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The ninth question from South Korea. "Defending the Baltics against Russian revanchism (as
they put it) would be difficult. Turkey could get embroiled in the Middle Eastern context.
Given these scenarios, how credible is the Article 5 guarantee this long after the Cold
War?"
This is a good question, but my answer is very clear. Article 5 is one hundred percent,
bulletproof credible. You saw that it was invoked over September 11th, the only time
it's been invoked. But in terms of the political commitment of the Allies to defend each other
it is rock solid. That's the first thing.
Second, as I mentioned in the previous question, NATO's capability is so much superior to any
possible opponent or constellation of possible opponents, that from a military sense, this
Alliance dominates any possible threat against it. So on that issue, I have no concerns.
We have a lot of difficulties here in terms of managing defense cuts, in terms of dealing
with complicated military operations like Afghanistan half-way around the world. But
when it comes to Article 5, I have no doubt that the Allies stand together, and they can
defend against any credible threat that anyone could conceivably imagine.