Contents

XIII. Cultural aspects 108

XIV. Why formal Membership matters. Status is substance. 111

XV. Transitional steps 112

Uses and abuses of transitions 112

Informal steps 115

Full Membership 116

Associate Memberships 117

A menu of short-term steps 117

A Committee on Extension of NATO Membership 118

The main step forward at this time 119

XIII. Cultural Aspects

Here we may pose the issue in terms of a series of leading questions:

How far would the Eastern European countries and Russia be willing to go in uniting with the West – association, alliance, confederation, or federation? How widespread is the desire to join the West?

An unscientific series of inquiries indicates that the answer is that the desire is pervasive and forms an underpinning of political discussion. The Easterners seem to want as much unity with the West as possible; it is the reticence of the West that sets the limits and depresses discourse on the subject. The practical vision of Easterners of what the West might agree to seems to consist of: alliance and loose confederation for the present, preferably in a way that facilitates a gradual strengthening of the confederation.

Can Russia ever be a European country? To what extent must Russia’s Eurasian geographical identity detract from its European identity – as much as the Western Hemisphere identity of the U.S.? and therefore to an extent still compatible with NATO membership?

Should NATO concentrate on bringing in those ex-Communist countries that are most pro-Western in sentiment, closest to the West culturally, and most “reliable;” i.e., the Poles, Czechs and Hungarians first and foremost? Or should NATO be equally interested in bringing in the countries that most need an Atlantic anchor for their democracy, i.e. Russia?

NATO history would favor the answer, “both.” Contrary to expectations in 1949, NATO’s greatest political accomplishment was not to unite the old reliable core group of Atlantic allies but to “Atlanticize” the countries of Central and Southern Europe (Germany, Italy, Spain, Portugal), by uniting them around the Atlantic core and anchoring and nurturing them on the path of democratic reliability. Today these countries are more reliable than some of the original “reliable” core members of NATO were in 1949. They form a part of an expanded reliable core, opening the door to a new expansion.

The unreliable members in the 1950s (including Greece and Turkey but not yet Spain) formed a third of the population of NATO. Today, the entire Eastern group would have a similar proportion within an Extended NATO. This would suggest taking in all of the Easterners – and pretty quickly, since NATO’s initial expansion among the “unreliables” took only 5 years from 1949.

On the other hand, NATO’s experience with Greece and Turkey was rocky enough to suggest that it may have been better if there had been an category of Associate Membership available from the start for them (and for Portugal). Full Mermbership might have been made contingent upon a resolution of their problems with one another and over Cyprus. Regression from democracy or refusal to submit to NATO mediation over Cyprus could have brought demotion back to Associate Membership.

This is comparable to what we have urged in the above pages for the Eastern countries. Only some of them should come in as full Members at this time; others as Associate Members. The conditions should be known for the Associates to move on to full Membership ... and vice versa. (See Section XV below.)

What would be the balance of reliable and unreliable peoples in a NATO extended to all of Central Europe? to the western border of Russia? to Vladivostok?

The present NATO members would retain a strong popular majority in NATO in any of these groupings. They would still have 90% of the population after bringing in the Central Europeans, 80% after bringing in the Ukrainians and Baltics, and over 60% after bringing in the Russians. This ought to be enough to stabilize the whole.

However, the West no longer has a majority of the member states of CSCE, due to the splintering of states in the East. This splintering has the perverse effect of strengthening the East numerically in inter-governmental Councils which operate on a one-state-one-vote principle, even while it weakens the East in every other sense. This makes it necessary to ask, Under what voting and decision-making arrangements for NATO would the West’s popular majority suffice to protect the reliability of an Extended NATO? (See Section XI above.)

What is the relative strength of the desire for unity with the West versus the desire to be different from the West?

Thus far the desire for unity predominates nearly everywhere (except Serbia). In Russia and Romania, however, there is a strong countervailing anti-Western trend, thus far in the minority but growing, combining ethno-religious nationalists and ultra-rightists with Communists, and playing upon frustrations and crises.

To what extent is the leaning toward Westernism or anti-Westernism a function of the hope (or lack thereof) of help from the West and of membership in the main Western institutional “clubs”?

To what extent is the trend in Russian thinking toward a “Eurasian” identity and away from a “European” identity a result of disappointment over not having been welcomed into the main European/Western “clubs” after 1991? Would membership in NATO and cooperation with the West in global strategy solidify an identity in Russia of being a European country?

