Make Love Not War: NATO 'Should Stop Creating Enemies and Become Useful'

© AFP 2023 / JOHN THYSThe NATO emblem is seen before a defence ministers meeting at the NATO headquarters in Brussels on October 22, 2013
The NATO emblem is seen before a defence ministers meeting at the NATO headquarters in Brussels on October 22, 2013 - Sputnik International
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Instead of "creating enemies," NATO could have transformed into a humanitarian organization that "could be useful without weapons," analyst Jan Oberg told RT, but this is not the path the North Atlantic Alliance appears to be on.

"I have always had a dream to see NATO as a new humanitarian organization, where we could use the technology, the communication, the highly educated people, and I am sure a lot of NATO people would like to do good for the world. And we need desperately somebody who can do a transport for earthquake situations and things like that," the head of the Transnational Foundation for Peace and Future Research noted.

NATO's priorities lie elsewhere. The Pentagon recently announced that it would drastically increase its defense budget for and military presence in Europe. The organization has been determined to conduct more military drills and open additional command and control centers close to Russia's borders.

© AP Photo / Alik KepliczIn this June 18, 2015,file photo flags wave in front of soldiers who take positions with their army vehicles during the NATO Noble Jump exercise on a training range near Swietoszow Zagan, Poland
In this June 18, 2015,file photo flags wave in front of soldiers who take positions with their army vehicles during the NATO Noble Jump exercise on a training range near Swietoszow Zagan, Poland - Sputnik International
In this June 18, 2015,file photo flags wave in front of soldiers who take positions with their army vehicles during the NATO Noble Jump exercise on a training range near Swietoszow Zagan, Poland

The eastward expansion is also on the agenda. Oberg warned that implications of adding new members could be detrimental to the alliance. The organization runs the risk of overstretching and losing its purpose.

Supreme Allied Commander Europe, U.S. General Philip M. Breedlove. - Sputnik International
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"When you get bigger, and bigger, and bigger, and quantity in itself is a merit, things will at some point be overextended: too many members; too many conflicts internally; too many long transport distances," he explained.

Oberg urged the bloc to focus on cooperating and making friends instead. We "should have policies that make other people friendly to us instead of bullying everybody and then expect them to be kind to us," he observed.

Should NATO fail to adapt to new realities, it should cease to exist, Oberg asserted. Irish freelance journalist Danielle Ryan echoed this sentiment.

"Sixty-seven years after its founding, NATO exists for no good reason. Where threats don't exist, it imagines them. Where tensions should be minimal, it heightens them. In the grander scheme of things, it serves the interests of only one of its members. It's time to call it a day," she suggested in an opinion piece for RT.

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