NATO accession is the most important strategic foreign policy goal for Bosnia and Herzegovina.

NATO membership represents ironclad guarantees for BiH’s sovereignty and territorial integrity in the face of persistent threats by malign foreign powers.

Further, NATO’s Article 5 provides the bedrock security needed to reform the country’s complex constitutional regime and to ensure that this process will be peaceful, democratic, and conducted exclusively within BiH’s state institutions and by the country’s elected officials.

Policymakers in Sarajevo are also keenly aware that every Western Balkan state and every former Eastern Bloc state which has acceded to the EU has first become a member of NATO. As such, for BiH, NATO membership is not only a critical security objective, but also a political stepping stone towards EU membership.

BiH offers a great deal to the Alliance

Over the past two decades, Bosnian forces have completed operations in both Afghanistan and Iraq, having successfully adopted core components of NATO’s interoperability doctrine. Bosnian security services have also worked extensively with NATO partner states in joint counter-extremism efforts, while Bosnian intelligence services have provided critical information for the Alliance concerning hostile activities on the territory of the Western Balkans.

How can the U.S. support BiH’s NATO accession?

• Accelerate relevant political processes necessary to complete BiH’s successful accession to NATO
• Strengthen the interoperability capacities of BiH’s Armed Forces (BH AF) and relevant associated security services
• Assist in the modernization of BH AF and all associated state security services