Countries

make up Nato, among them former Cold War adversaries is the persistent threat of global terror groups. Countries like Iran also pose a serious nuclear, cyber and terrorist danger. But it is China which many experts predict could be an even greater risk.

This is not the type of massive military danger Nato faced at its inception but a new type of competition. Today, we are realising the degree to which the Chinese Communist Party is hostile to the West and to our values. And we are watching the situation in Hong Kong with concern. How China responds will say a great deal about the role we can expect Beijing to play in the future.

The only certainty is that Nato must be ready for any threat, from any direction and in any form. We must be ready to defend ourselves in space and cyberspace, as well as on air, land and sea. In the 20th century, we had to defend ourselves from enemy planes, tanks and nuclear warheads. Today the weapons of war could just as easily be biotech or big data, disinformation or drones, algorithms or artificial intelligence. As the world’s premier political-military alliance, Nato is the indispensable answer to these questions.

No single country can meet all these challenges alone. Nato countries must band together. The United States believes this today as we believed it in 1949. Our commitment to Nato has never wavered. Today, America accounts for nearly 70 per cent of the total amount Nato members spend on defence. We will defend our allies with everything we have, and hope our Nato allies will step up and share the burden. And we know that Britain will do the same. A founding member of Nato, Britain gave Nato its first ever home. Across the generations, Britain has been instrumental in Nato’s success.

America is counting on British leadership once again. This December, 70 years after the alliance first began, Nato leaders will gather here in Britain to plan for the new challenges ahead. The United States will be clear: the threats may have changed since 1949, but the answer hasn’t. Nato remains the foundation of our collective security. Our peace and prosperity depend on it.

■ Robert Wood Johnson is the US Ambassador to the UK