[Senate Hearing 107-678]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
S. Hrg. 107-678
THE FUTURE OF NATO
=======================================================================
HEARING
BEFORE THE
COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN RELATIONS
UNITED STATES SENATE
ONE HUNDRED SEVENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
MAY 1, 2002
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Foreign Relations
Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.access.gpo.gov/congress/
senate
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COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN RELATIONS
JOSEPH R. BIDEN, Jr., Delaware, Chairman
PAUL S. SARBANES, Maryland JESSE HELMS, North Carolina
CHRISTOPHER J. DODD, Connecticut RICHARD G. LUGAR, Indiana
JOHN F. KERRY, Massachusetts CHUCK HAGEL, Nebraska
RUSSELL D. FEINGOLD, Wisconsin GORDON H. SMITH, Oregon
PAUL D. WELLSTONE, Minnesota BILL FRIST, Tennessee
BARBARA BOXER, California LINCOLN D. CHAFEE, Rhode Island
ROBERT G. TORRICELLI, New Jersey GEORGE ALLEN, Virginia
BILL NELSON, Florida SAM BROWNBACK, Kansas
JOHN D. ROCKEFELLER IV, West MICHAEL B. ENZI, Wyoming
Virginia
Antony J. Blinken, Staff Director
Patricia A. McNerney, Republican Staff Director
(ii)
C O N T E N T S
----------
Page
Biden, Hon. Joseph R., Jr., U.S. Senator from Delaware, prepared
statement...................................................... 4
Clark, Gen. Wesley K., U.S. Army (Ret.), former Supreme Allied
Commander Europe, The Stephens Group, Washington, DC........... 43
Prepared statement........................................... 47
Enzi, Hon. Michael B., U.S. Senator from Wyoming, prepared
statement...................................................... 9
Feingold, Hon. Russell D., U.S. Senator from Wisconsin, prepared
statement...................................................... 6
Feith, Hon. Douglas, Under Secretary of Defense for Policy,
Department of Defense, Washington, DC.......................... 22
Prepared statement........................................... 26
Responses to additional questions for the record from Senator
Gordon Smith............................................... 72
Grossman, Hon Marc, Under Secretary of State for Political
Affairs, Department of State, Washington, DC................... 12
Prepared statement........................................... 18
Responses to additional questions for the record from Senator
Gordon Smith............................................... 70
Helms, Hon. Jesse, U.S. Senator from North Carolina, prepared
statement...................................................... 7
Lugar Hon. Richard G., U.S. Senator from Indiana, prepared
statement...................................................... 7
Odom, Lt. Gen. William E., U.S. Army (Ret.), former Director,
National Security Agency, Yale University and The Hudson
Institute, Washington, DC...................................... 49
Prepared statement........................................... 51
(iii)
THE FUTURE OF NATO
----------
WEDNESDAY, MAY 1, 2002
U.S. Senate,
Committee on Foreign Relations,
Washington, DC.
The committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:14 a.m., in
room SD-419, Dirksen Senate Office Building, the Hon. Joseph R.
Biden (chairman of the committee), presiding.
Present: Senators Biden, Bill Nelson, Lugar, Hagel, Gordon
Smith, Allen, Brownback and Enzi.
The Chairman. Ladies and gentlemen, I welcome you to the
hearing. I do not know what Bertie told you, but I would listen
to him, because he controls the place.
All kidding aside, the hearing will come to order.
It is a pleasure to welcome you to the Foreign Relations
Committee for what I believe to be is an important hearing.
This morning, we are going to examine the future of an
institution that understandably has taken a back seat in
capturing our attention in the last several months.
But no one should doubt that NATO, the North Atlantic
Treaty Organization, remains absolutely critical to the
security of the United States, in my opinion.
For more than half a century, NATO has been the cornerstone
of our strategic defense. It is our most important tangible
link to Europe. It demonstrates the continuing commitment of
the United States, and the continuing commitment of the United
States to being a European power.
Despite September 11 and all that it implies about a new
security environment, I would submit that the circumstances I
just mentioned have not changed.
Without a stable Europe, we cannot hope to carry out our
ambitious goals elsewhere in the world. And without the active
cooperation of vibrant, loyal European partners, we cannot
succeed in our multifaceted war on terrorism. Nonetheless, the
war on terrorism does require a reexamination of our rationale
for NATO and how it should adapt to meeting these new
challenges.
This is a particularly opportune moment to conduct a
reexamination. In little more than 6 months, the Alliance will
hold a momentous summit in Prague, the capital of the Czech
Republic. And the Prague summit will deal with three
interrelated issues.
The first is the fundamental questions of NATO's scope and
purpose. Second is the new relationship between NATO and
Russia. And third is the next round of NATO enlargement.
It is no secret that many of our European allies have begun
to question the depth of America's commitment to NATO. On the
day after the terrorist attacks of 9/11, the Alliance for the
first time in its 52-year history invoked Article 5 of the
North Atlantic Treaty of 1949. I know the witnesses know this
language well, but we the public hears us talk about the
invocation of Article 5 and how momentous that was, and how
significant it was, but I want to read the language: ``The
Parties agree,'' I am quoting, ``that an armed attack against
one or more of them in Europe or North America shall be
considered an attack against them all, and consequently they
agree that, if such an armed attack occurs, each of them . . .
will assist the Party or Parties so attacked by taking
forthwith, individually, and in concert with other Parties,
such action as it deems necessary, including the use of armed
force, to restore and maintain the security of the North
Atlantic area.''
As I said that day on the floor of the U.S. Senate,
invoking Article 5 was a big deal, a very big deal. It was the
ultimate gesture of solidarity with us by our European and
Canadian allies.
And how did we react? I would submit that is a matter of
debate as to whether we reacted in the way that was
appropriate.
It is true that European NATO allies have piloted AWACS
planes flying along the east coast of the United States in
order to free up American crews for combat in Afghanistan. It
is also true that special forces units of the United Kingdom
and other allies alongside American forces have recently
engaged units of al-Qaeda and the Taliban. Some allied aircraft
have flown close air support for U.S. troops.
But all in all, and one must raise the question, our NATO
allies have until now played a peripheral role in the Afghan
campaign. Maybe the Pentagon was correct in its apparent
judgment that the war would go smoother if prosecuted in this
manner because of the well-known capabilities gap between our
allies and ourselves.
Whatever the accuracy of that assessment, NATO allies
inevitably in my view, have concluded, A, that the United
States demonstrated unmistakable, overwhelming domination of
the war in Afghanistan; B, we have conveyed a strong impression
that in future conflicts the United States will do the war
fighting; and C, given our war-fighting capability, we choose
to leave the other participants to start the international
peacekeeping force in Afghanistan; and, D, the Europeans will
be expected to clean up after the parade.
My trip to Afghanistan in January convinced me that we must
become actively involved in the International Security Afghan
Force [ISAF]. The International Security Afghan Force, in order
to bring security and stability to all parts of that country as
quickly as possible, in my view, has to be enlarged.
Our allies have already stepped up to the plate, two of
them in leadership roles. The U.K. currently leads ISAF; and
Turkey has agreed to take over the command for 6 months
beginning later this spring.
Does their example argue for NATO, through peacekeeping, to
be the key player in strategically important countries outside
of Europe? With regard to the capabilities gap, should NATO put
together a quick start capabilities package, as suggested by
former Assistant Secretary of Defense, Frank Kramer?
Such an effort would enhance Alliance interoperability and
enable European NATO expeditionary forces rapidly to become
operational.
The complexity of the Afghan situation raises questions.
How extensively outside the North Atlantic area should NATO be
involved? Before answering that question, we must look at the
new challenges to our security. How much relative weight should
NATO give to missions that until now have been peripheral? For
example, what institutional role might NATO have in the
struggles against terrorism, international crime, and the
proliferation of weapons of mass destruction?
More fundamentally, what if there is no common threat
perception within the Alliance? Most obviously, there is no
unanimity about Saddam Hussein and whether or not he
constitutes a clear and present danger to the United States and
Europe. In that case, does NATO defer to a ``new coalition of
the willing,'' led by the United States? Is that the likely
model for future campaigns outside of Europe?
Our witnesses today will have no shortage of ``big
picture'' topics to discuss.
Ladies and gentlemen, I am pleased that President Bush is
carrying on important work begun by the last administration of
bringing new members into NATO and reaching out to Russia.
September 11 has created historic opportunities to continue the
process of reconciliation with Russia. And if we get it right,
we can reverse the titanic rivalry that dominated the second
half of the 20th century.
President Putin, as I have said on numerous occasions, has
cast his country's lot with the West with a determination not
seen since Peter the Great. We should assist him in every way
consistent with our national security interests.
Domestically, that means helping democratic civil society
in Russia flourish. It means helping genuine rule of law take
root. It means cementing rights for all segments of society,
including safeguarding of the rights of religious groups.
We must also broaden our security cooperation with Russia.
At the Reykjavik NATO Ministerial meeting later this month, a
new NATO-Russian Council will be launched.
I would be very interested in hearing from our two
distinguished administration witnesses exactly how that body
will be structured and what issues it will have within its
purview.
My own feeling is that, at the outset, the council should
emphasize areas where there is already a meeting of the minds
between NATO and Russia. The struggle against international
terrorism is the most obvious example.
I would prefer to see the council not include peacekeeping
operations in its initial catalog of responsibilities, since
Russia was relatively actively opposed to NATO's last two
peacekeeping operations in Bosnia and Kosovo, before eventually
deciding to join them.
Despite the considerable suspicion and mistrust to
overcome, I am optimistic that the new relationship between
NATO and Russia can be mutually beneficial.
And I will ask unanimous consent that the remainder of my
statement be put in the record.
[The prepared statement of Senator Biden follows:]
Prepared Statement of Senator Joseph R. Biden, Jr.
``the future of nato: preparing for the prague summit''
It's a pleasure to welcome you to the Senate Foreign Relations
Committee for what I believe is a very important hearing.
This morning we will examine the future of an institution that
understandably has taken a back-seat in capturing our attention for the
last several months. But no one should doubt that NATO--the North
Atlantic Treaty Organization--remains absolutely critical to the
security of the United States.
For more than a half-century, NATO has been the cornerstone of our
strategic defense. It is our most important tangible link to Europe.
And it demonstrates the continuing commitment of the United States to
being a European power.
Despite September 11th and all that it implies about a new security
environment, I would submit that the circumstances I just mentioned
have not changed.
Without a stable Europe, we cannot hope to carry out our ambitious
goals elsewhere in the world.
Without the active cooperation of vibrant, loyal European partners,
we cannot succeed in our multi-faceted war on terrorism.
Nonetheless, the war on terrorism does require a re-examination of
the rationale for NATO--and how it should adapt to meet new challenges.
This is a particularly opportune moment to conduct a re-
examination. In little more than six months, the Alliance will hold a
momentous summit in Prague, the capital of the Czech Republic.
The Prague summit will deal with three great inter-related issues.
The first is the fundamental question of NATO's scope and purpose.
Second is the new relationship between NATO and Russia.
And, third, is the next round of NATO enlargement.
It's no secret that many of our European allies have begun to
question the depth of America's commitment to NATO.
On the day after the terrorist attacks of September 11, the
Alliance, for the first time in its then 52 year history invoked
Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty of 1949 whereby:
The Parties agree that an armed attack against one or more of
them in Europe or North America shall be considered an attack
against them all, and consequently they agree that, if such an
armed attack occurs, each of them. . . . will assist the Party
or Parties so attacked by taking forthwith, individually, and
in concert with the other Parties, such action as it deems
necessary, including the use of armed force, to restore and
maintain the security of the North Atlantic area . . .
As I said that day on the floor of the United States Senate, the
invoking of Article 5 was a big deal--a very big deal. It was the
ultimate gesture of solidarity with us by our European and Canadian
allies.
