blueprint to build a common approach.

China Europe & Eurasia

In-Depth Research & Reports

May 12, 2021

Falling in: The deterrent value of Host Nation Support in the Baltic Sea region

By Kathleen McInnis and Connor McPartland

Host Nation Support plays a vital, yet often overlooked, role in enabling NATO’s overall deterrence strategy for the Baltic Sea region.

Defense Policy Europe & Eurasia

In-Depth Research & Reports

May 18, 2021

Predictable strategy and unpredictable operations: The implications of agility in Northern Europe

By Conor Rodihan, Matthew R. Crouch, Ronald C. Fairbanks

As the US military becomes increasingly agile, its evolving strategy and activities pose implications for cooperation with allies, deterrence, and stability in Northern Europe.

Defense Policy Europe & Eurasia
Women in Swiss security

In-Depth Research & Reports

Mar 8, 2021

NATO partnerships for Women, Peace, and Security

By Lisa Aronsson

Lisa A. Aronsson outlines the achievements and the implementation challenges NATO faces, and offers three sets of recommendations for overcoming institutional hurdles, leveraging non-NATO members, and reviving NATO’s sense of purpose on the Women, Peace, and Security agenda.

Europe & Eurasia NATO
more in-depth reports on nato

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In the News

Oct 10, 2021

Binnendijk and Vershbow in Defense News: Needed: A transatlantic agreement on European strategic autonomy

By Hans Binnendijk, Alexander Vershbow

Hans Binnendijk and Alexander Vershbow write that the United States should drop its objections, agree with its European allies on how to ensure that strategic autonomy results in greater European strategic responsibility, and then embed that agreement in both NATO’s new strategic concept and the European Union’s new strategic compass.

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Oct 7, 2021

Pavel in the Washington Post on NATO defense spending

By Atlantic Council

Scowcroft Center director Barry Pavel speaks on NATO in the Washington Post.

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Oct 7, 2021

Greece and France give European strategic autonomy a shot

By Katerina Sokou

A new defense pact between the two aims to address instability in the Mediterranean by tackling multiple challenges in the region.

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Oct 1, 2021

How to ensure Afghanistan isn’t the graveyard of European defense

By Federica Fazio and Nicolas Adams

Stronger cooperation and interoperability can boost Europe's capacity to project hard power.

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TURKEYSource

Sep 30, 2021

Experts react: The key takeaways from the Erdoğan-Putin meeting

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Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and Russian President Vladimir Putin met in-person in Sochi, Russia for the first time since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. Atlantic Council experts give their take on the outcome.

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Sep 23, 2021

The US can’t fix Afghanistan, but it can still fix NATO

By Richard D. Hooker, Jr.

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Sep 22, 2021

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Our experts explain what his words really mean, how they’ll be received, and what the president didn’t say.

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Sep 21, 2021

EU Commissioner Thierry Breton: Trust in the US ‘has been eroded’

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Breton outlined developments in the European Union’s vaccination efforts, digital policy agenda, and cooperation with the United States.

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Sep 10, 2021

Kroenig and Ashford discuss the brewing refugee crisis in Eastern Europe and the new Taliban government

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Why Ukraine must join NATO

By Adrian Hoefer

Given the Kremlin's hostile revisionism, Ukraine's membership in NATO is in the long-term interest of the US and its allies. As Moscow expands its hybrid war on the West, Ukraine is an asset.

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Fri, October 22, 2021 • 10:00 am ET

Women, Peace, and Security 2030: Integrating lessons learned from Afghanistan
Afghanistan Crisis Management Defense Policy Europe & Eurasia