PORTUGAL: COMMANDER VIRGILIO DE CARVALHO ANALYSES SITUATION OF NATO

Portuguese Navy Commander Virgilio de Carvalho highlights the great difference between NATO’s Balkans campaign and all its former campaigns. “If NATO is the alliance with the greatest success in history, it owes this to being a maritime one (the great wars were all won by sea powers), and to being a democratic and defensive one, with a well defined geographical area of intervention, adequate for the clear and exclusive reason of the defence of Europe against historical hegemonies which intended to conquer the Continent.” For this, read “Germany, Second World War”. Commander Carvalho points out that even in the Gulf War, the objective was clear: some NATO countries, under the auspices of the United Nations and the Arab League, fought to make Iraq pull out of Kuweit. In the Balkans, NATO “intervened outside its area and without listening to the UNO, so as to, in the name of the defence of Europe, bar the Slavic-Orthodox corridor from Ruissia to the Mediterranean…which created a break in its cohesion and reputation”. He points out that certain Continental European countries are looking to alternatives, namely an EU intervention force.

TIMOTHY BANCROFT-HINCHEY, PRAVDA.RU, LISBON