V4 Countries in context of EU and NATO Security Policy

• bałkany
• czechy
• grupa wyszehradzka
• nato
• polska
• słowacja
• ue
• wegry

Introduction

Since the fall of communism twenty years have passed, and the Visegrad Countries (Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Slovakia) faced number of problems originated from the Soviet past, but we could experience many new things which brought us prosperity and the sense of freedom.

The process of democratisation, the transition to the market economy, the rule of law are organic parts of the former Western part of Europe, that’s why these were the general bases to be ensured if we wanted to reintegrate in Europe.

As it wasn’t an easy project, the Central European countries decided to cooperate on this field by founding the Visegrad Group on 15th February 1991 in memoriam to the historic royal meeting of 1335 in Visegrad by Lech Wałęsa, Václav Havel and József Antall. All of them (at the time of the foundation the V4 were composed of 3 countries as Slovaks and Czechs lived together until 1993) aspired for the European Union (EU) and the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation’s (NATO) membership. The official aims were to eliminate the communism, realise the social transformation and the European integration by joint efforts.

The 18 years of history brought its fruit as nowadays all us are members of the EU and NATO so that the main aims are accomplished but several fields of cooperation still exists justifying the necessity of a Central European organisation.

In the essay the history of the NATO is examined from the EU and V4 perspective concentrating on the milestones only. The cooperation and the competition between the EU and the NATO has been long time on the agenda, and it is worth to pay attention to the future possible cooperation on the operation between these two absolutely important international organisation.

As the Euro-Atlantic integration of the Visegrad Group is fulfilled several question raised upon the existence of the V4 so it is obvious that the essay has to monitor the fields of the cooperation and evaluate the results accomplished on the different issues but a few sentences also sacrificed to future of the Visegrad Countries from the aspect of a closer cooperation.

The 60th anniversary of the NATO

The end of the second World War didn’t bring the desired peace but a new world order arrived: the Cold War divided Europe into West and East according to the reorganisations of the continent in Yalta (4th February 1945 – 11th February 1945).
Sixty years ago, on 4th April 1949, the North Atlantic Treaty was signed aiming to ensure security and stability in the North Atlantic region against attacks from a third party (which refers mainly to the growing expansionist threat from the Soviet Union).

The constant enlargement (except for France, which left the NATO in 1966 according to the decision of Charles de Gaulle but returned under the presidency of Nicolas Sarkozy) during the last sixty years resulted that the organisation has extended from the 12 founder states to 28 members.

Of course the USSR couldn’t just simply look the foundation of such a military organisation so six years later the Warsaw Pact was born to counterbalance the joint power of the Atlantic countries. Contrary to the still existing NATO, the Warsaw Pact sank together with the Soviet Union. Although the emptiness caused by the disappearance of this latter military alliance, the main purpose and enemy of the NATO was eliminated creating an “identity crisis”.

As one of the greatest manifestations to prove that a new world order was born with the dissolution of the USSR, the republics which were ruled by the Soviets (but weren’t members of the Soviet Union) could join the NATO.

The Partnership for Peace (PfP) was launched in 1994 January for the V4 countries in the framework of the NATO. Establishment of PfP was calculated, to enclose former communist countries to NATO without annoying Russia. The Madrid Summit in 1997 marked the beginning of the NATO accession negotiation for Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland.

The first ones of the former Soviet Bloc were the three of the V4 who joined the NATO: Poland, Hungary and Czech Republic were welcomed in the alliance in 1999, Slovakia belonged to the second wave – after the fall of communism – along with Slovenia, the Baltic states, Bulgaria and Romania in 2004. Croatia and Albania showing that it is possible to recover from the Balkan war, joint the alliance in 2009.

Serbia, Montenegro and Bosnia are in the Partnership for Peace which is considered as the starting point on the road to the NATO. Macedonia because of it’s name dispute with Greece, first has to settle the debate than could belong to the Partnership for Peace.

As both the NATO and the European Union stated same purposes the cooperation between the two international organisations is inevitable. In the name of peace both of them endure to prevent and to solve crises and armed conflicts, fight against terrorism and to ensure stability by harmonising the military and civil dimension of the organisations.

