W(h)ither NATO?

NATO is an organization that, as far as I can see, has largely outlived its usefulness.

NATO, when it was formed, had one clear objective: To unite the nations of western Europe militarily in order to prepare for and deter an attack by the Soviet Union. It also had one unstated objective, which was to ensure that Germany did not become militarily dominant.

The prime reason for NATO's existence became obsolete two decades ago, when the Soviet Union crumbled and the Cold War ended. Nations of both the old Warsaw Pact and some of the new nations that were formerly Soviet republics have joined NATO. At the same time, the Russian defense establishment fell apart under its own weight.

Most of the old Soviet navy has rusted away at anchorage. What warships remain in service are largely ships build in Soviet times. Russian shipyards cannot build a reliable nuclear submarine, as the fiasco of the construction of the K-152/INS Chakra has shown. Russian shipyards cannot build a serviceable amphibious landing ship, which is why the Russian navy is buying them from the French.

The Russian army is not much better. The Russian army reportedly has both poorly-aid and barely trained draftees (draft-dodging is a large-scale sport in Russia) and better trained volunteers, who are in different units. Supposedly it was the volunteer units which rather effortlessly rolled up the Georgians two years ago. Their equipment is largely Soviet-era design.

More to the point, the Russian army (except for the forces in Kaliningrad), is 800 miles further to the east than it was two decades ago. The Russian army does not have the capability to roll across the Northern European Plain. Still, the old "Cold Warriors", largely conservative men who cannot accept the reality that the Soviet Union had collapsed, have hung on ever since, hyping the so-called Russian threat.

The so-called Russian threat, at least to the core nations of NATO, has not existed for two decades.

So why does NATO survive? What is its reason for being?