How did we react? I would submit that it's a matter of debate as to
whether we reacted in a way that was appropriate.
It is true that European NATO allies have piloted AWACS planes
flying along the East Coast of the United States in order to free up
American crews for combat in Afghanistan.
It is also true that Special Forces units of the United Kingdom and
other allies, alongside American forces, have recently engaged units of
al-Qaeda and the Taliban. Some allied aircraft have flown close air
support for U.S. troops.
But, all in all, one must come to the conclusion that our NATO
allies have until now played a peripheral role in the Afghan campaign.
Maybe the Pentagon was correct in its apparent judgment that the war
would go smoother if prosecuted in this manner because of the well-
known ``capabilities gap'' between our allies and ourselves.
Whatever the accuracy of that assessment, NATO allies inevitably
have concluded that:
(a) The United States demonstrated unmistakable, overwhelming
domination of the Afghan war.
(b) We have conveyed the strong impression that in future
conflicts the United States will do the war fighting.
(c) Given our war-fighting capability, we choose to leave to
others participation in the international peacekeeping force in
Afghanistan.
(d) The Europeans will be expected to clean up after the
parade.
My trip to Afghanistan in January convinced me that we must become
actively involved in ISAF--the International Security Assistance
Force--in order to bring security and stability to all parts of the
country as quickly as possible.
Our allies have already stepped up to the plate--two of them in
leadership roles. The U.K. currently leads ISAF, and Turkey has agreed
to take over command for six months, beginning later this spring.
Does their example argue for NATO, through peacekeeping, to be a
key player in strategically important countries outside of Europe?
With regard to the ``capabilities gap,'' should NATO put together a
``quick-start'' capabilities package, as suggested by former Assistant
Secretary of Defense Frank Kramer?
Such an effort would enhance Alliance inter-operability and enable
a European NATO Expeditionary Force rapidly to become operational.
The complexity of the Afghan situation raises the question of how
extensively outside of the North Atlantic area NATO should be involved.
Before answering, we must look at the new challenges to our
security. How much relative weight should NATO give to missions that,
until now, have been peripheral? For example, what institutional role
might NATO have in the struggles against terrorism, international
crime, and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction?
More fundamentally, what if there is no common threat perception
within the Alliance? Most obviously, there's no unanimity about whether
Saddam Hussein constitutes a clear and present danger to the United
States and Europe.
In that case, does NATO defer to a new ``coalition of the willing''
led by the U.S.? Is that the likely model for future campaigns outside
of Europe?
Our witnesses today will have no shortage of ``big picture'' topics
to discuss.
Ladies and Gentlemen, I am pleased that President Bush is carrying
on the important work begun by the Clinton administration of bringing
new members into NATO and reaching out to Russia.
September 11 has created historic opportunities to continue the
process of reconciliation with Russia. If we get it right, we can
reverse the titanic rivalry that dominated the second half of the 20th
century.
President Putin, as I have said on numerous occasions, has cast his
country's lot with the West with a determination not seen since Peter
the Great.
We should assist him in every way consistent with our own security
interests.
Domestically, that means helping a democratic civil society
flourish in Russia. It means helping genuine rule of law take root. It
means cementing rights for all segments of society, including
safeguarding the rights of all religious groups.
We must also broaden our security cooperation with Russia. At the
Reykjavik NATO Ministerial meetings later this month, a new NATO-Russia
Council will be launched.
I would be very interested in hearing from our two distinguished
administration witnesses how that body will be structured and what
issues it will have in its purview.
My own feeling is that, at the outset, the Council should emphasize
areas where there is already a meeting of the minds between NATO and
Russia. The struggle against international terrorism is the most
obvious example.
I would prefer to see the Council not include peacekeeping
operations in its initial catalogue of responsibilities, since Russia
actively opposed NATO's last two peacekeeping operations in Bosnia and
Kosovo, before eventually deciding to join.
Despite the considerable suspicion and mistrust to overcome, I am
optimistic that the new relationship between NATO and Russia can be
mutually beneficial.
The third major issue for Prague is NATO enlargement.
Four years ago, I had the privilege of being the floor manager for
the Resolution of Ratification that gave Senate approval to the
accession to NATO of Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic. Since
then, all three countries have proven themselves to be dependable
allies.
The most persuasive argument for NATO enlargement remains as valid
today as it was in 1998: extending the zone of stability eastward in
Europe. Through the well-conceived program of Membership Action Plans,
many more aspirant countries are on the brink of being invited to join
the Alliance.
By this summer it will be time to ``name names''--to openly declare
exactly which countries should be invited.
On many occasions I have said that Slovenia has been ready for
several years. Recently the three Baltic countries of Estonia, Latvia,
and Lithuania have made great strides toward qualifying. Slovakia has
made similar progress, and if it elects a democratic government in
October, it should be a strong candidate.
In the last few months, support for a so-called ``Southern
Dimension'' has been gaining momentum.
Both Romania and Bulgaria are working hard to meet the NATO norms.
Their case is strengthened both by their strategic geographic location,
and by their exemplary support for the anti-terrorism campaign since
September 11.
Aside from meeting the military criteria, all the aspirant
countries must demonstrate to NATO that they truly are members of an
Alliance of shared democratic values. In particular, ugly remnants of
war-time fascism must be totally--and permanently--suppressed.
Whatever the final number of invited countries, the process of NATO
enlargement will continue to strengthen the Alliance and to move the
Continent toward the goal of a ``Europe whole and free.''
Ladies and gentlemen, to discuss these and other issues this
morning we have a truly outstanding group of witnesses.
Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Marc Grossman is a
long-time friend. I didn't say ``old friend'' because Marc certainly
doesn't fit that description. He is the State Department's Wunderkind.
He served as our Ambassador to Turkey shortly after leaving high
school--and that's only a slight exaggeration. He now occupies the
senior career post in the Department.
Doug Feith is Under Secretary for Policy at the Department of
Defense. He came to the Pentagon from a distinguished career in the
private sector and has already made his mark as a keen analyst and
effective spokesman for the Department.
General Wes Clark, of course, capped a long, star-studded career in
the U.S. Army as Supreme Allied Commander Europe, where he successfully
prosecuted the Yugoslav air war. Most recently he has become a best-
selling author. I have long turned to him for incisive advice, and he
has never disappointed me.
Lieutenant General Bill Odom also served in the U.S. Army with
great distinction. An internationally recognized strategist, he did a
tour as Director of the National Security Agency. He is now affiliated
with Yale University and the Hudson Institute.
Gentlemen, we are grateful to all of you for agreeing to appear
before this committee.
[The following statement was submitted by Senator Feingold
for inclusion the record:]
Prepared Statement of Senator Russell D. Feingold
Mr. Chairman, thank you for calling this important hearing. I think
we are all eager to consider how to move forward at this crucial moment
in building stronger, larger and ultimately more effective structures
within NATO. And I am particularly grateful for this opportunity to
consider specific issues related to the next round of NATO expansion,
along with the establishment of a dynamic new NATO-Russia partnership.
As we begin the first of many such dialogues on these topics, I
think we must first pause to consider the larger policy objectives that
should guide future efforts to transform what is clearly the most
crucial of our security alliances. We must ask how robust of an
expansion we can support, while simultaneously maintaining military
preparedness, preserving the close security relationships of existing
member states, and securing a long-term but cost-effective investment
in our own national defense.
Many of the candidate states have made exceptional progress in
meeting the required standards for future NATO membership. I wish to
congratulate all of the candidates on their progress. But now we must
ask careful questions about how far each state has come in meeting
those obligations. We must also consider the additional regional
security advantages and potential economies of scale that could be
gained by inviting a larger slate of candidates to join the alliance at
the same time.
This is a security alliance, and our own national security
interests must guide these decisions. But at the same time we must give
careful consideration to the likely effect of NATO membership within
each candidate state, as our long-term objective must be to create
secure democratic allies with effective military capacities that are
willing to participate actively in the alliance. Some states could
benefit tremendously from early membership, even if their membership
could be premature by certain development standards. Other states could
also find it difficult and ultimately unproductive to struggle to meet
difficult membership standards prematurely. These will be difficult
decisions that must be made on a case-by-case basis. I look forward to
beginning these considerations here today.
[The following statement was submitted by Senator Helms for
inclusion the record:]
Prepared Statement of Senator Jesse Helms
Thank you Mr. Chairman for holding this significant hearing today.
You did so at my request and I am grateful to you for doing so. During
the previous debate over enlargement of the NATO Alliance, the Senate
Foreign Relations Committee held a total of nine hearings on the issue
of NATO enlargement. I am pleased that we are starting the process
again today for what I expect will be a robust enlargement of our
Alliance at the Prague summit in November.
In January of 2001 in a speech to the American Enterprise
Institute, I said, ``perhaps the greatest moral challenge we face at
the dawn of a new century is to right the wrongs perpetrated in the
last century at Yalta, when the West abandoned the nations of Central
and Eastern Europe to Stalin and a life of servitude behind the Iron
Curtain.''
When the Senate voted to admit Poland, Hungary and the Czech
Republic into NATO in 1998 we began the process of righting that wrong.
Senate ratification of the protocols to enlarge NATO and ensure that
the new members would secure their rightful place in the community of
Western democracies was one of my proudest achievements as chairman of
the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
However, the first round of NATO enlargement into the new
democracies of Central Europe did not fully erase the scars of Yalta.
During the cold war, many of us in the Senate fought to defend the
independence of what came to be known as the ``captive nations''--the
Baltic countries of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia. This second and
historic enlargement of the NATO Alliance into Eastern and Central
Europe will, I hope, bring the Baltic nations squarely into the
transatlantic alliance.
Last June in a stirring speech in Warsaw, President Bush said that
there would be ``no more Yaltas'' and committed ``NATO membership for
all of Europe's democracies that seek it and are ready to share the
responsibility.'' Senate bill 1572, The Freedom Consolidation Act,
which I introduced with Senator Lieberman and numerous other
cosponsors, endorses the President's vison. I hope that it will be
enacted before he travels to Europe later this month.
[The prepared statement of Senator Lugar follows:]
Prepared Statement of Senator Dick Lugar
nato enlargement and nato's future
Mr. Chairman, you are to be commended for calling this hearing and
for assembling two panels of very fine witnesses.
Government deliberations as well as public debate are beginning to
heat up on the NATO issue as Alliance members contemplate the run-up to
the NATO summit in Prague this November.
When I refer to the NATO issue, I refer not only to the enlargement
question or to the efforts to establish a new Russia-NATO relationship.
I also refer to the question of NATO's purpose, of its transformation
and its ability and willingness to adapt its roles, its missions and
its capabilities to the post-September 11 world and to the war on
terrorism in particular.
I would suggest for purposes of our hearing today that, on some
NATO-related issues, there is considerable common ground in Congress,
within the administration, and with Allies. But there also remain some
rather weighty issues concerning the Alliance on which efforts at
consensus remain difficult.
NATO Enlargement, NATO-Russia
I sense that there is a common view on two key issues. First, there
is general agreement that NATO enlargement should continue, that we
should think about an ambitious round for Prague, and that the war on
terrorism makes it all the more important to accelerate the task of
consolidation democracy and security in Central and Eastern Europe. The
recent V-10 Bucharest summit has given added impetus to the prospect of
including Bulgaria and Romania as possible candidates at Prague as part
of a new ``southern dimension.'' Thus, we are now considering a second
round of candidates that could include seven countries--Estonia,
Latvia, Lithuania, Slovakia, Slovema, Bulgaria, and Romania.