Can Russia work out its inferiority complex toward the West more constructively by staying separate, sometimes borrowing from the West, but retaining the possibility of returning to the idea of trying to form a new, distinct, “higher” synthesis; or by joining the most powerful intra-Western institutions and getting a share of the say in what they do?

In the reaction of the Slavophiles and Leninists against the individualism of Western society, to what extent were they really reacting (e.g., after the Napoleonic wars and World War I) to the disunity in the Western international system and its propensity to war, which Slavophile and Leninist ideologies blamed on the individualism of the Western domestic social system?

Did Western unity after 1947 overcome the propensity to romantic reaction in the East and help inspire the return of Easterners to a westernizing, European orientation in the Gorbachev years? Now that a new pessimism has developed about the openness of Western institutions to the East, is the propensity to romantic reaction returning?

If the answers to these questions were, “No, none, not at all, no chance,” then that would greatly reduce the merits of extension of NATO. But it is evident that the answer to each of these questions is actually, “Yes, there is a significant interactive role between Westernization in the East and readiness in the West for integrating the East.” This does not mean that integration of the East into NATO would guarantee the success of Westernization in the East; it only means that it could make a major difference, and that the West fails to pursue this prospect at its own risk.

Two questions also need to be asked about the ultimate historical meaning of Western unity:

After 1947, NATO and the European Community were built on the theory that, if democracies united in the West, this would serve as a “magnet” for their neighbors to the East, who would want to “go democratic” and join in. What has been the extent of this influence as a “magnet”?

Critics charged that Western institutions excluded the East and perpetuated the cold war division of Europe, and that real European unity would be developed on a neutral basis cutting across the blocs after NATO and the EC had dissolved. Now that the former East bloc countries nearly all want to join NATO and the EC, the original theorists of Western unification seem to have had the better half of the argument. If, however, the Western institutions do not remember and act on their original ideas of bringing in the East, would the critics be validated?

XIV. Why formal Membership matters. Status is substance.

In British polemics against European Union, formal status and structure are compared unfavorably to the informal work of building “practical links.” It is said that what matters is “unity” not “union;” that the specific common policies are the “real” substance of integration, and that the effort to get formal commitments and common institutions only creates dissension and loses time. This argument has never been persuasive to Britain’s EC partners, who have wisely pressed ahead with stronger structures and institutions, without which no progress would have been made.

The British argument has one important merit: it reminds us of the need to get on with informal steps when they can be taken. But it errs grievously in putting off formal structures and status for the end and in treating these as the mere icing on the cake and formalization of the “substantive” work which is done in advance informally.

Status is itself a substance. It helps people form their self-image. It gives them roles to play and responsibilities to perform. It plays an interactive role in the course of achieving the goals which it proclaims. People try to live up to their status – especially when there are common institutions and common personnel to create a common peer pressure and watch over their performance. People try to fulfill their responsibilities. They try to fit themselves into their roles.

So do nations.

Membership in NATO affects how a country thinks of itself. It affects its conception of its place in the world. If affects its self-image. Indeed, it actually provides the country with a new and more positive self-image: an Atlanticist image, an image of itself as a partner with the Atlantic countries in European peace and in global leadership. Once given this formal image, a country is prone to fit itself into this image – to fit its policies to Atlanticist roles, to fit its thinking to Atlanticist ideology, and to adapt its government and economy to Atlanticist practices.

Membership in NATO especially affects the way the country develops its military doctrine. It motivates the military to draw up its doctrine and do its training in a way that fits into a NATO framework. Non-membership, on the other hand, inclines the military to include defense against NATO in its doctrine and its training. This has been a fateful question for Russian military doctrine.

Since the status of membership includes a commitment on both sides to one another’s defense, it greatly speeds the formation of practical links. It imparts confidence that a country can go ahead with “practical” steps, and that its own steps will be made productive and safe by the corresponding steps of its treaty partners.

This is why the Atlantic countries concentrated first in 1948-9 on negotiating and signing the North Atlantic Treaty. Informal steps developed in the course of working on the formal Treaty, and even more so after its signing and ratification.

This is not to say that there were no informal links among the Atlantic countries before 1948. There were lots of them – just as today there are lots of links between the Atlantic countries and the Easterners. The formal commitments are not the first step, but neither are they the last step; rather, they are an early step in process of developing links, and are interactive with informal steps not a mere confirmation of those steps.

