> Only if you assume the risk of conflict in any member country being the same as when they weren't a member
Let's imagine we're France.
What's the actual risk of us being directly attacked by an enemy country, starting a conflict?
Now imagine we're France, obliged to join in a conflict by NATO's "collective defence" Article 5. This conflict was already started by an enemy attacking any one of the other 29 NATO members. Particularly murky that now NATO claims cyberattacks count for article 5, and since 2001 we know terrorism can count too.
What's the risk of the latter compared to the former?
I don't see Article 5 as the providor of peace that so many appear to assume it is. Now that the Cold War is long-gone, and it's no longer as simple as "NATO vs Warsaw Pact" in which is was fairly easy to see which side you'd want to be on, I also don't think Article 5 is worth the paper it's written on.
For instance, would your country's citizens be happy to join a war over Taiwan?
Let's imagine we're France.
What's the actual risk of us being directly attacked by an enemy country, starting a conflict?
Now imagine we're France, obliged to join in a conflict by NATO's "collective defence" Article 5. This conflict was already started by an enemy attacking any one of the other 29 NATO members. Particularly murky that now NATO claims cyberattacks count for article 5, and since 2001 we know terrorism can count too.
What's the risk of the latter compared to the former?
I don't see Article 5 as the providor of peace that so many appear to assume it is. Now that the Cold War is long-gone, and it's no longer as simple as "NATO vs Warsaw Pact" in which is was fairly easy to see which side you'd want to be on, I also don't think Article 5 is worth the paper it's written on.
For instance, would your country's citizens be happy to join a war over Taiwan?