Second, there would appear to be something of a common view that
the United States and NATO are also moving forward constructively on
the NATO-Russia track. Reassurances provided by administration
officials have answered many of the concerns that had been raised about
the new NATO-Russia Council. While we await the outcome of the
Ministerial in Iceland later this month, I believe it is fair to say
that the administration's approach has been a constructive one that is
consistent with the provisions of the Senate resolution of ratification
regarding the NATO-Russia Pennanent Joint Council.
NATO's Purpose, NATO's Future
The third issue where there is less agreement and where the
thinking of the administration as well as Alliance officials is also
less developed, has to do with NATO's future missions and capabilities.
What do we want NATO to do in the future? I believe that this issue
will and should be a central issue at the Prague summit.
The ongoing pace of military operations in Afghanistan and the
escalating violence in the Middle East serve to underscore the simple
fact that the greatest security challenges of our day no longer lie
within Europe but outside of it. As a result, the trans-Atlantic
relationship faces a paradox. We have the most successful Alliance ever
created but it is or seems to be marginal or even irrelevant when it
comes to dealing with the most urgent issues of the day.
And the fact that NATO--ostensibly America's premiere alliance and
the linchpin of the trans-Atlantic relationship--appears to be
completely absent in our strategy on these critical issues raises
important questions about this institution's future centrality and
vitality.
It also seems to me that the issue for NATO is also pretty simple
if far-reaching: Should NATO remain focused on managing security in an
already fairly stable European Continent? Or should it now seek to
expand its missions beyond Europe in order to deal with the new
threats? And should this issue be part of the agenda for the Prague
summit in November of this year?
Addressing this challenge is the strategic issue of our time. It is
as daunting as dealing with the USSR was in its day. September 11 can
and, in my view, should lead to a renaissance of trans-Atlantic
cooperation around this new agenda. If it does not, if NATO remains
focused on Europe, the Alliance will be reduced to what might be called
the ``housekeeping'' function of managing security on an already stable
continent. It will cease to be America's premier alliance for the
simple reason that it will not be addressing the major security issue
of our time. And if we stop investing in it, we can hardly expect the
European allies to invest in it either.
On a more basic level, we must address a strategic disconnect. We
have the most developed Alliance to deal with those strategic issues
that are largely resolved and receding in importance and urgency, yet
no alliance to deal with the most important and more deadly and
immediate threats to our nations. That is hardly a recipe for a sound
strategy or a healthy alliance!
The problem we face in NATO today is not just one of capabilities
but of purpose. The two are inextricably linked. One cannot be solved
without addressing the other. And our answer cannot be limited to the
technocratic issue if devising a more effective successor to the
Defense Capabilities Initiative (DCI). A DCI-2 that focuses on
specialization and special forces might be helpful but it no substitute
for a common strategy that addresses the key strategic challenge for
our time and harnesses U.S. and European will and purpose. Formulation
of and fidelity to that common purpose is a fundamental prerequisite
for generating the resources to create new capabilities, not the other
way around.
The issue of what NATO is for, its basic purpose, is already part
of the public debate. It will inevitably be an issue for the Prague
summit--especially if events in the Middle East or Iraq make it a
central issue in European-American relations this fall. Thus, the
question is whether the United States will lead in embracing this kind
of reform agenda or not. If U.S. policy wants to produce a strategic
shift of this magnitude, then, in my view, there will never be a better
opportunity for the Bush administration to initiate that process than
the Prague summit.
I look forward to hearing from Under Secretary of State for
Political Affairs, Marc Grossman, and Under Secretary of Defense for
Policy, Doug Feith, on the administration's efforts in these important
areas. Our second panel is also very qualified to speak on these
subjects, General Wes Clark, has led the Alliance in combat and General
Odom has been a longtime commentator and student of NATO and the trans-
Atlantic relationship.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman and I look forward to our witnesses
testimony.
[The following statement was submitted by Senator Enzi for
inclusion the record:]
Prepared Statement of Senator Michael B. Enzi
Mr. Chairman, thank you for calling this hearing to look at the
future of NATO. As we all know, NATO, as an organization, has been one
of the strongest supporters of the United States following the attacks
of September 11. The historical landmark of having NATO invoke Article
5 of the mutual defense policy was a good example of how NATO is
supposed to work. The support from those nations currently being
considered for NATO membership also showed how effective this alliance
is and can continue to be. The aspiring nations, along with our NATO
allies, provided the United States with permission to use their air
space and many have sent their own troops to Afghanistan. We have also
seen many of these countries take immediate action to address terrorism
and the financing of terrorism within their own borders. As the United
States continues to fight terrorism internationally, I believe we can
be proud that so many nations stand with us.
I am pleased that the Bush administration has endorsed robust
enlargement of the NATO Alliance. I personally have had the opportunity
to meet with representatives of many of the aspiring countries. In
these meetings, I have seen evidence of progress and strong desires to
continue to have improved economies and stable governments. So much
progress has been made in each of the countries over the last 10 years
that each nation should be commended. As the President has stated
repeatedly about the Prague summit in November, ``We should not
calculate how little we can get away with, but how much we can do to
advance the cause of freedom.'' I believe the President is correct.
NATO is a defense alliance of nations who want to protect the freedom
of their people and the freedom of their allies. The summit in Prague
is an opportunity not just for aspiring countries to join the alliance,
but for the world to see the continued advancement of freedom and
democracy.
I believe NATO enlargement should continue to be a focus and a
priority of the United States. I was pleased when Senator Helms led the
effort in the Senate on the Freedom Consolidation Act and that this
committee approved the Act last year. The Freedom Consolidation Act is
an important statement that the Congress of the United States supports
the President and supports NATO enlargement. The Act includes
statements from both President Bush and President Clinton and has
strong support from both parties. I hope the Senate will be able to
take up this Act for consideration as soon as possible.
In this hearing we are not only examining NATO enlargement, but
more generally, the future of the Alliance. One area where we can see
the future of NATO changing almost immediately is in the relationship
between Russia and NATO. While there will be many issues that the new
NATO-Russia Council will not be able to address or reach consensus on,
the Council can provide a good forum for an improved NATO-Russia
dialog. I believe one of the most important ways to improve relations
with Russia, on any issue, is through communication. The Council has
great possibilities and should go forward with support from the United
States. Critics must be assured that the Council does not give Russia a
``back door'' into NATO. The Council gives both NATO and Russia the
opportunity to take actions together but does not threaten the
Alliance. I believe the Council is a constructive tool that can improve
international security.
As we look at improving the relationship between the Alliance and
Russia, I believe it is important to see other areas in need of
improvement. NATO has been criticized for taking actions that go beyond
the original mandate. This is simply not true. NATO continues to be a
strong alliance with an important mandate of providing defense and
security for its members. We saw the evidence that this remains true
after September 11. The organization of NATO, however, should be
examined by its members to determine how it can be made better.
Improvement can and should be made in how the organization operates. I
believe it is our responsibility to ask the questions: Is NATO
operating efficiently, is NATO responding timely and appropriately to
international crisis, and what can be done to improve NATO operations?
These questions must be addressed by the United States and our
delegates should have proposals to take to the organization.
Mr. Chairman, I am impressed with the witnesses prepared to testify
before this committee. Experience is a learning tool that cannot be
reproduced, but it can be shared. Today's witnesses have the experience
and knowledge that will make this hearing a productive discussion on
NATO's future. I look forward to hearing the testimony of both panels.
Thank you again, Mr. Chairman, for holding this important hearing.
The Chairman. And by way of closing, I am suggesting that
of the two witnesses whom I will introduce later, Under
Secretary of State for Political Affairs Marc Grossman is a
long-time friend. I did not say ``old friend,'' because Marc
certainly does not fit that description.
Mr. Grossman. Yes.
The Chairman. Marc served as Ambassador to Turkey shortly
after leaving high school. That is only a slight exaggeration.
He now occupies a senior career post in the Department.
And Doug Feith is Under Secretary for Policy at the
Department of Defense. He came to the Pentagon from a
distinguished career in the private sector and has already made
his mark as a keen analyst and effective spokesman for the
Department.
We are also going to hear from others; I will introduce
them later. Well, I might as well do it now, so I do not have
to do it later. General Wes Clark, of course, capped a long,
star-studded career in the U.S. Army by serving as Supreme
Allied Commander of Europe, where he successfully prosecuted
the Yugoslav air war. Most recently, he has become a best-
selling author. And I have long turned to him for advice, as
have many of us up here on this panel. And he has never
disappointed me, or I suspect, anyone on the panel.
Lieutenant General Bill Odom also served in the U.S. Army
with great distinction. An internationally recognized
strategist, he did a tour as Director of the National Security
Agency, and he is now affiliated with Yale University and the
Hudson Institute.
We have a very, very distinguished group of Americans
before us today and I am anxious to, after I turn to my friend
from Indiana, to get to hear what they have to say and be able
to question them.
Senator Lugar.
Senator Lugar. Mr. Chairman, thank you for calling this
hearing, for assembling two panels of excellent witnesses.
Government deliberations, as well as public debate, are
beginning to focus on the NATO issue, as Alliance members
contemplate the runup to the NATO summit in Prague this
November.
When I refer to the NATO issue, I refer not only to the
enlargement question, or to the efforts to establish a new
Russian-NATO relationship, I also refer to the question of
NATO's purpose, of its transformation, its ability and
willingness to adopt its roles, its mission, its capabilities
to the post-September 11 world and to the war on terrorism in
particular.
I would suggest for purposes of our hearing today that on
some NATO-related issues there is considerable common ground in
Congress, within the administration and with our allies. But
there also remains some weighty issues concerning the Alliance,
on which efforts at consensus remain difficult.
I sense there is a common view on two key issues. First
there is general agreement that NATO enlargement should
continue, that we should think about an ambitious round for
Prague and that the war on terrorism makes it all the more
important to accelerate the task of consolidating democracy and
security in Central and Eastern Europe.
The recent V-10 Bucharest summit has given added impetus to
the prospect of including Bulgaria and Romania as possible
candidates at Prague, as part of a new southern dimension. Thus
we are now considering a second round of candidates that
include seven countries, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Slovakia,
Slovenia, Bulgaria and Romania.
Second, there would appear to be a common view that the
United States and NATO are moving forward constructively on the
NATO-Russia track. Reassurances provided by administration
officials have answered many of the concerns that have been
raised about the new NATO-Russia Council.
While we await the outcome of the Ministerial in Iceland
later this month, I believe that the administration's approach
has been a constructive one that is consistent with the
provisions of the Senate resolutions of ratification regarding
NATO-Russian Permanent Joint Council.
The third issue, where there is less agreement and where
the thinking of the administration as well as Alliance
officials, is also less developed, has to do with NATO's future
missions and capabilities. What do we want NATO to do in the
future?
I believe that this issue will and should be a central
issue at the Prague summit. The ongoing pace of military
operations in Afghanistan, the escalating violence in the
Middle East serve to underscore the simple fact that the
greatest security challenges of our day no longer lie within
Europe, but outside of it.
As a result, the transatlantic relationship faces a
paradox. We have the most successful Alliance ever created, but
it is or seems to be marginal or even irrelevant when it comes
to dealing with the most urgent issues of the day.
And the fact that NATO, ostensibly America's premiere
alliance and the linchpin of the transatlantic relationship,
sometimes appears to be absent in our strategy on these
critical issues raises important questions about NATO's future
centrality and vitality.
It also seems to me that the issue for NATO is also simple
if far-reaching. Should NATO remain focused on managing
security in an already fairly stable European continent, or
should it now seek to expand its mission beyond Europe in order
to deal with the new threats? And should this issue be a part
of the agenda for the Prague summit in November of this year?
Addressing this challenge is the strategic issue of our
time. It is as daunting as dealing with the USSR was in its
day.