Furthermore: from a standpoint of political leadership rather than historical writing, it is usually the case from the very outset that the formal steps are the main work to be done. This is because most of the informal links fall underneath the level of active intervention by the top political leadership; they will often take care of themselves, or be taken care of by the normal efforts of lower-level officials within the framework of the formal steps at the top. It is only when serious formal steps are not being taken that it is necessary to get active top-level leadership on each of the informal steps. This has been the situation between NATO and the East since 1990. But once the necessary formal links start being built, most of the informal links will evolve naturally en passant.

XV. Transitional Steps

Transitional steps should be used to expedite Membership, not delay it.

When NATO was formed in 1949, it did not ask the subscribing countries to go first through a series of transitional steps in order to assure their compatibility with one another and then become members. Rather, they all became members immediately by virtue of signing the North Atlantic Treaty. It was after joining – that is, after making a serious commitment to one another – that they undertook the transitional efforts to enable themselves to work together effectively. In many areas the oldest allies are still working on the transition to unity.

This is the natural order for proceeding. Putting the lengthy transitional processes before the mutual commitment is putting the cart before the horse.

Uses and Abuses of Transitions

This does not mean that transitional steps can never have a place prior to actual membership. When the logical way forward is obstructed by inability to reach agreement to proceed logically on all the necessary sides, partial steps have to be taken – as well as sidesteps and end runs. This is constructive, as long as people do not try to make an ideological virtue out of necessity and thereby turn the partial steps into obstacles to more complete steps.

There are even occasions when a partial step is more virtuous than the complete step, because there are preconditions for mutual compatibility that have to be met before the full step can be safely taken, and the partial steps serve to prepare the preconditions. But these are relatively rare occasions. Basic conditions for compatibility are usually satisfied in advance well enough to get started, make the commitments and set up the institutions. The completion of conditions for compatibility can come later; indeed, it can only come later.

What is helpful in a group like NATO is not to have everyone meet all optimal conditions of reliability in advance, but to have a core subgroup that is already somewhat habituated to cooperation and mutual reliability. Today the entirety of NATO provides the core group for the East to unite around. In 1949 it was the World War I and II allies on the two shores of the Atlantic that formed the core group. At that time, all of the continental countries were in weak and unstable condition; it was NATO that helped to stabilize them, not stability that was the precondition of NATO. Italy was a good distance from compatibility. Portugal was a friendly dictatorship. Today, thanks to NATO and the EC, all these countries are stable democracies and reliable allies. So are Germany and other countries that in 1949 were viewed askance. Together all these countries form a sturdy core group around which the Eastern countries can now unite, much as Italy and Germany were able to unite around the core group of old Atlanticist allies in 1949 and 1954.

The constructive use of transitional steps in the case of Eastern entry into NATO is to facilitate the entry and get around obstacles – by going ahead with interim compromises that are worth acting on when more definite solutions are not yet possible, and by using the compromise steps to help open the door to proceeding to those more definite solutions. This is the proper use of transitions.

It would be an abuse of transitions to use them to slow down entry. This happens when potential transitional steps are reified as necessary historical stages which must each be completed before the next is begun.

The greatest mistake of all schematic doctrines of transitional “stages” and of conditions of mutual reliability is to treat them as if they were all preconditions that must be completed in advance of far-reaching mutual commitments and institutions. This creates chicken-and-egg problems, because the mutual commitments and institutions are needed for overcoming important obstacles that stand in the way of completing the transitions. Since the reality is that transitions to partnership require steps by both sides on an interactive schedule, mutual commitments and common structures are doubly needed to guide the effort and prevent slippage into interactive stalling.

To avoid an obstructionist abuse of transitions, there is a need to keep clear the different implications of several different kinds of transitional steps:

— Steps that need to be completed in advance of expansion of NATO membership or of a country’s entry into NATO.

— Steps that need to get started in advance of formal membership but may be completed later.

— Steps that can be written into the agreement on accession into NATO, but are best carried out after the commitment has been signed on both sides (e.g., because the alliance commitment provides confidence and common instruments that clear away obstacles to carrying them out).

— Steps that are not necessary but are desirable.

— Subsequent steps that can be written into the protocols of accession in the form of a commitment to hold a future review or negotiation concerning them.

Most steps that are transitional would be better placed in the latter categories – as steps that need not be completed in advance of extension of membership in NATO, but can proceed parallel to it or after it – than by being treated as preconditions for extension of membership and reasons for lengthy delays.