The cooperation started by the Maastricht Treaty which created the Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) as a separate pillar of the EU, and together with the Western Union the road to the joint missions were based.

The next step was the Combined Joint Task Forces accompanied by the Berlin agreement in 1994 which aimed to harmonise the cooperation between Europe and NATO by developing the capabilities of the old continent. The Berlin plus five years later reinforced the European wish to posses the capacity for a European Security and Defence Policy (ESDP).

The institutionalisation framework of the relations was reached in 2001 and since then, NATO-EU summits have been hold several times. The real milestone was in 2004 by the initiative of creating the EU Rapid Reaction Units composed of EU Battlegroups (EU BG).

The cooperation in practice started in Bosnian war, where in 1995 the NATO deployed the Implementation Force (IFOR) to secure the Dayton Peace Treaty. It was transformed to the Stabilisation Force (SFOR) two years later, then in 2004 the EU Force (EUFOR)got the responsibility to ensure the peace in the region with less and less soldiers.

The Balkan Peninsula brought another field to prove the effectivity of the cooperation: after the Kosovo war the NATO deployed the Kosovo Force (KFOR) complemented by the United Nations Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK), to it’s civil part the Community contributed as well. Since 2008, the EU operates other civilian mission there: the EU Rule of Law Mission in Kosovo (EULEX). In 2003, the Macedonian civil war exacted the assistance of these international organisations.

Beyond Europe the EU and the NATO try to secure stability in Afghanistan as well: the NATO operates the multinational International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) and the EU launched its Rule of Law Mission (EUPOL) too.

The African continent also suffers from civil wars: the NATO and the EU gave assistance to the African Union in the Darfur and Sudan conflict. The new field of the team work was created due to the spreading piracy off the coast of Somalia. Since September 2008 EU naval forces has been controlling the corn of the Africa along with some other parties.

{mospagebreak}NATO – EU: cooperation or competition?

In the last few years both NATO and EU underwent some transformations. NATO, apart from the purely military aspects, has been involved into the field of its interest founding energy safety and stability, which had been rather the domain of EU earlier. On the other hand, EU does not depend on the NATO’s ensuring the safety and developments CFSP. Such doubling of the aims may result in unnecessary costs and misunderstandings.

The launching of the NATO Response Force initiative (NRF) was announced in 2002 and was fully developed by 2006. It can number up to 25 000 troops which are able to be deployed five days after issuing a command and sustain itself for the operations lasting 30 days. Article 23 of the Riga Summit Declaration from 2006 states that NRF can be used also for EU purposes .

Nevertheless, Brussels decided to develop its own armed forces capable of being rapidly deployed in case of crisis. Conception of creating European rapid response forces was expressed first time in „Helsinki Headline Goal 2003” and reaffirmed in „Headline Goal 2010” approved by General Affairs and External Relations Council .

Full operational capacity of the first EU Battlegroups was reached in 2007. Every single - or multinational Battlegroup consists of approximately 1 500 soldiers prepared to be deployed in five to ten days in every corner of the world . Every time there are minimum two Battlegoups standing by and their readiness is a half year long period in a rotating system.

EU, as well as NATO, stresses its readiness to cooperate with UN and other international organisations . Brussels directly underlines that „the EU is attentive to develop its military tools and capabilities, where requirements overlap, in a mutually reinforcing way with NATO initiatives such as the NATO Response Force” . Moreover, in Europe exists a third multinational unit designed for a rapid reaction – Eurocorps, which is at the disposal of both EU and NATO.

Existence of two, or even three, similar rapid forces groups may be perceived as a needless competition within the European countries. However, what is noteworthy, is the fact that EU needs more independence in military policy to play a significant role on a geopolitical scene. The necessity of a more intense cooperation in Europe is the argument in favour of EU BG as well. The armed forces from both outside NATO and the EU colla within this initiative. BG has also contributed to reinforce the regional partnerships. For example, in Nordic BG countries such as Sweden, Finland, Estonia, Ireland and Norway work together, another one consists of Germany, Czech Republic and Austria; in the Polish-led Battlegroup Poland, Germany, Slovakia, Latvia and Lithuania do cooperate.