September 11 can and, in my view, should lead to a
renaissance of transatlantic cooperation around this new
agenda. If it does not, if NATO remains focused on Europe, the
Alliance will be reduced to what might be called the
housekeeping function of managing security in an already stable
continent. And it will cease to be America's premiere alliance
for the simple reason that it will not be addressing the major
security issues of our time. And if we stop investing in it, we
can hardly expect European allies to invest in it either.
On a more basic level, we must address strategic
disconnect. We have the most developed alliance to deal with
those strategic issues that are largely resolved and receding
in importance and urgency, yet no alliance to deal with the
most important and more deadly and immediate threats to our
nations, United States and European.
That is hardly a recipe for a sound strategy or a healthy
alliance. The problem we face in NATO today is not just one of
capabilities, but of purpose. The two are inextricably linked,
and one cannot be solved without addressing the other.
And our answer cannot be limited to the technocratic issue
of devising a more effective successor to the Defense
Capabilities Initiative, the DCI. A DCI-2, that focuses on
specialization and special forces might be helpful, but is no
substitute for a common strategy that addresses the key
strategic challenge for our time and harnesses U.S. and
European will and purpose. Formulation of and fidelity to that
common purpose is a fundamental prerequisite for generating the
resources to create new capabilities and not the other way
around.
The issue of what NATO is for, its basic purpose, is
already part of the public debate, and it will be an issue for
the Prague summit, especially if events in the Middle East or
Iraq make it a central issue in the European-American relations
this fall. Thus the question is whether the United States will
lead in embracing this kind of reform agenda or not. If U.S.
policy wants to produce a strategic shift of this magnitude,
then in my view, there will never be a better opportunity for
the Bush administration to initiate that process than the
Prague summit.
I will look forward to hearing from Under Secretary of
State for Political Affairs Marc Grossman, and Under Secretary
of Defense for Policy Doug Feith, on the administration's
efforts in these important areas.
Our second panel is exceptionally well qualified to speak
on these subjects. General Wes Clark has led the Alliance in
combat, and General Bill Odom has been a long-time commentator
and student of NATO and the transatlantic relationship.
I thank you, Mr. Chairman, for this hearing. I look forward
to the testimony of our witnesses.
The Chairman. Thank you very much, Senator.
Under Secretary Grossman.
STATEMENT OF HON. MARC GROSSMAN, UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE FOR
POLITICAL AFFAIRS, DEPARTMENT OF STATE, WASHINGTON, DC
Mr. Grossman. Yes, Mr. Chairman. Thank you very much. First
of all, Mr. Chairman, Senator Lugar, other members of the
committee. I thank you very much for this opportunity to
testify today. It is always an honor and a privilege to be
here.
Mr. Chairman, with your permission, I would like to submit
a longer statement for the record, and if you might just allow
me to make----
The Chairman. Without objection, the whole statement will
be placed in the record.
Mr. Grossman. If you would allow me to make some comments,
I would very much appreciate it to start this conversation.
First of all, before I do anything else, let me thank you
and all of the members of the committee and, indeed, Members of
the Senate for all the consultation and the time and the effort
that you have taken with us, not just over the past few months,
but over the past few years as we try to get NATO right.
Those are in formal sessions and informal sessions and we
have always very much benefited from your advice and from your
wisdom. And we know that as we go forward, especially on the
issues of capabilities and relationships and this relationship
with Russia, we will need to be in the closest possible
consultation with the Senate. And we very much look forward to
that.
Mr. Chairman, as you both said, the conversation about NATO
and ``What is NATO's purpose? What is NATO all about? Is NATO
relevant to the future?'' is now on--in our publics, in our
parliaments and in our administration. And I have got to say I
welcome this debate. This is not something that I shrink from
at all. And I do not think the administration shrinks from it
at all, because we ought to be talking about the future of
NATO, and we ought to be considering new relationships and new
partners and new members for NATO. And that seems to me what
democratically supported foreign and defense policy is all
about.
As you said, Mr. Chairman, and also Senator Lugar, the
attacks on the 11th of September and NATO's response, which as
Senator Biden said was a big deal, proved to me that NATO's
continuing value in the world, in this world of new and
unpredictable threats, to me, as to Senator Biden, invoking
Article 5 for the very first time in NATO's history sent a
clear message that this is an Alliance that is united and is
very much determined.
We very much, all of us, ought to very much welcome NATO's
collective response as well as the contributions of individual
allies. From our perspective, these 50 years of people working
together in NATO made it possible for allied forces to work
together in Operation Enduring Freedom.
Take first the collective response. As Senator Biden noted,
NATO AWACS have logged over 3,000 hours patrolling American
skies. NATO standing naval forces are working with U.S. naval
forces in the eastern Mediterranean.
All of the NATO allies have provided blanket overflight
rights, access to ports and bases, refueling assistance, and
stepped up intelligence efforts. Sixteen of the 19 allies are
supporting Operations Enduring Freedom and Noble Eagle with
military forces and with military capabilities. Fourteen of our
19 allies have deployed forces in the region, and 9 are
actually participating in combat operations in Afghanistan.
So we believe that what the NATO allies have done is made a
significant contribution both collectively and individually to
Operation Enduring Freedom.
As Senator Biden pointed out, almost all of our allies are
also involved in the International Security and Assistance
Force in Afghanistan. Current allies, aspiring allies are all
there to be part of the effort to bring Afghanistan into the
modern world. NATO, to me, still matters.
Senator Lugar talked a little bit about the question of the
vision of NATO. Where do we want to take this Alliance? I think
when President Bush and his counterparts meet in Prague later
this year, their gathering will symbolize the changes that have
taken place in Europe and NATO's central role in making these
changes possible.
Think about Prague: Prague, a city that was once behind the
Iron Curtain; Prague, a city that was once synonymous in a
famous spring in 1968 with the rebellion against the system
that we defeated. And in 1991, Prague was the city in which the
Warsaw Pact was dissolved. So it seems, to me anyway, that it
is a perfect place to think about the future of this Alliance.
NATO remains a fundamental pillar of our foreign and
defense policy. As President Bush said last month when NATO
Secretary General Robertson was here, ``NATO remains an anchor
of security for both Europe and the United States.''
As you both know, Senators, I have just returned from a
meeting with all of our NATO allies in Brussels and then I went
on to 8 individual allies to consult on our agenda for Prague,
our vision of the future. And we proposed that Prague be
defined by three themes: First, new capabilities; second, new
members; and third, new relationships.
And Mr. Chairman, with your permission, I would just like
to say a word about each of these categories.
First, September 11 brought home to every single person in
this room and certainly in the United States, and I believe to
each one of our allies, how dangerous our world still is, as
you both noted.
Czech President Havel, who will host the Prague summit,
observed that September 11, and these are his words, ``alerted
us to the evil existing in this world.''
September 11 also demonstrated how important it is that we
have allies if we are to defend our way of life and if we are
to defend our democracy.
So to me, NATO is no less important to our security today.
Indeed, it is possible that NATO is more important to our
security today. And so as I report to you, our agenda for
Prague has three parts. First, ensuring that NATO has the
capabilities needed to meet emerging new threats; second, to
extend NATO membership to more new European democracies; and
third, to renew NATO's partnerships and relationships with
Russia and the Ukraine and other partners. It is new
capabilities, new members, and new relationships.
It seems, to me anyway, that these three themes are very
much rooted in NATO's values and goals as set out in the 1949
treaty. The chairman read from that treaty.
I also took a look, since we are 53 years almost exactly
from the treaty being signed, at what President Truman had to
say on April 4, 1949 about this NATO treaty. And I think it
goes very much along with what the chairman said.
This is what Truman said in announcing this treaty, ``It is
altogether appropriate that nations so deeply conscious of
their common interests should join in expressing their
determination to preserve their present peaceful situation and
protect it in the future. And with our common traditions, we
face common problems.''
He did not talk about one problem. He did not talk about
one geography. He did not talk about one set of issues. But in
Truman's speech, he talked about the need to defend common
values, common traditions and our common security.
Since the end of the cold war, Mr. Chairman, the Alliance
has taken steps to revise its doctrine and improve its command
and force structures to meet today's threats. The 1999
strategic concept, which all of us worked so hard on, defined
those new threats explicitly, noting that the new risk to the
Euro-Atlantic peace and stability were becoming clearer:
oppression, ethnic conflict, the proliferation of weapons of
mass destruction and the global spread of weapons technology
and terrorism.
I think it is clear that while we have recognized these new
threats, there has to be lots more done at NATO to meet them.
In order to defend ourselves against these new threats, NATO
needs to be able to deploy at short notice flexible, well armed
forces capable of conducting sustained military operations
across a range of options.
And while the United States now possesses these kinds of
forces, in large measure our European allies do not. And I
believe that this growing capabilities gap between Europe and
the United States is the most serious long-term problem facing
NATO. It must be addressed.
And I would say to Senator Lugar that I think there is
consensus on this; there is consensus that Europeans need to do
more to close this capabilities gap. In order to fight
effectively alongside the United States, our European allies
need more flexible, sustainable forces able to move long
distances quickly and deliver overwhelming firepower on
arrival. This will mean that they need to invest in airlift,
and in sealift, precision strike capabilities and the ability
to communicate with the rest of us at the fight.
In our view, at Prague, NATO must begin to address these
issues and must begin to take serious steps to improve overall
Alliance capabilities. Under Secretary Feith will have more to
say on this. I would like--as I have said, I have more on mine
that is part of the record, but this is a very, very important
issue.
The Chairman. Do not short-circuit your comments on that
issue, I mean, do not worry about the time.
Mr. Grossman. OK.
The Chairman. This is the central issue for most of us
sitting up here.
Mr. Grossman. It is a central issue. I will just make one
more comment since both of you raised it.
What I said at NATO the other day to all of our allies
sitting around the table was, ``If we get to a point where it
is the truth that the United States fights and NATO cleans up
or the United States fights and the European Union cleans up,
that is bad for us and it is very, very bad for our European
allies.''
So I just could not agree with both of you more and, as I
say, the Under Secretary will say more about the precise parts
of these capabilities. But I believe that if we work ourselves
into this position where there is this division of labor, we
will all have done ourselves--we will have done ourselves a
considerable amount of damage, not just to the United States,
but certainly to the Europeans as well.
I will talk for a minute about new members, Mr. Chairman.
Our second goal for Prague is to continue the process of
building a united Euro-Atlantic community, by extending
membership to those democratic European countries who have
demonstrated their determination and their ability to defend
the principles of democracy, individual liberty and the rule of
law.
As the President observed last year in Warsaw, ``Yalta did
not ratify a natural divide. It divided a living
civilization.''
And I believe that a fair review of the enlargement to
Europe's new democracies in 1997, which this committee so
successfully supported, has brought us closer to completing the
vision of NATO's founders of a free and united Europe. But our
work on this is not yet done.
In his first meeting with allies last June, President Bush
secured a consensus to take concrete, historic decisions in
Prague to advance enlargement. And we take as our guidance the
President's view that NATO ``should not calculate how little we
can get away with, but how much we can do to advance the cause
of freedom.''
We have been working very hard with the aspirant countries
and with other allies so that people are ready for NATO
membership.
You all know that a team led by U.S. Ambassador to NATO
Nick Burns completed a tour of all 9 of the aspirant countries
focusing on the need for reform. We have told aspirants that
the United States has made no decision on which countries to
support for membership, and we have urged them all to
accelerate their reforms between now and Prague.
Members of this committee, Members of the Senate, members
of the public, I think will rightly ask: ``What capabilities,
what contributions will these aspirant countries bring to the
Alliance if they are allowed to join our treaty?''
Well, the Washington treaty makes clear that states invited
to join NATO should be in a position to further the principles
of the treaty and contribute to the security of the Euro-
Atlantic area. Many aspirants have already demonstrated their
determination to do just this.