The Main Transitional Step and Other Constructive Steps

The most important transitional step is simply: to set in motion the process of consultation and negotiations on achieving the goal, namely Eastern European and Russian membership in NATO. It is an optical illusion to view negotiation for the main goal as a precipitous step. Negotiation for a major goal is itself a very substantial transitional process, with lesser transitions usually achieved as by-products along the way, and with further transitions usually incorporated into the negotiated package at the conclusion of the process.

Negotiations for actual membership in NATO would be a multi-tier process encompassing the following major stages:

1) Decision by both old members and prospective new members to open the negotiations, and on the terms and procedures of the negotiations.

2) Working out a preliminary accord on the adaptations that would have to be made on both sides in order for extension of membership to work.

3) The actual negotiations for membership, or for partial or associate membership for countries whose full membership cannot yet be agreed on.

4) Signature by all parties to the accord. Ratification by all parties. Entry into force.

This is a process which it would be entirely realistic to begin at this time if the West wanted to. There is nothing incautious about it; it provides plenty of escape hatches if excessive problems arise along the way. It is recommended for the West just as soon as it becomes fully serious about proceeding.

It is only when people are not sure if they want to proceed and when the main step faces blockages that it is necessary to make a special point of looking for smaller steps and end runs. Even when working on smaller steps, however, it is necessary to keep the main step ever in mind: to keep on explaining the need for it, keep on exploring whether there are openings for it, and keep poised to come right back to it as soon as an opening appears.

This valid use of interim steps is different from an attitude of moving purposely by slow stages and avoiding dramatic goals and initiatives; an attitude which itself can serve as a blockage. When discussion of the goal is suppressed and steps are offered up that make little sense in the absence of the goal, those steps in turn are likely to get whittled down further in negotiating processes until they are discarded as not worth the trouble.

For the last several years the main step – negotiation of full Membership for the Easterners – has faced blockages. It still does. Therefore, let us look at smaller steps – interim status levels such as “Observer” or “Associate Member,” and particular links that can be built within these status levels or in some cases without regard to status level.

Informal Steps – diplomatic liaison, the NACC

Two transitional “status” steps were already taken in the Bush years: the inviting of the former WTO states to establish liaisons with NATO in Brussels, and the formation of the North Atlantic Cooperation Council (NACC) at the end of 1991.

There was a tendency for some time to describe NACC as a major step and transformation in the Alliance. And indeed it is a major change, if the standard of comparison is the era of stagnation from the 1960s to the 1980s. However, the East Europeans and Russians mostly view it as a weak and inadequate step. This is because they measure it against the standard of the new needs for European security, and against the danger of catastrophe and loss of the new opportunities if adequate steps are not taken in good time.

NACC could conceivably be used as a jumping-off point for negotiations for an actual expansion of NATO membership. In this case it would have vindicated itself as a truly important transitional step.

Short of this transformative role, many small steps can be taken within the framework of NACC. There could be stronger liaison for the new countries in Brussels, e.g. permanent, well-staffed liaison offices at NATO headquarters. The “liaison” officers could be accredited as “ambassadors” to NATO and invited to attend meetings of the North Atlantic Council with an “observer” status. There could be a frequently-meeting NACC-on-the-ambassadorial-level, and on various other levels.

No intrinsic delay is involved in taking such informal steps, except such delay as may be involved in getting agreement on all sides to go ahead and take them. They are relatively non-controversial. They are useful in a preparatory way: they help people on both sides develop habits and linkages for working together.

However, these steps are very limited in their effect; this is the price that is paid for keeping them relatively informal and uncontroversial. It would be a mistake to take the relative ease of these steps as a recommendation of them as better than other, bigger steps at this phase, or to adopt a rigid schematum in which they are treated as necessary consecutive stages in a gradual process of development toward membership. There is no need to “complete” these steps before taking bigger steps. There is in fact every need to pursue steps of several sizes and on several planes simultaneously. Otherwise the process would bog down and fall further behind the pace of events.

No matter how rapidly informal steps are multiplied, they cannot keep up with the pace of external developments and needs. They are not able to halt or reverse the “renationalization of defense.” Even while they prepare for a modicum of integration, they are not able to prevent the opportunities for a deep integration of military forces from being eroded.