In the Joint Communiqué from April 2007 the Ministers of Defence of the Visegrad Group Countries welcomed the discussion about Visegrad Battlegroup. It might be established „in the horizon beyond 2015” . Visegrad Battlegroup could be a proper tool to enclose V4 countries and give them another pretext to enforce the joint cooperation.

European Union Battlegroups gave a solution for non-NATO countries engaging in regional peacekeeping problems. Constitutionally neutral Austria is rather far from accession to NATO, however Vienna fully participates in one of the BG. Just as Finland and Sweden. They contribute to regional and European stability. Moreover, participation in EU military initiative of two Scandinavian countries is easier to present it for Russia, than a possible accession of this countries to the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation.

The Western Balkan and the Eastern Partnership from the V4 perspective

So far, the most successful and credible part of the EU CFSP is the enlargement, although it seems like the further continuation is facing with several problems (under the pretext of the Lisbon Treaty) that could set back these processes.

At the present, the EU has three candidate countries which are the following: Croatia, Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia and Turkey. From the Visegrad Group the Western Balkan and the EU’s recently launched Eastern Partnership are the most important.

The borders of the Visegrad countries excluding the Czech Republic, compose the Eastern border of the EU and the Schengen area and they should take advantage of this unique geopolitical position but this also involves special kind of responsibility.

The Balkan Peninsula is just recovering from a horrible war and the EU would like to make efforts in order to stabilize the region and integrate them into the organization. The V4 declared in a joint statement during a V4+ meeting in 2007 that they would support the accession of the countries of the region to the EU .

Although there are differences on the question of Kosovo, as Slovakia expressed its unwillingness to recognize the independence of the new country, but one couldn’t find further discrepancies on the other states of the peninsula.

Croatia has the brightest prospects to join the Community and the V4 countries openly endorsed the wish to welcome Croatia as the next new member of the EU. However there is still unsolved Slovenian-Croatian conflict in Piran Bay which stopped Croatian accession negotiations. It could be a space for V4-led consiliations, nevertheless V4 hasn’t engaged into negotiations yet.

As new members of the integration it’s our duty and responsibility to approve and to promote the aspirations of the candidate and potential candidate countries to become member states.
Between the Visegrad countries it is Hungary which has the greatest interests in the integration and stabilization of the Western Balkan, as it shares a long border with Croatia and Serbia, but fortunately the other states agree on the Hungarian position on this issue. In April 2009 by assuming the responsibility for the Western Balkan, Hungary initiated a letter aiming to urge to visa liberalization of the Western Balkan addressed to the relevant commissioners and to the Czech Presidency. The letter was supported by the other V4 countries as well, which could be estimated as a great step to ease the citizens of the region to travel to the Schengen area.

The European Neighbourhood Policy deals with the Neighbouring countries and regions, and the so-called Eastern Partnership initiated by the Poles and Swedish takes part of this program. As Poland shares long border with Ukraine and Belarus and those countries have significant Polish minorities, it is obvious that the Polish government is the advocate of this Eastern Partnership.

The whole EU is also paying intense attention to the new initiative as having borders with those parties included in this program could serve the Community’s interests as well. Besides stabilizing and promoting democracy in those countries, the EU would like to create free trade agreements with the region and agree on visa liberalization but a more important aspect is that the region plays a special role in the EU’s energy security and gas war and Georgian war showed the vulnerability of the territory showing the risk for Europe as well at the same time.
The idea got highlight and was launched officially during the Czech EU Presidency which proves that in this field, the cooperation works on high level (in every sense) as the Czechs represented and urged an idea on EU level which is in the interest of every V4 countries.
But the Eastern dimension of Europe and the importance of integrating and helping are not only an EU matters but a serious question in the light of the NATO’s future as well. During George W. Bush, the enlargement of the NATO with Georgia and Ukraine was on the agenda, but mainly because of the loud resistance of some EU countries the idea failed as for the moment.

