LOOK BACK ON THE WASHINGTON SUMMIT


Atlantic Council at the NATO Summit in Washington

Live commentary, authoritative analysis, and high-level events covering NATO’s Washington summit, courtesy of our experts.

Essays on the Alliance’s future

NATO’s seventy-fifth anniversary is a milestone in a remarkable story of reinvention, adaptation, and unity. However, as the Alliance seeks to secure its future for the next seventy-five years, it faces revanchist old rivals, escalating strategic competition, and uncertainties over the future of the rules-based international order. 

With partners and allies turning attention from celebrations to challenges, the Atlantic Council’s Transatlantic Security Initiative invited contributors to engage with the most pressing concerns ahead of the historic Washington summit and chart a path for the Alliance’s future. This series features seven essays focused on concrete issues that NATO must address at the Washington summit and five essays that examine longer-term challenges the Alliance must confront to ensure transatlantic security. 

Related program

The Transatlantic Security Initiative, in the Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security, shapes and influences the debate on the greatest security challenges facing the North Atlantic Alliance and its key partners.

Content

Defense Commission of the Swedish Parliament visited Lithuania

NATOSource

May 16, 2014

Swedish Defense Commission Says Russian Aggression in Ukraine has Increased Risk in Nordic and Baltic Region

By Swedish Mission to NATO

The Swedish Parliamentary Defence Commission (Försvarsberedningen) presented its defence report to Minister for Defence Karin Enström on 15 May.

NATO NATO Partnerships
NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen and Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk

NATOSource

May 16, 2014

Polish Prime Minister Says NATO Needs Larger Presence in Eastern Allies

By Reuters

“If there is no readiness for a greater NATO presence in bordering countries of the European Union, it will mean NATO solidarity is only declarative,” [Polish Prime Minister Donald] Tusk said at a security conference in the Slovak capital.

NATO Poland
NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen, May 15, 2014

NATOSource

May 16, 2014

Secretary General Wants to Deepen NATO’s Ties with China

By Anders Fogh Rasmussen, NATO

I would very much like to see what I will call a more structured dialogue between NATO and China.

China NATO
NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen with the Prime Ministers of the Visegrad countries

NATOSource

May 15, 2014

Rasmussen: NATO Members Need to Increase Their Defense Budgets

By Anders Fogh Rasmussen, NATO

Twenty-five years ago, this part of Europe was the front-line in the fight for freedom. Barbed wire fences were cut. Walls came down. And freedom prevailed over force.

NATO Russia
Norwegian frigate HNoMS Fridtjof Nansen

NATOSource

May 14, 2014

Norway Deploys Frigate 10,000 Miles Around Globe to Participate in RIMPAC Exercise

By Ine Eriksen Søreide, Ministry of Defense of Norway

Today – May 12th 2014 – is a day worth remembering. The Norwegian frigate KNM Fridtjof Nansen departs for the Pacific to participate in world’s largest international maritime warfare exercise RIMPAC.

NATO Northern Europe
Chairman of the Joints Chiefs of Staff General Martin Dempsey, May 14, 2014

NATOSource

May 14, 2014

US Chief of Defense: NATO Needs to Revisit the Meaning of Deterrence

By Martin Dempsey, Defense One

Dempsey: My personal view is that this is a moment for NATO to decide what it intends to be in the future.

NATO Russia
NATO provides airlift support to African Union mission in Somalia, March 2010

NATOSource

May 13, 2014

NATO and the African Union Increase Cooperation

By NATO

NATO and the African Union (AU) took a further step in advancing their cooperation, by signing on 8 May 2014 an agreement which formalizes the status of the NATO liaison office to the African Union Headquarters in Addis Ababa.

Africa NATO
Russian President Vladimir Putin

NATOSource

May 13, 2014

Europeans Dither on Defense While Putin Laughs

By John Vinocur, Wall Street Journal

On one hand, there are European countries reasonably bemoaning years of declining American leadership and resolve.

Europe & Eurasia NATO
Czech Prime Minister Bohuslav Sobotka and NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen, April 10, 2014

NATOSource

May 12, 2014

Czech Republic Wary of Permanently Hosting NATO Troops

By Robert Muller, Reuters

The Czech Republic does not favor hosting foreign NATO troops as part of the alliance’s plans to boost its eastern wing over the Ukraine crisis, its Defense minister said, in sharp contrast to some of its regional peers.

Central Europe NATO
Entrance to Sloviansk City Council, April 14, 2014

NATOSource

May 9, 2014

Putin’s Unconventional Tools for Destabilizing Neighbors and Undermining NATO

By Massimo Calabresi, TIME

Over the last decade, Putin has established a well-organized, well-funded and often subtle overt and covert operation in the vast swath of neighboring countries, from Estonia on the Baltic Sea to Azerbaijan in the Caucuses, say western and regional government officials.

NATO Northern Europe

Experts

Events