By Joost Lagendijk - Russian President Vladimir Putin and Islamic State (IS) leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi have involuntarily thrown a lifeline to NATO.
Since the fall of the Berlin Wall, the Western defense organization has been struggling with its raison d'être. Whether or not one agrees with the alleged scale of the Soviet threat during the Cold War, it was clear to everybody that NATO was there to protect the territorial integrity of its member states. Because in the last two decades nobody expected the Russians to attack any of its western neighbors, NATO was forced to reform the armed forces under its command and focus increasingly on sending troops to other parts of the world where NATO presumably had an interest in restoring or keeping the peace (Balkans, Afghanistan).
These days, NATO is having one of its regular summits in Wales. Until a few months ago, there was a lot of speculation and discussion in security circles about new, effective ways to prevent the alliance from sinking into oblivion, at least in public perception. Russia's annexation of Crimea and its aggressive policies in eastern Ukraine plus the daily horror-show by the IS in Iraq and Syria have, however, drastically changed NATO's agenda.