The Eastern dimension from both organizations affects the relations with Russia. Moscow is very nervous about a possible Euro-Atlantic integration of the former Soviet Union’ Republics keeping on repeating that the EU and the NATO violate its sphere of influences which refers to the rhetoric of the Cold War era.

In such circumstances it is absolutely necessary from the Central European countries lived previously under the rule of the Soviet Union to represent a common position and of course the launch of the Eastern Partnership can be accepted as an impressive success, but further steps are needed to be made.

Both the Western Balkan dimension and the Eastern Partnership has a great chance to be the most successful parts of the CFSP and the V4 countries are in that position that they are absolutely involved in this question so they should play a more active role in these questions.
As far as it was possible to get information about the priorities the Hungarian Presidency from July 2009 this EU issues will play a central role in the life of the Visegrad Group and we are looking forward to the concrete plans.

Problems affecting V4 internal relations

Maintaining good-neighbourhood relations with Russia is not only a Scandinavian problem. Cold bilateral Polish-Russian and Czech-Russian relations affect cooperation in V4. Appraised as „friendly pragmatics” Hungary and Slovakia prefer rather to search for economic aspect of coexistence with its huge ex-neighbour. The likeness of Poles and Czechs for US missile defence system is understandable for its V4 partners. Unfortunately Russian-sceptic policy of Presidents Klaus and Kaczyński has a significant chance to be continued in Poland as well as in Czech Republic.

However aggressive moves of Russian government in Slovakia (its efforts to take over Slovakian pipelines after Yukos’ bankruptcy) and Gasprom’s in Hungary (purchasing the MOL’s stocks without the agreement of the Hungarians) may trigger the deterioration of the Russian relations with those countries.

Also the attitude assuming the easy access of Ukraine and Georgia to NATO supported by the Visegrad Group is a controversial point in the relations between all the four countries and Russia. Therefore, Bratislava and Budapest prefer to focus on the European Eastern Partnership than on the enlargement of NATO.

Visegrad Group may also have the problems with communicating on the European area. The Budget of EU established for the years 2014-2020 will be probably the first one to include countries such as the Czech Republic or Hungary as the possible net payers. Poland, still the payee of the European funds, will be in favor of the biggest possible union budget. The Czech Republic and Hungary may acquire quite reverse points of view. A common position of the whole group during the negotiation of the next EU budget would be a great success of the Visegrad cooperation.

{mospagebreak}The reasons for cooperating

Like in case of every international organization the question arises here as well: why should the given countries cooperate?

The historical background combined with common cultural roots of the four countries is obvious to everyone who lives in this region. The origins of the Visegrad Group are widely known: founding the way to the adhesion to the European Union and reaching the membership in the Euro-Atlantic integration. The most obvious manifestations of these aims have already been fulfilled: the V4 countries are members of the EU and the NATO.

In this situation, one may ask why we should move on with this cooperation. Well, several answers can be given to this question, now we are going to examine only a few, but determined options for the future cooperation.

The most important reason which justifies the existence of the V4 is the power of the member countries. Or rather the non-power of the countries. None of the four republics appear on the international scene (not even on the European scene) as a significant or influential player, their voice is simply silent when they try to act alone.

The great member states like for example France with huge population and significant political power can alter the processes of the decision and can give voice to their opinion – see for instance the Turkish EU accession.

The so-called small state syndrome combined with historical disadvantages affects all these Central European states which can be exceeded only by joint force. If one examines the Visegrad countries in the context of their weight in the European Parliament, their population and their territory, interesting results can be discovered.

The territory of the four countries is 532 km2 altogether, the population is around 65 million, they dispose 116 members out of 785 in the European Parliament . These figures lead us to the consequences that the Visegrad countries as a group are having almost the same parameters like France and in terms of MEPs they represent a significant number in the EU’s co-legislator, supervisor power.

In territorial and in population aspect the V4 appears as an influential power which can influence the processes and the development of the EU.

This latter case also gets importance if take into account that a potential Paris-Berlin tandem was about to be created, at least during the French EU Presidency the cooperation between these countries on the main issues seemed very effective and to counterbalance their power none of the Visegrad countries could be successful but a strong regional cooperation could solve the problem.

