Title: With the Armed Forces into year 2000 - Defence in a New Setting
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DEFENCE IN A NEW SETTING
The international community finds itself in a time of pervasive change and uncertainty. Moves towards security frameworks based on dialogue, cooperation and partnership have contributed to the strengthening of Norway's security.
There are, however, many fundamental questions in the field of security policy which remain unanswered. These developments provide Norway with new challenges in matters of security and defence, but they also offer new opportunities for collaboration and influence. The main aims of Norwegian security policy remain unchanged, namely to contribute to a stable and peaceful process of development, to protect our national freedom of action and sovereignty, and to safeguard our rights and interests.
International cooperation is being extended and intensified in a number of areas and bonds between countries are being strengthened through a wide range of mutual contacts. Even though this process makes an important contribution towards a more peaceful world, it is not sufficient to guarantee a country's sovereignty and security. In order to safeguard our national integrity and freedom of action in all circumstances, our Defence Establishment must be seen as the embodiment of our determination and ability to defend ourselves.
A state cannot create security on its own. Norway's membership in NATO has been of decisive importance to our security throughout the last 50 years and continues to be the central forum for collaboration in matters of security and defence. This collaboration is based on the sharing of both benefits and burdens. In today's security situation, it requires on our part more than simply a credible ability to defend our own territory. Active international involvement, substantive contribution to NATO's mutual defence arrangements and participation in peace operations, even outside NATO's borders, all form an important part of Norwegian security and defence policy.
Even though, on the one hand, it is difficult to see any military threat to Norway's security today, it is difficult on the other to overlook the long-term uncertainty regarding the future development of the political and security situation both in our own part of Europe and on the continent as a whole. In spite of the fact that dialogue and cooperation are characteristics of the current European political scene, future developments remain unpredictable and far from straightforward. Thus, an effective and credible defence capability is not something that can be built up overnight. The way Norway's armed forces develop in the future must leave no doubt about our capacity to safeguard our security.
The achievement of a credible defence capability in a democratic society requires broadly based public support. Only through genuine involvement can the will and the capacity to defend ourselves be kept alive. In Norway we have traditionally enjoyed broad political agreement on matters of security and defence. Current preoccupations, however, tend to dim in people's minds the experience of past generations, and there are fewer and fewer now who have suffered at first hand the effects of war. Those deep and involving discussions of defence and security policy are now rare in Norway. Can we still take our will to defend ourselves for granted?
The Armed Forces can help to sustain this will to defend ourselves by changing and adapting to meet the new challenges to security both nationally and internationally, by maintaining visibility and a presence throughout the country and through the system of compulsory military service. But above all, the will to defend must be based on a unified and consistent policy for the safeguarding of Norwegian security.