The Vilnius Group, which met in Sofia last October declared
its shared intention, and I quote here from their statement, to
``fully support the war against the terrorism'' and to ``act as
Allies of the United States of America.'' And when Deputy
Secretary Armitage was in Bucharest not 3 weeks ago, this
commitment was very much reaffirmed.
Aspirants have offered overflight rights, transit and
basing privileges, military and police forces, medical units
and transportation support to U.S. efforts. Most of them will
participate in the International Security Assistance Force in
Afghanistan. And most aspirant countries have contributed
already to our efforts in the Balkans.
Some people have said that after September 11, enlargement
should not remain a priority. I think that is wrong. I believe
that enlargement should remain a priority for this Alliance
because, as you said, Senator Lugar and Senator Biden, the
events of September 11 show us that the more allies we have,
the better off we are going to be. The more allies we have to
prosecute the war on terrorism the better off we are going to
be.
And if we are going to meet these new threats to our
security, we need to build the broadest and strongest coalition
possible of countries that share our values and are able to act
effectively with us. With freedom under attack, we must
demonstrate our resolve to do as much as we can to advance our
cause.
It is our goal and it is also our expectation that, working
with you, we will be able to forge a solid and united approach
to enlargement and to build an equally strong consensus within
the Alliance.
I might say, if I could take this opportunity also, that we
very much appreciate the support that members of this committee
have given to the Freedom Consolidation Act, and we hope that
the solid bipartisan support for this act might help it pass in
the very near future. We look forward to the closest possible
consultations with the Congress, and especially the Senate, as
we go forward on the questions of enlargement.
Finally, Mr. Chairman, a word or two about new
relationships. And I appreciate what Senator Lugar said, that
there seems to be a consensus on the fact that we need to have
the right new relationship with Russia, but I also appreciate
the point that you made, Mr. Chairman, that we have got to get
it right and we should not leave doubts and anxieties on either
side about what this relationship is to be about.
Our goal for Prague is to advance this NATO core principle,
which is that NATO ought to live in peace with all peoples and
promote stability in the Euro-Atlantic area. NATO-Russia have
taken important steps to give new emphasis and direction to
their extensive cooperation in the aftermath of September 11.
And as you both said, NATO is now working with Russia to
complete negotiations on the creation of a new body to be
called the NATO-Russia Council that will permit joint decisions
and actions in areas of common interests. At the upcoming
Reykjavik Ministerial, we are optimistic that Secretary of
State Powell will be able to conclude with his colleagues the
agreement on this new structure.
And then to acknowledge the potential significance of the
new relationship, President Bush and other NATO leaders have
been invited to a summit on the 28th of May in Rome to
celebrate the new NATO-Russia Council.
Mr. Chairman, let me answer your question as directly as I
can. From our perspective, here is what this new NATO-Russia
Council will do: First, it will focus on practical, well-
defined projects, where NATO and Russia share a common purpose
and a common goal. Second, it will offer Russia the opportunity
to participate in shaping the development of cooperative
mechanisms in areas such as counterterrorism, nonproliferation,
and civil emergency preparedness.
Very importantly as well, here is what the NATO-Russia
Council will not do: The body will not give Russia the ability
to veto any NATO actions in any area. Second, it is not a back
door to NATO membership. Third, the NATO-Russia Council will
not infringe on NATO's prerogatives.
NATO members will continue to take any decision by
consensus on any issue. And the NATO-Russia Council will be
fully separate from the North Atlantic Council, which will
continue to meet and make decisions as it always has on the
full range of issues on NATO's agenda.
Mr. Chairman, while forging these new links with Russia, we
also need to pay attention to countries like Ukraine, to the
countries we are working with in Central Asia. And very
importantly from my trip to the region, we want to pay
attention to what is called NATO's Mediterranean dialog as
well.
Mr. Chairman, nearly 53 years after its creation, NATO
remains the core of the United States commitment to Europe and
the bedrock of our security. A Europe whole and free and at
peace is a goal fast becoming a reality thanks to NATO.
As we look to Prague and to our agenda for new
capabilities, new members and new relationships, we look
forward to working closely with members of this committee to
ensure that NATO will meet tomorrow's challenges as
successfully as it met those of the past. I thank you very
much.
The Chairman. Thank you, Marc.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Grossman follows:]
Prepared Statement of Hon. Marc Grossman, Under Secretary of State for
Political Affairs
Senator Biden, Senator Lugar, Members of the Committee, it is an
honor and a privilege to be here. I thank you for the opportunity to
address the Senate Foreign Relations Committee with my friend and
colleague, Doug Feith.
Mr. Chairman, I would like to begin by thanking you and other
members of this Committee and the Senate for your strong and consistent
support for NATO, which has helped ensure it remains the greatest
Alliance in history.
It has been a privilege and my good fortune to have had the
opportunity to consult with you and take your advice over the years on
NATO. I look forward to continuing this dialogue and consultation in
the future.
Mr. Chairman, I appreciate your invitation today at a time when the
future of NATO is being actively discussed on both sides of the
Atlantic.
I welcome this debate. Our governments, our parliaments and our
publics ought to talk about the future of NATO. That is what
democratically supported foreign and defense policy is all about.
The attacks of September 11 and NATO's response prove to me NATO's
continuing value in a world of new and unpredictable threats. Invoking
Article 5 for the first time in history, NATO sent a clear message that
the Alliance is united and determined.
We greatly value NATO's collective response, as well as the
contributions of individual Allies. Fifty years of NATO cooperation
made natural the participation of Allied forces in Operation Enduring
Freedom. NATO AWACS have logged over 3,000 hours patrolling American
skies. All NATO Allies have provided blanket overflight rights, access
to ports and bases, refueling assistance, and stepped up intelligence
efforts. Sixteen of our Allies are supporting Operations Enduring
Freedom and Noble Eagle with military forces and capabilities. Fourteen
Allies have deployed forces in the region, and nine are participating
in combat operations with us in eastern Afghanistan as we speak.
Almost all contributors to the International Security Assistance
Force, initially led by Britain and soon by Turkey, are current Allies,
aspiring Allies, or countries who have trained with NATO in the
Partnership for Peace. Their varied contributions include air
reconnaissance, refueling, cargo, and close air support missions,
special forces missions, specialized nuclear, biological, and chemical
weapons units, mine clearing and medical units, and naval patrols.
Altogether Allies and Partners have deployed nearly 4,000 troops to
Afghanistan.
NATO's actions in response to September 11 come as no surprise to
me. Throughout its history, NATO has adapted to meet new threats and
seize new opportunities.
Nothing illustrates this fact better than the number of countries
seeking to join. Secretary Powell made this point last week, observing
that countries want to join ``because they want to be a part of a
political and security organization that is anchored in its
relationship with North America.''
nato today: enduring values and common purposes
When President Bush and his counterparts meet in Prague later this
year, their gathering will symbolize the changes that have taken place
in Europe and NATO's central role in making these changes possible.
Prague: Once behind an Iron Curtain.
Prague: Synonymous in a famous spring in 1968 with rebellion
against oppression and thirst for democracy. And in 1991, Prague hosted
the meeting that dissolved the Warsaw Pact.
In 2002, NATO leaders will come to Prague to continue shaping that
new Europe and to reaffirm the strength, unity and vitality of the
Atlantic Alliance.
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization remains a fundamental pillar
of our foreign and defense policy. As President Bush said last month,
NATO remains ``an anchor of security for both Europe and the United
States.''
I have just returned from meeting with all of our Allies at NATO. I
then traveled to eight Allied capitals to consult on our agenda for
Prague.
We proposed that Prague be defined by three themes: New
Capabilities, New Members, and New Relationships.
21st century nato: new capabilities, new members, new relationships
September 11 has brought home to us how dangerous our world has
become. Czech President Vaclav Havel, who will host the Prague summit,
observed that September 11 ``alerted us to the evil existing in this
world.'' September 11 has also demonstrated how important our Allies
are in helping to defeat the new threats that face us. To protect our
way of life, the Alliance must be an effective tool in the world after
September 11.
That is why NATO ministers agreed last December to intensify common
efforts to meet the threats from terrorism and weapons of mass
destruction that all Allies face. When President Bush meets with Allied
leaders in Prague later this year, we expect that Allies will approve
an action plan aimed at enhancing NATO's ability to deal with these and
other threats.
NATO is not less important to our security today, NATO is more
important.
Our agenda at Prague will be threefold:
Ensuring NATO has the capabilities needed to meet emerging
new threats,
Extending NATO membership to more new European democracies,
and
Renewing NATO relationsships with Russia, Ukraine and other
Partners.
New capabilities. New members. New relationships.
This agenda is rooted in NATO's values and goals as set out in the
1949 Washington Treaty--to safeguard the freedom, common heritage and
civilization of our peoples, live in peace with all peoples and
governments, and promote the stability and well-being of the North
Atlantic area.
new capabilities
Since the end of the Cold War, the Alliance has taken steps to
revise its doctrine and improve its command and force structures to
meet today's threats. The 1999 Strategic Concept defined these new
threats explicitly, noting that ``new risks to Euro-Atlantic peace and
stability were becoming clearer--oppression, ethnic conflict, the
proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, and the global spread of
weapons technology and terrorism.''
While we have recognized the new threats, we have more to do to
prepare NATO to meet them. The September 11 terrorist attacks
demonstrated that the threats to Allies and to our Alliance can come
from anywhere, at any time, employing devices ranging from a box cutter
to weapons of mass destruction. In order to defend ourselves against
these new threats, NATO needs to be able to deploy at short notice
flexible, well-armed forces capable of conducting sustained operations
across a range of military options.
While the U.S. currently possesses forces with such capabilities,
in large measure our European Allies do not. I believe the growing
capabilities gap between the United States and Europe is the most
serious long-term problem facing NATO and must be addressed. In order
to fight effectively alongside the U.S., our European Allies need
flexible, sustainable forces, able to move long distances quickly and
deliver overwhelming firepower on arrival. This will require improved
strategic lift and modern precision strike capabilities, as well as
enhanced combat support and combat service support. Unless the
disparity is substantially narrowed, NATO will be increasingly less
able to play its part in countering the threats that now face us.
At Prague, NATO must begin to redress this imbalance by agreeing to
steps aimed at improving overall Alliance capabilities. These will
include further streamlining NATO's command structure to make it more
responsive to today's threats and a commitment to provide the
deployable, capable and ready forces NATO needs.
We are seeking a comprehensive improvement in European military
capabilities. Although the DCI initiative identified many areas where
improvements were needed, much remains to be done to fulfill its goals.
We need to sharpen and narrow our focus. Increased defense spending
remains an important goal, and we believe Alllies can also use
resources more effectively by greater pooling of their efforts. Among
the proposals we would favor is creation of a European Mobility Command
to coordinate existing and future European airlift assets.
Afghanistan has also demonstrated the importance of Special
Operations forces in combined land-air operations. To enhance NATO
capabilities in this area we will also propose creation of a Special
Operations Coordination Center at SHAPE.
NATO must also develop the means to defend its forces and members
against weapons of mass destruction fielded either by rogue states or
terrorist groups or by some combination of the two. Here we have
proposed initiatives on biological weapons defense and bio-terrorism
and will soon offer proposals on missile defense.
new members
Our second goal for Prague is to continue the process of building a
united Euro-Atlantic community by extending membership to those
democratic European countries who have demonstrated their determination
and ability to defend the principles of democracy, individual liberty,
and the rule of law.
As the President observed last year in Warsaw, ``Yalta did not
ratify a natural divide, it divided a living civilization.'' He made it
clear that his goal is to erase the false lines that have divided
Europe and to ``welcome into Europe's home'' every European nation that
struggles toward democracy, free markets, and a strong civic culture.
