Weapons of mass destruction: What will be new in the 2022 NATO strategic concept?

This week’s NATO Summit in Madrid will launch a new Strategic Concept, NATO’s statement of its strategic goals and objectives, its purpose in life. With Russia threatening to use weapons of mass destruction, NATO’s approach to deterring chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear attacks will be in the global spotlight. Will NATO have something new to say on deterrence, or stick to the past?

This summit was meant to be many things that it will not. NATO was going to focus its attention for the first time on China, to think through how best to sustain the defense of Europe while the United States pivots to the Indo-Pacific. The defense of Europe, in this setting, would remain important, but more the purview of the European NATO allies, a kind of strategic rear guard against the main action, countering China’s rising influence.

The NATO Summit was also meant to be the celebratory hand-off between Jens Stoltenberg, who has served skillfully as NATO Secretary General for eight years, to a new Secretary General. Perhaps, for the first time, the person selected would be a woman.

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