Already much of NATO’s initial opportunity for a deep integration of the command and control of the ex-Communist military forces has been eroded. If the new democracies join NATO today, the integration of their forces is likely to go less deep than it could have gone three years ago, because the “renationalization of defense” has meanwhile proceeded apace. National structures of command have grown; nationalist habits have developed. They will not be easily dislodged. The longer actual membership in NATO waits, the deeper they will be entrenched and farther they will be retained despite NATO.

Full Membership

What then of full-fledged NATO Membership? This would halt the deterioration in a nationalistic direction and begin to reverse it. It may be left as an open question whether this would ever undo all of the renationalization of defense that has already taken place.

Full formal NATO Membership is usually understood as accession to the North Atlantic Treaty. This includes a two-way commitment to mutual defense of all parties. It also brings a full seat on the North Atlantic Council. (Preferably this would be accompanied by reformation of the procedures of the Council, as discussed in Section XI, so that it could make decisions effectively to deal with the more complex and fast-moving issues of the new era, and with more members around the table.) It requires a formal negotiated agreement, which might be achieved in 12-18 months once the West became serious about it.

Full Membership ought also to be understood to include full-scale participation in the bodies that have been established under the North Atlantic Council, above all the Integrated Command. The meaning of “full-scale participation” would vary in details from country to country, but the core of it is clear.

If a country fails to participate up to a sufficient standard – and France does presently fail this standard, which is a relevant and necessary standard for Membership not an artificial one – then it ought to be categorized as an “Associate Member” not a full Member. Such a country ought not continue to be granted the courtesy of a veto on the North Atlantic Council, or a power to obstruct the use of common NATO instruments in which it does not participate.

Associate Memberships

The status of “Associate Member” lies in-between the status of “liaison” and of “full Member.” It is sometimes defined as anything short of accession to the North Atlantic Treaty. It might be better defined as a form of Membership that falls short of accession to the North Atlantic Treaty or falls short of normal overall participation in the common instruments and Integrated Command. Thus, one could accede to the Treaty while ignoring the Integrated Command, or join the Integrated Command while ignoring the Treaty, and become an Associate Member either way. Both together would define the full Member.

Associate Member status would require a formal agreement, the complications of which might in some instances be greater than full Membership. Negotiations for it could be begun without delay; completion might take 12-18 months. Meanwhile many of the informal aspects of it could be developed prior to or in the course of the formalization of the agreement.

Within the “Associate” status, there could be many different levels of actual participation in NATO and of actual mutual commitment, depending on the specific protocols of Associate Membership for each country.

A Menu of Short-Term Steps

Following are steps could be elements of Associate Membership agreements. A few of them are already included in the Partnership plan, and most of them could be included within the framework of Partnership. Indeed, many of them could be undertaken immediately on their own, with or without Associate Memberships or Partnerships:

• Accreditation of the liaison officers as Ambassadors to NATO.

• Regular participation in North Atlantic Council meetings, without power of veto.

• More participation in bodies of NATO beneath the North Atlantic Council and the SACEUR; e.g., the SHAPE technical shop and standardization processes; or the review forums on national military needs, capabilities, plans, and budgets.

• Commitment of national military forces to the NATO Integrated Command.

• Establishment of a multinational NATO-linked command command for the East and Central European participants in the Partnership program.

• Linkage of the CIS command with the NATO command, by exchange of officers in official positions, starting with relatively non-sensitive positions.

• Establishment of NATO bases on the territory of East and Central European nations, with some access also given to Russian military personnel, ships, and planes (to give the Russian military a feeling that it is regaining a bit of a common strategic space rather than losing countries to the West). Poland among other countries has welcomed the idea of NATO bases on its soil.

• Joint real-life military actions. Full acceptance of Eastern forces to participate alongside NATO or Western coalition forces in a conflict, the next time they are offered.

• Parallel, coordinated national military moves, e.g. a U.S. move against the Croatian government and a Russian move against the Serbian government, or U.S. in Afghanistan and Russia in North Korea. (See Section VII above.)

• A one-way guarantee of the country’s security by NATO.

• A full two-way mutual security guarantee, as in Article V of the North Atlantic Treaty, but without right of veto on the NATO Council.

• Restructuring of NATO procedures to allow ordinary decisions by less-than-unanimous consent. Flexible use of NATO’s name and instruments by coalitions of the willing.

• An all-NATO Coordinating Command that would begin to integrate NORAD, SACLANT, SACEUR, and such East Europeans and CIS forces as were willing. Inclusion of some Eastern officers in this Command.

