National caveats
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A national caveat is a restriction that North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) members place on the use of their forces. NATO General Bantz J. Craddock, NATO's Supreme Allied Commander Europe (SACEUR), was quoted as saying all caveats must be removed in February 2007 in an article written by the Associated Press. The level of constraints (i.e. caveats) is tied directly to the level of national interests a country has in a particular mission and the level of risk it is willing to take.[1]
United States officials have urged NATO countries to eliminate caveats, and some steps have been taken to lift them, but the problem appears to remain. At the Riga Summit NATO nations agreed to lift caveats in a time of an emergency, however the definition of an emergency is debatable.
The problem of National Caveats is not new and was identified as a problem during the KFOR mission in Kosovo in 1999. NATO leaders met in Copenhagen, Denmark in 2005 to address the matter of national caveats. They passed RESOLUTION 336 on REDUCING NATIONAL CAVEATS, but the resolution was non-binding, meaning that nations could apply it as they deemed fit.[2]
Riga Summit
In November 2006, NATO held the Riga Summit. At the meetings, President George W. Bush called for countries to lift caveats. However, many analysts say the problem has not been solved. For instance, political scientist Joseph Nye stated in a 2006 article that "many NATO countries with troops in Afghanistan have "national caveats" that restrict how their troops may be used. While the Riga summit relaxed some of these caveats to allow assistance to allies in dire circumstances, Britain, Canada, the Netherlands, and the US are doing most of the fighting in southern Afghanistan, while French, German, and Italian troops are deployed in the quieter north. It is difficult to see how NATO can succeed in stabilizing Afghanistan unless it is willing to commit more troops and give commanders more flexibility."[3]