19
might provide, the United States asked NATO to expand its involvement in the
reconstruction of Afghanistan and Iraq.
NATO has officially agreed to help in both places, but in terms of the enthusiasm
with which the alliance has complied, the Iraq mission lags far behind. The more NATO
involves itself in crisis management and politically complex stabilization missions, the
more opportunity small state members will have for supplying soft power to the coalition.
While the power to persuade citizens on the ground has something to do with material
capabilities brought to the mission, legitimacy also depends on characteristics that do not
require a massive defense budget: openness with which aid is given, the courage with
which it is rendered in country, and whether an ally’s diplomacy adds to the choir of
voices underwriting the mission’s international justification.
Of course, if small NATO states today are in position to lend legitimacy to action
taken by a great power, they may freely wrest it back as well. None of the conventional
ways of understanding NATO draw much attention to power politics played by Denmark,
Spain, or Poland due to their relatively small size. Nevertheless, observers should take it
as more than a coincidence that these three countries have long-standing geopolitical
concerns outside those provided for them by the United States and NATO, and all three
also jumped on the soft power lever arm handed to them by the United States in post-
invasion Iraq. If the United States wishes for them to stay, or, in the case of Spain,
reconsider their departure from Iraq, the superpower is obliged to acknowledge their
needs as individual states apart from US goals.
23
Given the trajectory of NATO
22-34.
23
Richard Beeston, “Fears of a Vacuum As More Troops Go Home,” London Times (February 11, 2005).
Convention