In his new PRIF Working Paper, Eldad Ben Aharon takes a comprehensive historical and analytical look at a concept of growing global reach: the U.S. designation of states as “Major Non-NATO Allies” (MNNA). Between 1987 and 2026, 21 states entered into this flexible agreement, gaining access to military support and surplus U.S. defense equipment – but not NATO defense guarantees. Asking how MNNA status enable both parties to balance their normative expectations in security cooperation, alliance formation, strategic restraint, and broader regional commitments, this working paper examines the designation as a normative global security network.
A historical examination of the concept confirms its adaptive quality: originally conceived as a Cold War instrument, the MNNA was gradually repurposed to address the challenges of counterterrorism, regional conflict management, and, most recently, great-power competition. Unlike traditional alliance theory, a normative perspective highlights how the designation institutionalizes appreciation without offering guarantees, thereby preserving the strategic flexibility of the United States.
The main empirical section analyzes the global and regional distribution of MNNA status, focusing on South America, the Middle East and the Levant, Africa, the Gulf region, and the Indo-Pacific. The regional analysis shows that MNNA are deployed unevenly in global security contexts and do not have a fixed function: depending on the intended use and the needs of the parties involved, a variety of security roles and regional priorities emerge.
Ben Aharon therefore emphasizes that the MNNA concept should be understood as a core element of current U.S. security governance – with significant implications for NATO and global politics. Where boundaries of transatlantic security shift and distinctions between alliance partners and non-alliance partners become blurred, questions arise about the future role of formal multilateral institutions in managing security cooperation.
The working paper is available for download (PDF).