The process of enlargement to Europe's new democracies launched in
1997 has fulfilled NATO's promise and brought us closer to completing
the vision of NATO's founders of a free and united Europe. But our work
is not done.
In his first meeting with Allies last June, the President secured a
consensus to take concrete, historic decisions at Prague to advance
enlargement. We take as guidance the President's view that NATO
``should not calculate how little we can get away with, but how much we
can do to advance the cause of freedom.''
We have been working with Allies and the nine current aspirant
countries to strengthen their preparations. A team led by U.S.
Ambassador to NATO Nick Burns visited the aspirant countries earlier
this year to reinforce the importance of addressing key reform
priorities in the months before Prague. Our team came away from its
meetings impressed by the commitment of the aspirants to meeting their
Membership Action Plan goals and advancing reforms, even while
recognizing that they all have serious work ahead to prepare for
membership. We have told aspirants that the U.S. has made no decision
on which countries to support for membership, and we have urged them to
accelerate their reforms between now and Prague.
Members of this Committee and the rest of the Senate will rightly
ask what capabilities and contributions potential new members will
bring to the Alliance.
The Washington Treaty makes clear that states invited to join NATO
should be in a position to further the principles of the Treaty and
contribute to the security of the Euro-Atlantic area. This is the
standard that we and our Allies will apply as we approach decisions at
Prague. Many aspirants have already demonstrated their determination to
contribute to Euro-Atlantic security and stability. The Vilnius Group,
meeting in Sofia last October declared its shared intention to ``fully
support the war against terrorism'' and to ``act as Allies of the
United States.'' Aspirants have offered overflight rights, transit and
basing privileges, military and police forces, medical units and
transport support to U.S. efforts. Most will participate in the
International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan. Most aspirant
countries have also contributed actively to NATO efforts to prevent
further hostilities in the Balkans.
Some have asked in the aftermath of September 11 whether
enlargement should remain a priority. I believe the answer is ``yes.''
The events of September 11 have reinforced the importance of closer
cooperation and integration between the United States and all the
democracies of Europe. If we are to meet new threats to our security,
we need to build the broadest and strongest coalition possible of
countries that share our values and are able to act effectively with
us. With freedom under attack, we must demonstrate our resolve to do as
much as we can to advance its cause.
It is our goal and expectation that, working with you, we will be
able to forge a solid and united approach to enlargement and build an
equally strong consensus with the Alliance.
We welcome the support from members of this Committee for the
Freedom Consolidation Support Act, and believe that a solid bipartisan
majority behind this bill will send a message of our commitment to an
enlarged and strengthened Alliance.
We look forward to the closest consultations with the Congress on
this subject and to the debate in the Senate on ratification as we
approach these historic decisions.
Our third goal for Prague is also aimed at advancing NATO's core
principles--those of living in peace with all peoples and promoting
stability in the Euro-Atlantic area. As we work to complete the vision
of a united Europe from which, Winston Churchill once observed, ``no
nation should be permanently outcast,'' we must continue to reach out
and expand cooperation and integration with all of NATO's Partners.
NATO and Russia have taken steps to give new impetus and direction
to their extensive cooperation in the aftermath of September 11.
President Bush's vision is of a Russia ``fully reformed, fully
democratic, and closely bound to the rest of Europe,'' which is able to
build partnerships with Europe's great institutions, including NATO.
NATO is now working with Russia to complete negotiations on
creation of a new body--the NATO-Russia Council--that will permit joint
decisions and actions in areas of common interest. At the upcoming
Reykjavik ministerial, we are optimistic that Secretary Powell will
conclude with his colleagues the agreement on the new structure. To
acknowledge the potential significance of the new relationship,
President Bush will join NATO and Russian leaders at a summit May 28 in
Italy to inaugurate the NATO-Russia Council.
Here's what the proposed NATO-Russia Council will do:
It will focus on practical, well-defined projects where NATO
and Russia share a common purpose and a common goal.
It will offer Russia the opportunity to participate in
shaping the development of cooperative mechanisms in areas such
as counter-terrorism, nonproliferation, and civil emergency
preparedness.
Here is what the NATO-Russia Council will not do:
The new body will not give Russia the ability to veto NATO
actions in any areas.
It is not a back door to NATO membership.
It will not infringe on NATO prerogatives. NATO members will
continue to take any decision by consensus on any issue.
The NATO-Russia Council will be fully separate from the NAC, which
will continue to meet and make decisions as it always has on the full
range of issues on NATO's agenda.
While forging new links with Russia, our cooperative vision for
NATO embraces all of NATO's Partners, including Ukraine, countries in
the Caucasus and Central Asia, and Mediterranean Dialogue partners.
Our Distinctive Partnership with Ukraine has helped ensure that
Ukraine continues to progress along the reform path and expand its
links to the West. Ukraine has signaled its desire for closer
integration with NATO. NATO has made clear to Ukraine the need for
greater substantive progress in a number of areas. At Prague, we should
welcome Ukraine's interest while looking to develop initiatives aimed
at concrete results in strategic areas of common interest.
We want to focus at Prague on NATO's Partner activities with
countries of Central Asia that have played such constructive roles in
the war against terrorism. The Partnership for Peace and EAPC have been
successful vehicles for integration, but we believe that much more can
be done to expand cooperation between NATO and these countries. Through
the PfP, NATO can help build reformed, stable, democratic societies in
Central Asia and the Caucasus. We need to make sure PfP programs and
resources are tailored to their needs, so that they can develop the
forces and training they need to meet common threats and strengthen
stability.
Nearly fifty-three years after its creation, NATO remains the core
of the United States commitment to Europe and the bedrock of our
security. NATO has kept peace in Europe for over half a century, it
continues to provide for Allies conventional and nuclear defense, and
it is the nexus of cooperation with Russia, Ukraine, Central Asia and
the Caucasus. No other organization can fulfill these roles.
A Europe whole, free and at peace is a goal fast becoming a reality
thanks to NATO. We and our Allies have much work ahead, but also an
historic opportunity to achieve our goals of defending, integrating,
and stabilizing the Euro-Atlantic area and continuing to strengthen
this greatest of Alliances. As we look to Prague and our agenda of new
capabilities, new members, and new relationships, we look forward to
working closely with members of this Committee to ensure that NATO will
meet tomorrow's challenges as successfully as it has those of the past.
The Chairman. Secretary Feith.
STATEMENT OF HON. DOUGLAS J. FEITH, UNDER SECRETARY OF DEFENSE
FOR POLICY, DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE, WASHINGTON, DC
Mr. Feith. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Chairman, Senator Lugar, members of the committee, I
would like first to echo Secretary Grossman's comment about the
usefulness of the consultation that we in the administration
have had with members of this committee and other Members of
the Senate.
We have been impressed by the degree of interest in NATO.
It is useful to us to learn your perspectives and it is
gratifying to see that there is the kind of support, bipartisan
support for NATO that remains very strong today despite all--
no, I would not even say ``despite.'' I would say largely
because of all the questions that people continually raise
about NATO's relevance to the current world.
Chairman Biden began his remarks by reading from the North
Atlantic Treaty. He quoted from Article 5. I would like to
quote a short passage from the preamble of the 1949 treaty. It
said, ``The parties are determined to safeguard the freedom,
common heritage and civilization of their peoples, founded on
the principles of democracy, individual liberty, and the rule
of law. They seek to promote stability and well-being in the
North Atlantic area.''
NATO achieved these purposes during the cold war, and since
then it has fulfilled them in the Balkans through its
peacekeeping work in Bosnia and in the war against ethnic
cleansing in Kosovo.
NATO has adapted itself to play an important role now in
supporting the U.S.-led war on terrorism. And in the future, an
expanding list of NATO members will continue to promote Euro-
Atlantic stability. The Alliance will continue to safeguard the
community of North Atlantic democracies against all types of
threats, including, I suppose, threats that we cannot now
anticipate.
Since 1949, we have had a broad and bipartisan support for
NATO as an element of U.S. national security policy. I take
this as a sign that the phrase ``Atlantic community'' is
meaningful.
The United States and its European and Canadian allies
indeed are a community. We are not just a collection of members
of a multinational forum. We share fundamental beliefs, for
example about the nature of human beings, their rights and
their relationship to their respective governments. And the
security of the community's different elements is of a piece.
Among the Atlantic community's members there are common
interests, large common interests, economic and political, as
well as military. And there is true fellow feeling that
motivates action.
For an alliance of this kind to remain vital for over 50
years, there must be more than a treaty underlying it. There
must be sentiment, a sense of community, that makes the
Alliance richer than a simple legal obligation. And this point,
I think, was illustrated in the response of NATO and NATO
members to the attack on the United States on September 11. Our
allies responded to the attack quickly, loyally and usefully.
Less than 24 hours after the World Trade Center and
Pentagon were hit, the Alliance for the first time in history,
as Chairman Biden noted, invoked Article 5, the collective
defense provision of the NATO treaty. And since last fall, as
has been commented on, we have 7 NATO AWACS aircraft patrolling
U.S. skies.
The war effort and the post-Taliban reconstruction and
security effort in Afghanistan are benefiting from the
contributions of our NATO allies and partners. Those
contributions have come from within and outside the formal
Alliance structures. All, as Secretary Grossman stressed, are
the result of more than 50 years of joint planning, training,
and operations within NATO.
The contributions have entailed great sacrifice. America is
not the only NATO ally to have lost soldiers in Operation
Enduring Freedom. The forces of our Canadian and European
allies have also suffered losses, as have other Enduring
Freedom coalition states.
In speaking to the NATO Defense Ministers last June,
Secretary Rumsfeld listed terrorism first among the new threats
facing the Alliance. The other threats he mentioned were cyber
attack, high-tech conventional weapons and ballistic and cruise
missiles armed with weapons of mass destruction.
Members of this committee also recognize these new threats.
As Senator Lugar pointed out in a recent speech, ``The
terrorist attacks on the United States of last September have
graphically demonstrated how vulnerable we are. And when I say
`we,' I mean the West in general, including Europe. The next
attack could just as easily be in London, Paris, or Berlin as
in Washington, Los Angeles or New York. And it could involve
weapons of mass destruction.''
NATO's core mission remains the collective defense of its
members, as stated in Article 5. But there is room and need for
change in how NATO fulfills its responsibility to protect the
Alliance's interests and promote its principles. NATO will need
to transform itself to handle new threats and serve its other
purposes.
The Prague summit will be an important event and as
Secretary Grossman said, it is going to stress the themes of
new capabilities, new members and new relationships.
The military forces of the Alliance are the essence of the
Alliance's essential function, common defense. But I agree with
Secretary Grossman that the notorious capabilities gap between
the United States and its European and Canadian allies
continues to grow, and if the divergence is not reversed, it
will impede the allies' ability to operate with U.S. forces in
the future and will ultimately weaken the Alliance's political
cohesion.
So our first goal at Prague must be to remedy the
capabilities deficiencies within the Alliance. We will work to
secure the commitment of allied leaders to specific measures
and definite timelines to fix shortfalls in four top priority
areas. And I would like to review these top priority areas:
First, nuclear, biological, and chemical defenses to
protect allied forces and missile defenses to protect Alliance
forces, territory and population centers against the range of
missile threats; second, platforms and support capabilities to
transport Alliance forces rapidly to wherever they are needed
and to supply them until their mission is completed; third,
communication and information systems that will connect
Alliance forces securely before and during combat and peace
enforcement operations; and, fourth, modern weapons systems,
such as all-weather precision guided munitions, jamming systems
and capabilities to suppress enemy air defenses that will
enable allies to make first tier contributions to combat
operations.
To achieve these goals, we believe allies should seek both
to increase defense spending and to use their resources more
effectively by pooling efforts.
At Prague, the United States will also seek agreements to
streamline NATO's command force structures. As you know, the
United States is changing its own Unified Command Plan.
