Bulgaria, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia have received only scant attention in scholarly literature over the past decade. This book offers an in-depth analysis of the readiness of the four East European states for membership in NATO. Zoltan Barany examines their political, economic, and military conditions and concludes that they do not satisfy NATO's own criteria for membership. He argues, that while NATO should reiterate readiness to accept qualified candidates, it should not dilute its military capabilities by admitting new members who will be consumers of, rather than contributors to, security.