NATO was created on April 4th 1949 as a military alliance of “democratic” states against the evil (red) East. It served its mission up to year 1991, the dissolution of the Soviet Union, and at that time the reason to keep the alliance was weak.

However, the bright minds of the modern European civilization managed not only to create a raison de vivre for the organization, thus managing to keep it alive, but even succeeded in enlarging it.

The question is: was it really necessary?

Of course, another threat emerged — the evil (green) Terrorism, which certainly needed some attention from the Western side (in the end, how else can it succeed if there’s no reaction?). But, as most of the readers already know, missions in Aghanistan and Iraq were not NATO’s per se (since some NATO countries opposed it), thought the ISAF and the ‘coalition of the willing’ countries overlapped with NATO members. And today fewer people are talking about the true “unity” within the organization.

In most countries, when a person reaches a certain age (say, 65), it is deemed usual for her or him to rest and give way for the up and coming. Sometimes the elderly find themeselves harder to accomodate with new circumstances, they are prone to miscalculations and reluctant to reforms. Of course, elderly workers are valuable — they have experience.

However, what if the experience is already outdated?

In fact, this is not really about NATO — it’s about mindsets, huge rigid organizations and the future.

Alliances have a huge history, they evolved over centuries and have already changed their features greatly: the alliances in the Peloponessian War were nothing like those during the Crusades, and Entente Cordiale is hardly NATO. The change is always there, nothing is eternal under the moon, the alliances are no exception.

When we are talking about networks, Big Data, new security threats and the rise of the individual, such structures and organizations seem outdated. Today we have achieved an immense level of cooperation in a variety of spheres, from economic to humanitarian, but NATO played little role in this. Being a Cold War creation, it remids us of the confrontation period rather than stimulates further development (and I am not speaking only about Africa here). Isn’t it strange: bloc confrontation no longer exists, but one of the blocs still does?

Today, before you start a war, you ask yourself a dozen times at least: “Does it serve my interests? Will I win more than lose?” The reason is simple — wars cost more than they used to. But Article 5 of the Washington treaty makes it easier for you to get involved in a conflict.

If you want to cooperate with someone, or if you want your business to prosper — you have to be as flexible as you can. The ‘coalition of the willing’ is a good exmaple: countries want flexibility which NATO cannot provide.

In our modern, complicated, interconnected, more cooperative and less violent world, do we really need NATO? What for, exactly?