Likewise, NATO should ensure that its command and force
structures are reorganized for 21st century missions.
One of the U.S. Unified Command Plan changes has
implications for the job of Supreme Allied Commander, Atlantic,
SACLANT. SACLANT heads one of the two existing NATO strategic
commands. Today, the commander of the U.S. Joint Forces Command
serves as SACLANT.
The new U.S. Unified Command Plan, however, is going to
refocus the U.S. Joint Forces Command solely on its
transformation mission. Secretary Rumsfeld has approved the
decision to divest the commander of the U.S. Joint Forces
Command of his SACLANT responsibilities.
Now, various allied officials have told us that NATO's
connection to an American four-star combatant commander based
in the United States is an important transatlantic link for the
Alliance. And we are consulting with Lord Robertson, NATO's
Secretary-General, and with the allies on the future
arrangements for SACLANT.
We are intent on bolstering, not cutting the transatlantic
links of NATO. And we will do so in ways that serve the common
interest in promoting defense transformation and streamlining
NATO's Command Structure.
Now, Mr. Chairman, I would like to offer a word or two on
this issue of new members. The goal of inviting additional
European democracies to join the Alliance has been well
addressed by Secretary Grossman, who cited this important
statement by President Bush that, as we plan the Prague summit,
``We should not calculate how little we can get away with, but
how much we can do to advance the cause of freedom.''
Mr. Chairman, I recall that you and Senator Helms and other
members of this committee wrote to President Bush a few weeks
before his Warsaw speech stating that, ``It is in America's
strategic interest that the process of NATO enlargement
continue.''
The events of September 11 have intensified the President's
commitment to this goal. The administration wants to preserve a
bipartisan approach as we move forward. An enlarged Alliance of
democratic states with improved military capabilities and
interoperability, joint defense and operational planning, and
realistic training will be better able to fulfill the
Alliance's purpose to increase the security of its members and
provide for their common defense effort against terrorism and
other threats.
The aspirant countries are demonstrating their ability to
operate with the Alliance. For example, in the past year, 7 of
the 9 NATO aspirants contributed forces to the NATO-led
operation in Kosovo; and 8 of the 9 participated in the NATO-
led operation in Bosnia.
Aspirants have contributed in various ways to Operation
Enduring Freedom through intelligence, overflight rights, use
of their air bases, offers of personnel to support operations
in the region, and public and diplomatic support. They have
conducted themselves as we want our allies to act.
Mr. Chairman, we recognize that enlargement of the Alliance
is not an exercise free of risks and difficult judgments.
People of experience and wisdom have warned us of the dangers
of making the Alliance unwieldy. They do not want the Alliance
to dilute its military capabilities through enlargement, and
they are concerned about NATO's relations with neighbors.
They want to ensure that any enlargement will strengthen
NATO's ability to perform its defense mission. And they want to
ensure that the commitment of new members to the Alliance's
principles and work will be real and enduring. We respect these
views and share the concerns. Receiving these concerns is one
of the useful elements of the dialog that the administration
has been having with the Senate. It is clear that enlargement
must be done with care.
As part of this process, the Defense Department is working
with the aspirants to help them become the best possible
candidates. We are assessing the state of each aspirant's
military structures, its implementation of defense reforms, the
readiness of its military units dedicated to NATO-led missions,
and the military value it can bring to NATO. We are telling
them clearly where improvements are necessary.
As to the issue of new relationships and NATO's
relationship in particular with Russia, President Bush has made
a top priority of creating a new, cooperative U.S.-Russian
relationship. And that effort is integrated with the work that
we are doing with the NATO allies to create the NATO-Russia
relationship based on specific practical cooperation. The goal
is to erase the vestiges of cold war hostility.
Fostering improved NATO-Russia cooperation can induce
further democratic, market and military reform in Russia and
contribute to improving Russia's relations with its neighbors.
As we move forward, first to the NATO-Russia summit that is
coming at the end of this month, and then beyond, NATO should
take, and will take care to retain its ability to decide and
act on security issues as its members see fit.
The North Atlantic Council will decide by consensus on the
form and substance of our cooperation with Russia. As Secretary
Grossman stressed, Russia will not have a veto over Alliance
decisions, and we will ensure that NATO-Russia cooperation does
not serve to discourage or marginalize other partners.
Mr. Chairman, in conclusion, we plan to use the Prague
summit to improve the Alliance, to make it more capable
militarily, better able to secure the peace and more tightly
knit across the Atlantic.
I believe we have strong bipartisan support for this
approach. I look forward to working with you and the members of
this committee as we move forward to the NATO summit in Prague.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Feith follows:]
Prepared Statement of Hon. Douglas J. Feith, Under Secretary of Defense
for Policy
Mr. Chairman, Members of the Committee, I appreciate the
opportunity to discuss with you NATO's future in the run-up to the
Alliance's summit meeting in Prague next November.
The preamble to the 1949 NATO Treaty states:
[The Parties] are determined to safeguard the freedom, common
heritage and civilization of their peoples, founded on the
principles of democracy, individual liberty and the rule of
law. They seek to promote stability and well-being in the North
Atlantic Area.
NATO achieved these purposes during the Cold War. Since then, it
fulfilled them in the Balkans through its peacekeeping work in Bosnia
and in the war against ethnic cleansing in Kosovo. NATO has adapted
itself to play an important role supporting the current U.S.-led war on
terrorism. In the future, an expanding list of NATO members will
continue to promote Euro-Atlantic stability. The Alliance will continue
to safeguard the community of North Atlantic democracies against
threats of all types, including, I suppose, threats we cannot now even
anticipate.
Since 1949, broad, bipartisan support for NATO has been an element
of U.S. national security policy. This is a sign that the phrase
``Atlantic community'' is meaningful. The United States and its
European and Canadian Allies indeed constitute a community. We are not
just a collection of members of a multinational forum. We share
fundamental beliefs--for example, about the nature of human beings,
their rights and their relationship to their respective governments.
And the security of the community's different elements is of a piece.
Among the Atlantic community's members, there are large common
interests--economic and political as well as military--and there is
true fellow feeling that motivates action. For an alliance of this kind
to remain vital for over fifty years, there must be more than a treaty
underlying it. There must be sentiment--a sense of community--that
makes the Alliance richer than a simple legal obligation.
This point, I think, was illustrated in the immediate aftermath of
the September 11 attack on the United States.
NATO and our NATO Allies responded to the attack quickly, loyally
and usefully. Less than 24 hours after the World Trade Center and
Pentagon were hit, the NATO Alliance, for the first time in history,
invoked Article 5--the collective defense provision of the 1949 NATO
Treaty. Since last fall, seven NATO Airborne Warning and Control System
(AWACS) aircraft have been patrolling U.S. skies. The war effort and
the post-Taliban reconstruction and security effort in Afghanistan are
benefiting from individual NATO Allies' and Partners' contributions.
Such Allied contributions have come within and outside formal NATO
structures. All those contributions, however, are the result of more
than 50 years of joint planning, training and operations within NATO.
Those contributions have entailed great sacrifice. America is not
the only NATO Ally to have lost soldiers in Operation Enduring Freedom.
The forces of our Canadian and European Allies also have suffered
losses, as have other coalition states in Operation Enduring Freedom.
In his statement to NATO defense ministers last June, Secretary
Rumsfeld listed terrorism first among the new threats facing the
Alliance. The others he mentioned were cyber-attack, high-tech
conventional weapons, and ballistic and cruise missiles armed with
weapons of mass destruction.
Members of this Committee also recognize these new threats. As
Senator Lugar pointed out in a recent speech:
The terrorist attacks on the United States of last September
have graphically demonstrated how vulnerable we are. And when I
say ``we'', I mean the West in general, including Europe . . .
The next attack could just as easily be in London, Paris, or
Berlin as in Washington, Los Angeles or New York. And it could
involve weapons of mass destruction.
NATO's core mission remains the collective defense of its members,
as stated in Article 5. But there is room and need for change in how
NATO fulfills its responsibility to protect the Alliance's interests
and promote its principles. NATO will need to transform itself to
handle with new threats and serve its other purposes.
NATO's Prague summit meeting this fall will be an important event.
At Prague, the United States will stress three themes: new
capabilities, new members, and new relationships.
new capabilities
NATO's military forces are the essence of the Alliance's essential
function: common defense. But the notorious ``capabilities gap''
between the United States and its European and Canadian Allies
continues to grow. If this divergence is not reversed, it will impede
the Allies' ability to operate with U.S. forces in the future and will,
ultimately, weaken the Alliance's political cohesion.
So our first goal at Prague must be to begin to remedy the
capabilities deficiencies within NATO. We shall work to secure the
commitment of Allied leaders to specific measures and definite
timelines to fix shortfalls in four top-priority areas:
First: Nuclear, biological, and chemical defenses to protect
Allied forces, and missile defenses to protect Alliance forces,
territory, and population centers against the range of missile
threats.
Second: Platforms (and support capabilities) to transport
Alliance forces rapidly to wherever they are needed, and to
supply them until their mission is completed.
Third: Communication and information systems that will
connect Alliance forces securely before and during combat and
peace enforcement operations; and
Fourth: Modern weapons systems--such as all-weather
precision guided munitions, jamming systems, and capabilities
to suppress enemy air defenses--that will enable Allies to make
first-tier contributions to combat operations.
To achieve these goals, we believe that Allies should seek both to
increase defense spending and to use their resources more effectively
by pooling efforts.
At Prague, the United States will also seek agreements to
streamline NATO's command and force structures. As you know, the United
States is changing its own Unified Command Plan. Likewise, NATO should
ensure that its command and force structures are reorganized for 21st
century missions.
One of the U.S. Unified Command Plan changes has implications for
the job of the Supreme Allied Commander, Atlantic (SACLANT). SACLANT
heads one of the two existing NATO strategic commands. Today, the
Commander of the U.S. Joint Forces Command serves as SACLANT. The new
U.S. Unified Command Plan, however, will refocus the U.S. Joint Forces
Command solely on its transformation mission. Secretary Rumsfeld has
approved the decision to divest the Commander of the U.S. Joint Forces
Command of his SACLANT responsibilities.
Various Allied officials have told us that NATO's connection to an
American four-star Combatant Commander, based in the United States, is
an important trans-Atlantic link for the Alliance. We are consulting
with Lord Robertson, NATO's Secretary General, and with the Allies on
the future arrangements for SACLANT. We are intent on bolstering, not
cutting, the Alliance's trans-Atlantic links. We shall do so in ways
that serve the common interest in promoting defense transformation and
streamlining the NATO Command Structure.
new members
Our second goal at Prague will be to invite additional European
democracies to join the Alliance. President Bush declared his policy on
NATO enlargement in a speech last June in Warsaw:
I believe [the President said] in NATO membership for all of
Europe's democracies that seek it and are ready to share the
responsibility that NATO brings . . . As we plan the Prague
summit, we should not calculate how little we can get away
with, but how much we can do to advance the cause of freedom.
Mr. Chairman, I recall that you, Senator Helms, and other Members
of this Committee wrote to President Bush a few weeks before his Warsaw
speech, saying:
It is in America's strategic interest that the process of
NATO enlargement continue.
The events of September 11 have intensified the President's
commitment to this goal. The administration wants to preserve a
bipartisan approach as we move forward. An enlarged Alliance of
democratic states with improved military capabilities and
interoperability, joint defense and operational planning, and realistic
training exercises will be better able to fulfill the Alliance's
purpose to increase the security of its members and provide for their
common defense against terrorism and other threats.
The aspirant countries are demonstrating their ability to operate
with the Alliance. For example, in the past year, seven of the nine
NATO aspirants contributed forces to the NATO-led operation in Kosovo,
and eight of the nine participated in the NATO-led operation in Bosnia.
