A study of NATO enlargement to the east and European security architecture

Abstract

The Master’s Essay is going to focus on the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) enlargement to the East and its relationship with the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and Russia in European Security Architecture. With the end of the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union, NATO found itself in a dilemma. For some four decades during the Cold War, NATO protected the freedom and security of Western Europe from Soviet aggression. The Cold War is over, the Soviet Union is gone, and NATO faced no other great-power threat to its security. NATO responded to these new conditions in part by undertaking a major expansion effort. The hidden motive for expanding the alliance may be the desire to bring the fragile democracies of Eastern and Central Europe under NATO’s wing while Russia is too weak to do anything about it. On the other hand, NATO gains a unique opportunity to build improved security architecture in the whole of the Euro-Atlantic area and NATO came to play an essential role within the developing European Security Architecture.