Can NATO Survive Afghanistan?
Since 2003, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization has led the operation of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) to “establish conditions in which Afghanistan can enjoy a representative government and self-sustaining peace and security.” However, ISAF has struggled to bring stability to Afghanistan, prompting concerns about its chances for meeting those objectives. Moreover, senior U.S. officials referred in spring 2008 to a possible “existential crisis” for NATO, as a result of tensions within the alliance over member countries’ troop-level and mission task commitments to ISAF. This collection of articles examines the significant challenges facing NATO as it conducts its first mission outside the Euro-Atlantic arena in its nearly sixty-year history.
