THE WORLD : DIPLOMACY : Don’t Make NATO Any Bigger, Retire It

Eastward expansion of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization is a bad idea. Its most probable results would include all the outcomes the U.S. foreign-policy Establishment professes to avoid: a divided Europe; a United States burdened with new, costly and unnecessary commitments; a dubious U.S. credibility; an alienated Russia, and an insecure Eastern Europe.

The American public has been told that NATO expansion is necessary to preserve the alliance, but nobody has had the audacity to ask why the organization has to be preserved after the Cold War? If its purpose of keeping the Russians out, the Americans in and the Germans down has been exhausted, if the alliance is confident of Germany’s transformation and the lack of a threat from Russia, perhaps the organization has reached the end of its useful life.

Nevertheless, the expand-or-die litany of proponents of a bigger NATO generally pivots on one of three rationales.

* An enlarged security alliance would preserve the trans-Atlantic link and sustain U.S. engagement in Europe through a military presence there.

But what would be the purpose of stationing American soldiers on the continent? To serve as a trip wire against the Russian threat? Hardly, since NATO-expansion advocates insist that Russia is no longer a menace to its former East European satellites. In fact, Russia is sometimes mentioned as a future member of NATO.

* NATO expansion would stabilize Eastern Europe.

Since the end of the Cold War, ethnic conflict, border disputes and lesser issues have arisen in the region, but NATO would seem to be a poor vehicle to resolve them. Indeed, the states of the former Yugoslavia should be prime candidates for admission into NATO, because that’s where the alliance’s stabilizing presence and military muscle are needed more than anywhere else in Europe.

But for Eastern Europeans worried about their security, the tragedy of Bosnia, in particular, and the West’s policy toward the former Yugoslavia, in general, should mean one and only one thing: There is no political will among members of the Western alliance to intervene in ethnic and civil wars of the post-communist era where the alliance’s interests are not directly affected.

Rather, Poland’s stability and democratic transition will best be enhanced by securing greater access to European markets, not by hollow guarantees against nonexistent threats. By the same token, Hungary’s and Slovakia’s ethnic tensions will be alleviated when the two countries can fully participate in Europe’s economic institutions, though that day is probably a long time off.

* NATO expansion is a necessary hedge against the possibility of Russian irredentism.

That’s no reason, however, to expand NATO now or anytime soon. Russia is--and will remain for a long time--too weak to threaten Eastern Europe militarily. There would be plenty of time to counter any such moves.

For the West--and the United States--the key strategic choice in post-Cold War Europe is between trying to breathe new life into an outdated security arrangement or shaping a new security order that includes Russia from square one. No matter how the new Europe defines its boundaries, Russia will always be part of the European security equation, either as a partner in helping ensure security and stability in Europe’s East or as a threat for the rest of the continent to mobilize its energies against.

The one positive aspect of the debate over NATO expansion is that the alliance will have to make up its mind about which Russia exists. To expand means to define Russia as a threat. Not to expand means Russia is a partner.

The choice made by proponents of a larger NATO seems to be in favor of a divided Europe. Except this time the dividing line will be along Poland’s eastern frontier. Such a partition of the continent should not be mistaken for anything other than two spheres of influence--new, united Europe in the West, Russia’s domain in the East.

For to conceive of Ukraine, Belarus or the Baltic states being admitted into NATO, in the eyes of even most ardent NATO expansionists, is to tread on truly dangerous ground that will appear quite provocative to the Russians. That would mean, of course, that Russia’s most immediate neighbors, vulnerable if Moscow returned as an evil empire, would have to fend for themselves. Otherwise, NATO’s credibility might be put to a real test--as in Bosnia--where the risks are high and the stakes are unclear; where the nature of its interests has not been explained; where threats to its security interests are due, in no small measure, to its own policies and poor judgment, and where its credibility would be compromised as a result of overextension.

Public statements from Washington, Bonn and Brussels have gone too far for the alliance’s leaders to abandon NATO expansion gracefully. But the real debate about the nature and shape of the obligations entailed in the promised eastward move lie ahead, both among the allies and within their national-security Establishments, most notably in Washington. Once it becomes clear that the expansion lacks strategic purpose, two choices will be available: abandoning the idea with loss of face, or recreating the old threat to Europe from the East, thus fulfilling Russian President Boris N. Yeltsin’s prediction of cold peace on the continent.