Categories: Need to know

U.S. Defense Secretary warns NATO of looming irrelevance

Too many countries shirking their duty, says Gates

by macleans.ca on Friday, June 10, 2011 12:41pm - 8 Comments

NATO is facing “the very real possibility of collective military irrelevance,” outgoing U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates warned in his farewell speech to the NATO Council on Friday. Gates specifically called out those countries “who enjoy the benefits of NATO membership… but don’t want to share the risks and costs.” Only five of the 28 members of the alliance spend the agreed-upon target of two per cent of GDP on defence, Gates pointed out, and missions like those in Afghanistan and Libya have exposed a shortage of resources.

CNN

Tags: NATO

http://www.thedaltonwearsprada.blogspot.com dirtyderkson

NATO is a defence organization. Maybe if we stopped treating it like a worldwide police force, nations wouldn’t have to spend so much money on it and we wouldn’t have this issue.
http://pulse.yahoo.com/_3LTTP6244OE6S3WTQLQYLB3WXA Bernie

Concur. That said, when the Alliance agrees to an operation and many countries put caveats on their participation, the whole notion becomes a farce.
Anonymous

NATO was originally formed to counter a perceived threat from Russia and other Eastern Bloc nations. That threat has evaporated. Now NATO is looking for a new role to justify its existence. To that end, NATO has taken on the role of the military arm of the UN. It has become the police force to the world to punish third world nations who are deemed to be acting inappropriately.

Does Canada want to belong to an organization that is required to go around beating up on third world nations? I think not!

Anonymous

It SHOULD be the military arm of the UN….but it’s membership has to be open to all.

That way the UN won’t have to beg for troops everytime something needs doing….but it should never been seen as being from any one country or region….global
Anonymous

It SHOULD be the military arm of the UN….but it’s membership has to be open to all.

That way the UN won’t have to beg for troops everytime something needs doing….but it should never been seen as being from any one country or region….global
Anonymous

It SHOULD be the military arm of the UN….but it’s membership has to be open to all.

That way the UN won’t have to beg for troops everytime something needs doing….but it should never been seen as being from any one country or region….global
Anonymous

It SHOULD be the military arm of the UN….but it’s membership has to be open to all.

That way the UN won’t have to beg for troops everytime something needs doing….but it should never been seen as being from any one country or region….global