The Netherlands is seeing that the geopolitical balance of power is changing rapidly, especially in Europe instability reigns on eastern and southern borders, with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as the ultimate game changer.
With its Security Strategy for the Kingdom of the Netherlands, the government wants to lay the foundation for a future in which its population is resilient and prepared. To that end, the government calls to its people to be alert and prepared, as only by acting together, a safe and resilient society can be created.
This strategy sets the course for national security for the next six years (2023-2029), while the course to be followed encompasses both intentional (security) and unintentional (safety) threats, therefore resulting in an all-hazards strategy. The Kingdom of the Netherlands is in favor of a stable and secure world and a well-functioning international legal order, which includes the promotion of human rights and an inclusive and effective multilateral system based on rules, as it works on its benefit.
It has to be mentioned that, the Kingdom consists of four countries: Curaçao, Aruba, Sint Maarten (the Caribbean Countries) and the Netherlands. The Charter for the Kingdom of the Netherlands governs the constitutional relationship between the countries. Particularly, the countries are autonomous and responsible for their national security. The exceptions to this are the so-called Kingdom affairs, i.e., preservation of the independence and defense of the Kingdom, Dutch citizenship and foreign policy. The Kingdom as a whole is responsible for this and not the separate countries themselves.
The key objective of the Security Strategy for the Kingdom of the Netherlands is to protect its national security interests which are: 1) the physical security, 2) the economic security, 3) the territorial security, 4) the international legal order and stability, 5) the ecological security and 5) the social and political stability.
In this context, this strategy recognizes seven intersecting themes showing the consistency between threats which are: 1) the pressure on the democratic legal order, 2) climate change, 3) societal tensions, declining trust, disinformation and a radical undercurrent, 4) hybrid threats, 5) increased dependencies and their consequences for critical infrastructure and economy, 6) technological developments and digitalization of systems and 7) geopolitical challenges and military threats.
For this paper, national security is meant the protection of national security interests against threats that could harm those interests and thereby could cause societal disruption. This is ensured by reducing threats and becoming more resilient to them. The basis for this strategy is the Nationwide Risk Assessment and a complementary assessment of the impact of the war in Ukraine on the national security of the Netherlands.
These assessments provided an overview of threats to the Kingdom’s national security in relation to the six national security interests and the development of these threats resulted the following: 1) economic threats, 2) threat to critical infrastructure, 3) major accidents, 4) infectious diseases, 5) climate and natural disasters, 6) organized subversive crime, 7) polarization, 8) extremism and terrorism, 9) unwanted foreign influence and interference, 10) cyber threats, and 11) international and military threats.
Moving further, the strategy explains the intersecting themes and according our team’s view the following two are quite interesting, first the Kingdom will have to realign itself based on this changing balance of power that drives the world to a multipolar order and second the instrumentalization of migration by malign actors. What does this realignment mean, more European autonomy for example? For a country like the Netherlands with its free and open society are we going to experience an alteration in its migration policies, keeping in mind that the country is a preferred final destination for migrants?
In the Caribbean part of the Kingdom, it is unlikely that Venezuela will harm the territorial integrity of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, however, there is a chance of an unintentional escalation due to possible misinterpretations and incidents as a result of a decline in the professionalism of the military forces of Venezuela or the absence of democracy and a functioning state based on the rule of law, combined with geopolitical interference and the ongoing humanitarian crisis. If an escalation takes place or a malign actor provokes a security crisis, does the Kingdom has the capabilities to respond keeping in mind the geographical restraints?
In addition, the war in Ukraine had as a result no Russian oil products, crude oil and coal entering the Netherlands. The only exception to this is liquefied natural gas (LNG) from Russia, which is supplied by ship rather than pipeline. Although the Netherlands has greatly reduced its dependence, other European countries have not yet gone so far. On the above specific sentence that it is included in the security strategy we will come back later on the article.
As far as it concerns climate change for the Netherlands, the risk of drought, and therefore wildfires, poses a problem (in addition to longer- known challenges such as flooding): it is not a question of if but when an uncontrollable wildfire will occur, while in the Caribbean part of the Kingdom, hurricanes are the main threat. In the longer term, a rise in sea levels poses a significant threat: millions of people in cities in and around the Kingdom are increasingly vulnerable to sea level rise.
Other issues of concern, are jihadism as the main source of terrorist threats in the Kingdom, right-wing terrorism, organized subversive crime and finally high-risk strategic dependencies for the Caribbean part of the Kingdom. If for example, a cyberattack disrupts the supply of goods, food and energy, the consequences will be severe, and there are very limited alternatives to resume the crucial supply of goods and food.
The next part includes the strategic course with three main objectives which are: a secure Kingdom in a multipolar world, a resilient democratic legal order and a ready and resilient society. The proposed way forward is described with twelve lines of action with specific priorities for 2023 – 2029, that satisfy the above-mentioned objectives.
Finally, in the third and last part of the strategy, one can notice the way the government wants to exercise integrated control over national security and the need to implement the whole procedure not only involving the governmental bodies but, the entire society. Last but not least, this approach is scheduled to be evaluated annually and adjusted where necessary.
As an external observer the Proorasis team has tried to assess this strategy in a creative and helpful way. Some questions come to our mind, always with good intentions as we do not want to be pleasant but useful. If the Kingdom of the Netherlands wants to realign itself based on the changing balance of power that drives the world to a multipolar order, what investment is willing to do in order to secure its autonomy and its capability to act?
According the World Bank national accounts data, the country is strong economically (GDP 2021- 1,01 trillion $), but even today its defense expenditure as a share of GDP (%) is below the NATO guideline of 2%. With a full-scale war ongoing in European soil what else the Dutch political elite is waiting to invest in its hard power. Concerning the Caribbean part of the Kingdom, the development of a deep-water fleet and the enlargement of the Royal Navy is a prerequisite, to ensure minimum standards for protecting the Kingdom’s interests.
Moving forward, in this security strategy we have noticed that a clear message directed to external audiences is missing. What is the key narrative the country advertises to the world, how the country sees the future and which is the way forward. For example, what about diplomacy or cooperation on shared challenges like climate change where the country is a champion in ecological solutions, is there any initiative to lead the way on global trends and challenges.
In the field of energy security, we see that although the Netherlands has greatly reduced its dependence on Russian products, the country is still importing today liquefied natural gas (LNG) from Russia. So, if a rich country like the Netherlands has not been able until today to stop Russian imports, how is it possible for other countries to change easily their energy dependence. Especially on that issue, the phrase “…other European countries have not yet gone so far.” included in the strategy is very problematic and it should be avoided.
Furthermore, it should be mentioned that if someone wants to understand better this strategy, he must combine this paper with the latest Netherlands Defense White Paper 2022, where under the narrative: A STRONGER NETHERLANDS, A SAFER EUROPE, some critical questions are being answered, but this is a task to be completed in another article.
In conclusion, the Security Strategy for the Kingdom of the Netherlands has a proper formulation divided in three phases consisting the threat assessment, resilience to threats and determining the course. It offers a view of a specific way of thinking that responds to the needs of the country. The absence of an existential threat is obvious and this is an advantage for any country, or not?
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