Strategic Realities: Deepen Transatlantic Ties with the European Union – Not NATO – to Cooperate in the Indo-Pacific

At the Madrid Summit in June 2022, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) released its new Strategic Concept, sounding a tough new tone on China. The document, which lays out the Alliance’s strategic purpose and priorities until 2030, acknowledges China’s “stated ambitions and assertive behaviour”, present “systematic challenges” to transatlantic security. In a discussion of these challenges, NATO characterises Beijing’s policies as “assertive and coercive”, its hybrid and cyber activities as “malicious”, and its rhetoric as “confrontational”. More alarming still is the “deepening strategic partnership” between China and Russia, with the document warning that “their mutually reinforcing attempts to undercut the rules-based international order run counter to our values and interests”. Since the Strategic Concept constitutes the second most important political document after NATO’s founding treaty, the inclusion of China the first time—coming amid the war in Ukraine—is a watershed moment in the Alliance’s history…