International Politics

, Volume 46, Issue 5, pp 550–572 | Cite as

NATO in Afghanistan: perilous mission, dire ramifications

Original Article
First Online:

Abstract

This paper focuses on analysing NATO's involvement in Afghanistan, a current issue in the interaction between two main constituents of the West, the United States and Europe, with a part of the Muslim world. NATO forces in Afghanistan are engaged in one of the severest battles in the organisation's history. A failure in Afghanistan will have great implications for the transatlantic relationship as well as for the relations between the Muslim world and the West. The Alliance has been able to successfully deal with numerous challenges in the past. Would it be able to overcome the latest challenge? The aim of this paper is to examine this question. The paper starts with analysing the dynamics through which NATO reinvented itself in the 1990s, and then focuses on the post-9/11 era and the deployment of NATO forces in Afghanistan. The challenges posed by the resurgence of the Taliban insurgency are examined next, followed by a discussion of the internal rifts within NATO in general and regarding Afghanistan in particular. The conclusion assesses the chances of NATO's success and makes some policy recommendations.

Keywords

NATO the United States Europe post-9/11 Afghanistan Taliban insurgency 
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Copyright information

© Palgrave Macmillan 2009

Authors and Affiliations

  1. 1.Department of PoliticsUniversity of OtagoNew Zealand

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