These options include developing counter-networks to meet networked security threats such as terrorism and proliferation of nuclear, chemical, or biological materials, as well as highly decentralized threats such as piracy. As a result, when a crisis like the war in East Timor in 1999 or last year’s political stalemate in Côte d’Ivoire arises, NATO can backstop whichever country or group of countries chooses to take the lead in carrying out a UN mandate.