The economic success and political independence of Europe has long been a central point of U.S. foreign policy. These goals have been remarkably well achieved for Western Europe, but for many post-Iron Curtain countries, economic prosperity and security from foreign manipulation can only be half-celebrated.
In the past few years, a new organization has emerged, growing quickly, and poised to become a centerpiece for solutions to this problem. Acknowledging their shared history and contemporary strategic concerns, a large number of central European states have joined together to form the ‘Three Seas Initiative’ (3SI), an organization coordinating policy on regional issues most crucial to central Europe. Many of the most important political and economic issues for these countries cannot be solved domestically by each state adopting individual policies; instead, they require a regional strategy. 3SI exists to address these types of problems.
The Three Seas Initiative was formally announced in 2015 in a joint declaration by the Polish and Croatian Presidents, and quickly grew to its current size of twelve. The name was selected to invoke early 20th century Polish proposals for a federation of states between the Adratic, Baltic, and Black Seas; this is one stop on a long road of aspirations for central European political unity and cooperation.
The countries currently comprising 3SI are Austria, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czechia (the Czech Republic), Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, and Slovenia (Figure 1).