The alliance was built for the Cold War, and it shows “What we are about to do here is a neighborly act. We are like a group of householders, living in the same locality, who decide to express their community of interests by entering into a formal association for their mutual self-protection.” That was US President Harry Truman on April 4, 1949, at the signing of the Washington Declaration creating NATO. It is an effective metaphor, and a convincing one. But it can also be turned around. In a