An argument on the legitimacy of NATO even after the collapse of the U.S.S.R and the need for Canada to remain an active participant in the military bloc.
This paper examines how Canada’s role in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization is insignificant compared to the other member states and attempts to show that Canada has little choice but to remain part of NATO. In order to understand this argument, it provides an examination of NATO, its history and a record of the organization’s involvement in Bosnia and Kosovo. It looks at how valid NATO is in the present day, 15 years after its mandate was toppled. The state of Canada’s armed forces are also discussed, focusing on what and who, led to their weakness. A study of arguments calling for Canada’s withdrawal from NATO is then presented, followed by accounts stating that Canada has no choice but to remain a part of NATO.
“Since the end of the Soviet threat to the West in the early 1990’s, NATO has gone through an identity crisis. Through the Cold War, NATO’s existence was validated by immense conventional force buildup in Eastern Europe by the Warsaw Pact. The West sincerely believed, quite suitably, that they were under imminent threat of a Soviet attack. However, after 1991, “NATO no longer seemed necessary to keep the Russians out or the Germans down.” Instead of disbanding, NATO decided to change its prerogatives and find a new meaning, a fresh claim to validity.”