Professor Peterson deftly weaves together major security challenges, ranging from global terrorism to missile defense, and NATO's post-Cold War missions and expansion. He breaks new ground by evaluating the potential contributions of each new NATO member to the ongoing struggles faced by the Atlantic Alliance, in the process demonstrating that eastward NATO expansion has not been a mindless march toward inclusiveness. Peterson also displays an acute grasp of geopolitical considerations and NATO's need to tie its various challenges together into a coherent strategic vision. -Robert Evanson, University of Missouri-Kansas City.

"Book reveals substantial challenges to NATO during last twenty years. Jim Peterson depicts how NATO moved from predictable Cold War situation into multilateral nature of post 1989 security risks. Peterson's level of expertise is based on substantial research which includes not only up to date literature in English but significant portion of primary and secondary resources in Czech, Slovak or German language. Such a broad variety of resources helps Jim Peterson to create a balanced picture of NATO's role in last two decades as well as to underline important upcoming task for the organization. Presented text reflects carefully peculiarities of NATO enlargement, through movement towards active participation in different world conflict zones up to recent attempt to define future meaning of the organization. Peterson's book is substantial contribution to debate on current state of security studies." -Jirí Lach, Palacky University in Olomouc, Czech Republic.