NATO

Debate between Peter Bottomley and John Spellar

Thursday 4th July 2013 Commons Chamber

[Sir Peter Bottomley (Worthing West) (Con)]

NATO was originally a political grouping and then became military after the Berlin blockade, and particularly after the Korean war. The right hon. Gentleman is right to mention that the Labour Foreign Secretary of 1948 prepared the basis for the Western European Union, however. It has now gone, but it was an important part of the history of political and military co-operation in Europe.

[Mr Spellar]

The hon. Gentleman will also find that the North Atlantic treaty, including article 5, was signed in 1948 and that Ernie Bevin was the prime instigator of that. The hon. Gentleman is right that there were a limited number of countries and that other countries came in later, but that demonstrates the foresight of that Government, who saw the nature of the threat and recognised Britain’s responsibility to play our part in addressing it—and, as I have said, who saw the need to commission Britain’s first nuclear weapons programme.

We should also recognise and celebrate the fact that NATO has been one of the most successful military alliances in history, if not the most successful, especially if judged by the attainment of the objectives in restraining and containing an aggressive and virulent Soviet threat until the ultimate, and, in George Kennan’s prediction, inevitable—even if it was rather protracted—implosion of that empire. NATO protected the free world and western Europe, and also provided a beacon of hope for the liberation, with minimal bloodshed ultimately, of eastern Europe.

That does not mean that we should unthinkingly continue an organisation that has served us well in the past, but we must give serious consideration to adapting such an effective organisation to deal with emerging challenges and threats. I was very much taken by the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Bridgend (Mrs Moon) about the ability, through NATO, to undertake strategic thinking. The success of that policy of NATO inevitably and legitimately raised questions about the role of defence and collective security through NATO at the end of the cold war. My hon. Friend the Member for Islington North (Jeremy Corbyn) touched on that period during his contribution. I have to say, and I think that there would be some agreement on this among some Government Members, that the then Conservative Government, under their policy programme “Options for Change”, too readily reached for the so-called peace dividend, cut too far and too fast, and badly undermined our capability. They did not comprehend the stark warning from Senator Pat Moynihan that the world was still a dangerous place and that the end of the cold war represented perhaps less threat but also less peace.