• An official NATO goal of full membership for willing Eastern countries.

• A non-dilatory timetable for new memberships.

• A reasonable statement of terms and conditions for Eastern membership in NATO. In order to arrive at a statement that is reasonable, the Easterners should participate on equal terms in working out the statement.

• A Committee on Extension of NATO, including all Partner countries.

A Committee on Extension of NATO Membership

This committee can be set up as follows:

1. Task: to work out jointly with the Easterners the appropriate terms and conditions for full and associate membership.

Goal: to bring in all the Partner countries, and if possible at the same time, without giving any country a veto on the others.

2. Participants. All “Partner” countries (or all NACC countries).

This won’t give Russia or anyone else a veto; it is only the old NATO members who will have to unanimously sign off in the end on new membership agreements. What it will do is give the Easterners the full input that is needed to produce a sound plan, including the adjustments needed in both East and West, without unnecessary or unbearable burdens of adjustment on either side. Most of the Easterners have a greater desire to make this work than the Westerners; they have usually represented the true interests of NATO better than NATO itself since 1990. Their full participation in the planning will enable the terms to be made more constructive for the West as well as for the East.

3. Procedures. A working committee, deciding by consensus where possible, by informal vote where necessary; not an official negotiation where each country in theory has an option of veto on each point. The product should be a practical plan, not a signed diplomatic agreement. To give the exercise full meaning, however, NATO should commit itself in principle to proceed on the basis of the product.

4. Issues that the Committee will need to work out:

the adjustments needed on NATO’s side as well as the Easterners’s side in order to make a go of expanded membership

procedures flexible enough for making effective decisions with a lot more members around the NATO table (giving real substance, en passant, to the new NATO policy on “coalitions of the willing,” and solving the need for flexible procedures for the fast-moving crises of the new era)

definitions of full and associate membership, and expeditious procedures for moving countries from one to the other (in both directions)

realistic criteria for full and associate memberships; the commitments involved; transitions that may be written into the membership agreements

model membership agreements/protocols

5. Timeframe. The Committee can be set up immediately within the Partnership program.

Setting it up would go a long way toward reassuring the East Europeans. (It should also be on the whole welcomed by Russia, since Russia is fully included.) The actual work of the Committee could take anywhere from a few months to a number of years, depending on the political will on all sides.

The main step forward at this time

The main step at this time is to carry out the Partnership program and fortify it by proceeding, whether as a part of Partnership or along a parallel track, to take steps to concretize the NATO’s goal of expansion, such as setting up a “Committee on Extension of NATO.” In other words, the main step for this time contains the two facets:

1) The Partnership program proper, fleshed out with additional specific content (as in the “Menu of Short-Term Steps” above).

2.) Establishment of a joint Commission or negotiation with the Easterners, for elaboration of the terms and conditions for full Membership.

The elaboration of terms and conditions, if done properly, would point the way toward actual negotiations for membership. It would be done through two-way discussions, not by NATO simply “laying down the law” (see Section XII above).

Both sides in this Committee would place their conditions on the table; the unncessary and unhelpful demands on both sides would tend to get weeded out in the give-and-take. NATO would outline political standards for Members (Section XII) and the kinds of security settlements that would have to be reached among neighboring countries (Section VI). The prospective members would outline the transformations in NATO that they need and have hoped for. The question of new Command areas would be raised. So would procedures for making decisions when there are more members in the Council. So would the opportunities that an Extended NATO would open up for new joint functional agencies.

The point would not be to resolve all of these questions in advance, but to get them on the table and work out a joint conceptual framework on how to handle them. It would be seen, in the course of this negotiation, that most of the remaining “conditions” need to be resolved in the actual Membership agreements themselves, through commitments accompanying Membership. The way would then be clear for the actual negotiations for full Membership and the definitive resolution of the outstanding questions.

This program – an activation of Partnership, coupled with a series of serious consultations and negotiations on the expansion of NATO proper – would be akin to what Yeltsin asked for in his initial letter to NATO/NACC at the end of 1991. It is not a doctrinaire or exclusive plan; other steps can proceed at the same time, and can benefit from the context it provides. It would immediately provide a hope that is important to the Eastern countries and that would help protect them against desperation and extremism. Within 12-24 months it could lead to results sufficient to consolidate for the long term the orientation of the former East toward the democratic West.