Ever since the Alliance was formed, its image has been subject to many distortions and contradictions. Some of these myths originate from NATO itself as it claimed to deliver security and stability not only to its members but also globally. In reality though, it is above all an instrument for furthering various and sometimes competing interests of its participants in military and political domains.
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization positions itself as the most successful military alliance in history and the most powerful political coalition of today. Nevertheless, the relations among its members have never been cloudless and its durability has been achieved through repeated revisions of organizational mandate. NATO’s capacity to adapt is currently being put to the test once again, probably the most serious one since the reassessment of Alliance’s mission after the end of the Cold War.
The objective of this report is to review various scenarios of the NATO development over the next decade. Considering the large number of parameters on which the probability of these scenarios depends, this assessment is aimed not so much at identifying the dominant trend in NATO evolution as at marking the key trade-offs, contradictions, and probable directions of transformations that define the limits of what is possible..