Building Security in the New Europe: NATO, CSCE, the EC and a New Idea

Abstract

I am curious that the organisers of the Conference: ‘Europe 1945–1990s: the End of an Era?’ should have chosen to place a question mark after the title. In my own mind no such implied doubt exists. Admittedly great trouble still may threaten the West out of the former-Soviet Union, but the grip of a totalitarian political philosophy and organisation on Central and Eastern Europe has finally been broken. The change in security terms is profound. The Warsaw Pact has dissolved. The strategic borderline in Europe no longer runs through the middle of Germany but is to the east of Poland. The forces to the east of that line, although they appeared still powerful in 1991, would it was foreseen soon be smaller than those to the west of it.

The present chapter was completed in 1991 and it represents the author’s views at that time. In spite of the many changes in the European scene, in the opinion of the editor the main issues and problems raised by the author are still valid.