So with a common and determined position on serious issues, the Visegrad countries would dispose a significant power which could influence in big proportion the results of the European decisions.

For the EU it was always important to highlight that it is not a multi-speed organization and all the members are equal. But small, new member states always have had the concern that old members are more equal and they belong only to the second category. To avoid this awkward situation, to be equal in every sphere, the small countries need to cooperate, to agree on questions affecting them.

Currently the Visegrad Group holds informal meetings prior to EU summits but what is more important is to reach and form common position otherwise nobody would take this organization and its propositions seriously and the pure existence of the V4 could be queried.
The reason for cooperating is justified by an other very important cause: besides the common historical traditions the Visegrad countries have to recognize their similar geopolitical situation. If we put aside the historical reasons that justifies the common importance and the similarity in the geopolitical aspects (like the neighbouring Germany and the expansionist Soviet Union), the events of the last few years give us evidence that geopolitics deserve examination.

Just to mention a few things in brief: the infrastructural grids which can inspire - besides international transportation and logistics - the tourism, which in the economic downturn declines but by a convincing and modern infrastructure the process can be reversed.

The geopolitical situation is strongly connected to the energy sources which nowadays appear on the international scene as main concerns. Europe (and so like the Visegrad Group) heavily depends on the Russian crude oil and natural gas sources and transport. The gas war in January proved that Russia absolutely returned to the unilateral world dominated by the US. The threat that once on a cold winter day the Visegrad Group won’t be able to provide heating to its population should urge the aim to find solutions which could offer alternative energy sources that don’t depend that much on the Russians.

An other option in this situation would be to focus on the renewable energy and its production as this is how the EU would like to solve the current financial crisis (using more green energy), but this region is lagging behind Western Europe in this aspect.

One more reason could be to help each other on the way to join to the euro zone, although Slovakia has already fulfilled this goal, but she could suggest economic solutions to the rest whom could consult on this topic to find the best way in this aspect.

The future prospects for the Visegrad Group

The future of the Visegrad Group has several options but maybe the institutionalization could be the best way to ensure a prospering future for the organization.

The institutionalization of the Visegrad group has been for long time on the agenda but so far – besides the successful Visegrad Fund – no real progress could be measured on this issue. One can argue that there is no need to convert the V4 into an over bureaucratic organization, but if one sacrifices a few minutes to scrutinize the other two regional co-operations within the EU – the Nordic Council of Ministers and the Benelux – , one can notice that they also maintain an institutional framework which seems to be working.

In the case of the Visegrad countries the starting point could be a mini-institutional framework which would assist and facilitate the task of the Prime Ministers and Presidents but wouldn’t mean a political commitment right at the beginning and the bureaucracy wouldn’t find place in it to net the organization.

The one official meeting of the Prime Ministers in a year is not enough – of course the result and goals achieved by the Presidencies have to be evaluated – but it is still not satisfactory even if we add the informal meetings of the leaders and of the experts of the countries. Prime Ministers and Presidents are too busy and during one meeting the problems of a whole year cannot be solved. Many different things are happening in a year that’s why a more serious form should be created for operating the Visegrad Group.

In the Declaration of 2004 several areas for cooperation were defined, but to put them into a real form, to ensure the continuity and the functioning of these aims a supervising organ is necessary.

The mentioned fields to cooperate are wishing for closer integration. A General Commission might be founded with several sub commissions.

The General Commission could have 20 members (four from each country) to coordinate and harmonize the functioning of the Sub-Commissions. They would meet twice in 6 months and they would be responsible for preparing the presidential and ministerial meetings.

Each sub-commission would be devoted to the topics declared in 2004. Each of them is very important and the initiation to deal with these fields has to be appreciated but they have to move beyond the plans while paying attention not to over-bureaucratize the V4 at the same time.

The sub-commissions could be operated only by four members (one from each country) but with frequent meetings, maybe held every month, or once in two months to ensure the continuity of this organ.

It would be important as experts of the given field could focus on the appointed topic and between the meetings, they would be responsible to collect information from their home country and to present the agreements and the developments of their sub-commission to their nation.

