Page 425 - 1992 - XVIII Congresso Internazionale di Storia Militare

THE STRATEGlC ROLE OF THE AçORES IN THE
EURO-ATLANTIC RELA TIONS

ANT6NIO DE jESUS BISPO

The nim of this paper is co presenc a bricf view of the evoluùon of America n
strategie thinking and the conscquent milicary stante io general, some basic fea·
rures of Euro-Atlamic rc:latioos and. fìnally, tbc: rolc: that che Açores archipc:lago
has playcd and could plny in the future, in accordance with its geoscracegic potc:n-
tialities.
Euro·Aùantic relations have aJways been inOuenced by the common goal of
preserving che western values and, consequcndy, by the maintcn_ance of a strategie
bloc, a linkage between tbc: two concinents a.ccoss the Adantic Ocean, wh1ch aims
at ensuring an undisputed command of che sea.
The individuai inrercsts of any of the actors involvcd io such a relationship
indude che values of autonomy, indcpcndence or survival of the individual nations.
That common goal conscrained the natural disputes whkb poteotially could resulc
from tbc: prosecution of sucb specifìc national interescs, and forced tbc: councries
i neo dose cooperation. The evaluation of the incernauonal crisis situations and the
defìnition o( adequate strategies to fa ce tbem did not -aJways coincide a od tbc pow-
er starus of each of che partners was not irrdevant for tbc result of negotiations.
Tbc cxprcssion "transadancic barga in" uscd by some authors seems quite ap·
propriate co defìne the main character of the relations becween nations on both
sides of the Adantic.
Wheo no lim1tations are imposed on timeframe or on its concent, the d.scus-
sion abour euro-aùancic relations is normaUy focused on the questions concaned
with common western dcfence, namely the posirions of the Unircd Sa re and rhe
Europea n Powers, from the Washingron Conference of Dccember 1941 between
thc Presidem of the Unired Stares and the Prime Minister of che United Kingdom,
to che presem time. le has been indced a hard and difficult period, with very inren-
sive rclations, correspondin,g to a dramacic war which wa.s won, in its two phases:
the acrual war up co 1945 and the poumual and Cold War, from theo on to the
presenc day. W e ha ve also witnessed tbc: developmenr, consolidation and disrup·
tion of a bipolar world. AlJ of these key facts, some of them awfu~ bave been achieved
in a very complex web of inrernational relarionships. Now, there is again a hope
of a lasting peace io Europe, perhaps with a diffc:rent visioo. a realistic one, being