How on earth does NATO have any relevance in today’s political climate, and more to the point why should I be invited to intend a discussion forum that was specifically intended to widen the membership of this cold-war dinosaur? Before attending the conference I would have been hard pushed to answer these questions to my own satisfaction, let alone to a non-military third-party despite this being the second YROW I have attended. As with the previous one, - this was an eye-opener and an education.
The four-day conference (15-18 May 08) took place in the HQ of the Bulgarian Red Cross just outside Sofia. Along with Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Slovenia, Slovakia and Romania, Bulgaria is one of the recent ex-Warsaw Pact nations to join the organisation, as part of NATO’s gradual expansion eastwards. While the previous conference illustrated to me that essential ingredient to NATO’s successful functioning, fully-consensual decision making, this one demonstrated the precursor to that process: a need to fully understand the differences and difficulties of our partners around the same table. Ostensibly the theme given to us for discussion was how to improve the tripartite relationship between employer, employee and defence ministry. However, we very quickly determined that since many of the joiners still retain a significant Soviet weighting to their traditions, very few have any such relationship at all, either legislated or informal. Several examples were given from different nations of how the concept of a volunteer reserve had yet to even be considered so that when leaving the forces, or even upon joining a key industry like medicine, an individual automatically becomes a military reservist. As such, an employer receives no compensation, and is frequently expected to keep paying their worker, even if they are called-up for an extended period in an area that has little to do with maintaining their civilian skills. Three very common outcomes for this situation were mentioned. Either the employee develops a medical condition that prevents their deployment, the employer doesn’t ever hire reservists (or upon call-up simply fires them), or the reservist just doesn’t receive their civilian pay and deserts as they go into debt. Many of these countries are in the process of developing legislation to improve this situation, but details on the precise nature of how they want to enshrine this relationship are still sketchy.
Naturally, since we were intending to assist the transition of our new partners along the voluntary, and more market-driven route so they can learn from our mistakes, talk moved to the fortes and foibles of the Western model. We started with the role of the Defence Ministries in treading the very fine line between filling their manpower needs in the ranks, alienating employers across the board and keeping the divorce rate within bounds. To the fore were some wry observations from a Dutch Reservist Major – cunningly disguised as a young officer – who described the need for each party to seduce the others as to what they can offer to and require from the union, and in the process ensure they are not placed in a position to be left out-of-pocket. We have seen in the UK that although the 1996 Reserve Forces Act gives the MoD considerable power to call-up reservists without notice, albeit with a clause giving the employer an ability to appeal, it has been discovered that a considerably more consensual call-up process can pay significant long-term dividends in maintaining morale within the Reserves by giving individuals a chance to keep their employer on-side. On the downside we have seen that even if an individual has manoeuvred themselves into a position where there is a role for them to be called up in to, the MoD simply may not contest an employers appeal, however ill-founded. This leads to considerably frustration for the reservist wishing to use his skills and gives the unit with the gap a bad-taste for the perceived reliability of reservists. Royal Marine Reservists are extremely keen to join their regular counterparts in roles right across the board, but communicating the particular difficulties of our situation to them can be a challenge. The old-school phrase is that a reservist is twice the citizen. I prefer the suggestion from my Spanish Royal Marine opposite number: A reservist is twice the masochist.
During the wrap-up each group gave presentations with the summary of our dialogues. From these it is clear that even with the benefit of longer-standing traditions with enlisted, rather than conscripted forces, the NATO-originals have not yet found all the answers. However, bringing in the new members under the Partnership for Peace Program does enable us to share our experiences with the decision makers in the club and realise the commonality of understanding that is the essential precursor to creating an undivided strategy for dealing with the new military challenges facing the world.