Guidelines of Declaration of 2004 covers maybe the most important fields of cooperation, and many of them are useful in respect of the EU and the NATO as well; maybe somehow all of them could be linked to these international organizations.

Just to mention some of them: the defence and arm industries or the fight against terrorism are absolutely important from the view of the NATO, but the future strengthening of the EU is also looking forward to a harmonized defence system. If the V4 states could form a common position (and for this a sub-commission could be very useful) that would serve as an initiation to the EU security and foreign policy as well (suggesting that a cooperation is possible in this field).

The cultural and educational aspects (with the student exchange and sciences) have already been institutionalized in the framework of the Visegrad Fund. It could be assumed that this Fund is the most successful part of the Visegrad Group (besides the realized EU and NATO membership) at least in the eyes of whom have already taken part in any of the Fund’s program or have already been granted.

In our opinion, the Visegrad Fund serves as a perfect example which proves that the institutional form can work. The events and the granted programs attract a lot of visitors all over the countries but during these events, it should be emphasized more that this could have been come into existence thanks to the Visegrad Fund.

Somehow it should be reached that the civil sphere could get more information about the possibilities of the Visegrad Group and the perspectives offered by this organization. The more effective way would be to organize more festivals and events in the name of Visegrad Group, because this is the easiest way to reach the citizens. Or create something similar to the European Year of Intercultural Dialogue that the EU launched last year.

{mospagebreak}Conclusion

NATO and EU play now a crucial role in the world’s peacekeeping. Stabilization missions organized by the both alliances contribute to the sustainable growth in many regions of the world. A lot of tasks are being already fulfilled in a spirit of complement operations between NATO and EU. An example may be the cooperation of the NATO forces and EUPOL mission provided by EU in Afghanistan. European Union supports also the Provincial Reconstruction Teams led by NATO in the country. The military activity of the both organizations in the same regions of the world may invoke the fears for the efficiency of their mission. Therefore, a solution assuming the focus of NATO on the forcible solving the conflicts and the EU’s emphasis on the civil, legal and security aid should be perhaps taken into consideration.

Still greater role in the both organizations play the Mid-European countries, especially the ones constituting the Visegrad Group. It creates a field to intensify the cooperation of those countries. A common policy of V4 stands a chance to be regarded affirmatively on the forum of both NATO and EU. Institutionalization of the cooperation of V4 we suggest may result in positive effects and facilitate agreeing on one, unilateral, firm position. The stronger Visegrad Group might be a counterbalance for strongly intertwined Berlin and Paris. Moreover, more institutionalized V4 would be able to stating one common policy by the means on conciliation in aspects such as abolition of American visas, the building of US missile defence system or Nabucco and the improvement of the energetic safety in the region, as well as supporting the attempts of the countries of West Balkans to join NATO and EU. Together, the countries of V4 may also contribute to boosting the safety in the region by the closer military cooperation both within NATO and EU. What is significant is also the involvement into the democratisation of the countries of Eastern Europe that could gain importance due to the closer cooperation.

Intensification of the international cooperation conduces to the rising of the level of worldwide safety level and the economical and social development in all aspects. Therefore, it is important to draw in NATO-led Partnership for Peace, European Neighbourhood Policy and as many countries as possible in the process, while involving these relevant players into solving the world conflicts leads to positive effects. Visegard Group might, or even should, become the guide of the actions of both NATO and the EU in Central Europe. The development of safety and cooperation in the region is a great challenge for V4. It needs to undertake it regardless of whether it will do this in less or more institutionalised form.

Sources

1. History of the Visegrad Group, Visegrad Group
2. NATO-EU relations, NATO
3. Riga Summit Declaration issued by the Heads of State and Government participating in the meeting of the North Atlantic Council in Riga on 29 November 2006
4. Headline Goal 2010 approved by GAERC on 17 May 2004 endorsed by the European Council of 17 and 18 June 2004
5. EU Battlegroups factsheet, EU Counsil Secretariat
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8. Joint Communiqué of the Ministers of Defence of the Visegrad Group Countries, Bratislava, 12 April 2007
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Co-author: Edit Csavajda is a graduate of Budapesti Corvinus Egyetem (Hungary)