Aspirants also have contributed in various ways to Operation Enduring
Freedom--for example, through intelligence, over-flight rights, use of
their air bases, offers of personnel to support operations in the
region, and public and diplomatic support. They have conducted
themselves as we want our Allies to act.
Mr. Chairman, we recognize that enlargement of the Alliance is not
an exercise free of risks and difficult judgments. People of experience
and wisdom warn of the dangers of making the Alliance unwieldy. They do
not want the Alliance to dilute its military capabilities through
enlargement and they are concerned about NATO's relations with
neighbors. They want to ensure that any enlargement will strengthen
NATO's ability to perform its defense mission. They want to ensure that
the commitment of new members to the Alliance's principles and work
will be real and enduring. We respect these views and share the
concerns. Enlargement must be done with care.
As part of this process, the Defense Department is working with the
aspirants through bilateral and NATO channels to help them become the
best possible candidates. We are assessing the state of each aspirant's
military structures, its implementation of defense reforms, the
readiness of its military units dedicated to NATO-led missions, and the
military value it can bring to NATO. We are telling them clearly where
improvements are necessary.
new relationships
A third goal for the Prague summit is to strengthen NATO's
relationship with Russia and revitalize its relations with members of
NATO's Partnership for Peace.
President Bush has made a top priority of creating a new,
cooperative U.S.-Russian relationship. That effort is integrated with
the work we are doing with the NATO Allies to enhance the NATO-Russia
relationship based on specific, practical cooperation. The goal is to
erase any vestiges of Cold War hostility. Fostering improved NATO-
Russia cooperation can induce further democratic, market and military
reform in Russia and contribute to improving Russia's relations with
its neighbors. President Bush supported a NATO-Russia summit at the end
of this month as a means to press forward on this path.
As we do so, NATO will take care to retain its ability to decide
and act on security issues as its members see fit. Protecting Alliance
solidarity and effectiveness is of the utmost importance. The North
Atlantic Council will decide, by consensus, on the form and substance
of our cooperation with Russia. Russia will not have a veto over
Alliance decisions. And we shall ensure that NATO-Russia cooperation
does not serve to discourage or marginalize other Partners.
conclusion
Mr. Chairman, we plan to use the Prague summit to improve the
Alliance--to make it more capable militarily, better able to secure the
peace and more tightly knit across the Atlantic. I believe we have
strong, bipartisan support for this approach. I look forward to
continuing to work with you and all Members of this Committee as we
move toward the Prague summit. Thank you.
The Chairman. Thank you very much, Mr. Secretary.
Because we have good attendance and we have a second panel
of two very distinguished Americans, I am going to suggest
after consultation with Senator Lugar that we limit our rounds
to 5 minutes, even though I am confident we each have a good
half hour or more worth of questions apiece. But you both have
always been available, so we still have you at our disposal.
Let me also point out in our audience today, that I and the
staff have recognized, and we may not have recognized them all,
Ambassadors to the U.S. from NATO aspirant countries, including
Bulgaria.
Would each of the Ambassadors stand up? We have the
Bulgarian Ambassador to the United States, the Romanian
Ambassador to the United States, the Slovenian Ambassador to
the United States, the Lithuanian Ambassador to the United
States, the Estonian Ambassador to the United States, and the
Latvian Ambassador to the United States.
The Chairman. We welcome you all.
Thank you very much for your interest and the efforts your
countries are making.
Now, let me--you can begin the time for me, Bertie.
Let me state at the outset, I think Senator Lugar's
statement was brilliantly succinct and to the point and laid
out in stark relief what the most pressing concern is. We are
all talking about this in three parts, one of which is
expansion.
I would argue that the single most significant aspect of
expansion of NATO is the process itself. The aspirant countries
may very well have engaged in every reform even without the
carrot of admission to NATO, but I would suggest that the last
three admittees, which was significant.
So I think we should not lose sight of the process itself.
The process itself has had an incredibly democratizing impact
on Europe as a whole. And if we did nothing else, in my view,
that would make it all worthwhile, even beyond getting to the
question, but Secretary Feith talked about our shared
democratic values. Aside from meeting the military criteria,
all the aspirant countries have to demonstrate that they do
share those values, and in particular that they have rejected
the very ugly remnants of wartime fascism that must be totally
and permanently suppressed. It is something of great
consequence.
I realize this is a difficult time in Europe, and I realize
that circumstances in the Middle East and population shifts as
well as immigration in many of the countries that are part of
NATO, or are seeking to be part of NATO, have resulted in some
real demonstrations of anti-Semitism speaking only for this
Senator, and I am not making any accusations, but I suggest
that just speaking for myself, were I to conclude that any of
the aspirant countries, when picked, were not doing every
single solitary thing in their power to deal with that issue, I
would be part of a one-man band to keep them from becoming part
of NATO, whether or not the administration recommended them.
But let me speak to, and I ask permission of my colleague:
I ask if I can see his statement. I just want to read two
sentences from Senator Lugar's statement, because it is what I
want to focus on in my remaining 3 minutes or so.
He said, ``We have the most successful Alliance ever
created, but it is or seems to be marginal or even irrelevant
when it comes to dealing with the most urgent issues of the
day.'' Continuing the quote, ``And the fact that NATO,
ostensibly America's premiere alliance and the linchpin of
transatlantic relationship, sometimes appears to be absent in
our strategy on these critical issues, raises important
questions about NATO's future, centrality and vitality.''
I could not agree more with any statement that I have heard
about NATO in the last 10 years.
One of the things I know you know, but I want to emphasize,
is that we are having, ``increasing difficulty,'' though that
may be an exaggeration. I find myself, as a strong proponent of
NATO over the past 30 years being a United States Senator 29
years, having to ``make the case'' for NATO among my
colleagues. I have never had to ``make the case'' for NATO
before. It was sort of self-evident. But the case is having to
be made. And unless there is a growing understanding and a
resolution of what role NATO plays outside of Europe, I fear
that you may find the very support you both spoke to so
eloquently, that you found in the Senate, not there.
And so my question is to you, Secretary Grossman: What is
your sense of our NATO allies' sense of the need to resolve
this issue, the relationship issue? My discussions with our
NATO allies have primarily been discussions about the
relationship issue vis-a-vis Russia and vis-a-vis this force
that the Europeans are talking about, having this ESDP, this
European Security and Defense Policy.
I get very little blowback about the larger question which
is, in my view, the central question. So can you give me a
sense--not how high in the agenda--but how concerned and/or
interested our allies are in an enhanced if not an initial,
definition, of this new relationship?
Mr. Grossman. Mr. Chairman, let me try to do exactly that.
If I could, though, first say that I very much agree with your
opening comment that the process itself of having people get
ready to be NATO members has been hugely important, both to the
three new members in 1998 and to the aspirants today.
And may I, also speaking for myself, associate myself with
your comments about remnants not only of wartime fascism, but I
would also say of remnants of communism as well. And I think
you are exactly right. We would not come to you with a
recommendation that those countries get a nod from the United
States if these are problems. So I personally associate myself
with your remarks.
In terms of the Alliance and what Europeans are thinking
about us and our commitment to the Alliance, as I said, I was
in Europe. I visited with all the allies a couple of Mondays
ago. I went to 8 different European countries after that to
talk about the Prague summit.
And I will tell you a couple of things. First, most people
are very pleased with the three themes that we have got for
Prague, and I think that is a start.
Second, there is some anxiety in some of the European
countries about where we are headed with NATO, and whether we
believe in NATO. And one of my jobs, and I think one of Under
Secretary Feith's jobs and our Secretary's job, is to keep
making the case, not just in the United States, but to
Europeans, that this Alliance still matters.
Part of it, Senator, of course, is not our problem. Part of
it is their problem----
The Chairman. I agree.
Mr. Grossman [continuing]. In the sense that they do not
have the capabilities. It makes them feel bad. They are focused
in on the European Union. That is a big project. They wonder
where we are headed. They worry about that.
But what we have got to do, it seems to me, at Prague and
before Prague, is make sure that we are all focused in on the
same new threats. And that is why Senator Lugar's speech at
NATO, your comments, other comments from the committee are so
important.
It seems to me that if you can have a terrorist operation
that is planned in Afghanistan, refined in Hamburg, financed in
other places in Europe and around the world, and then carried
out in the United States of America, that what you have got is
not an issue here of out of area, but a return in many ways to
the fundamentals of the 1949 treaty.
I thought what was interesting was you quoted the 1949
treaty, Under Secretary Feith quoted the 1949 treaty, Senator
Lugar did, and I quoted President Truman's speech on the day it
came into being. In a way, we are not talking about new things
for the Alliance. We are going back to the old thing about the
Alliance, which was the defense of----
The Chairman. But do they sense that? My sense is they are
not anxious to talk about that right now. But I have not
recently, meaning in the last couple of months, made the tour
that you and Senator Lugar, and others have.
Mr. Grossman. Well, I think our European allies are
certainly interested in talking about capabilities. I also
believe that if we do this right and keep working at it, we
will get more and more conversation going in Europe about
weapons of mass destruction.
And I just highlight the point that my colleague made in
his presentation: We have got to focus Europeans on the threat
that they face from weapons of mass destruction and their
delivery systems.
The Chairman. I am trespassing my own rule, but the only
thing that I got from allies whom I met in Afghanistan, as well
as here is that they are somewhat miffed that once they did
invoke Article 5, they were not, in fact, embraced and used
immediately. And I found that to be a diplomatic problem in
terms of my discussions with them. But the----
Mr. Grossman. May I say, I think that that was probably
true, with all due respect, kind of September and October. But
if you see where we are now, with the collective response of
NATO, AWACS and ships, and then with the number of allies that
are fighting with us in Enduring Freedom, the number of allies
and aspirants that are in ISAF, the number of allies that have
provided all these kinds of rights, I mean, it may not be that
everything started as fast as everybody wanted. And part of it
also is that I think we kind of blew off, a little bit, the
NATO AWACS. I mean, people at first, said, ``Oh, it's no big
deal.''
But as you said in your opening statement, it was a big
deal. So as I said, it took time to get some traction, but when
you now have collective and individual responses of allies, I
think we are doing a lot better.
The Chairman. Well, this is the blowback again, and I yield
to the Senator, we are saying that we do not want to be part of
ISAF, and they are saying, ``Whoa, wait a minute.'' But I will
go to that later. Thank you.
Senator Lugar. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I ask unanimous
consent that a statement by the committee's Ranking Member,
Senator Helms, be placed at the start of the hearing.
The Chairman. Without objection.
Senator Lugar. I thank the Chair.
Secretary Feith, I appreciate your four ideas on
capabilities. And I want to center on the last two;
communication and information, weapons or equipment and modern
weapon systems.
The Senate has heard, recently, testimony by a young member
of our Special Forces, who was in Afghanistan. He described,
among other things, communication gear that allowed him to
bring air power over a target that he had designated with
special gear and provided its coordinates, he called in the
requisite aircraft, and they destroyed the enemy with a precise
hit.
Now, I mention this because without going into more
elaborate detail from a classified briefing, this illustrated
for many of us the equipment and communications dilemma of
NATO.
For example, NATO countries have special forces; many of
them highly trained, extraordinarily capable, but without the
lift capacity to get the special forces to the scene, in this
case Afghanistan; or the communications equipment and targeting
equipment, or finally, the aircraft, they are unable to deploy
sophisticated tactics. We had aircraft being deployed to attack
targets just as if they were taxicabs being summoned to the
Hart Building. An extraordinary way in which a war is being
fought, which most of us still only barely comprehend, and the
American people have really not been introduced to it. But this
is at the heart of the issue.
Now, how do we work with NATO allies so that they are able
to produce either the equipment to locate the enemy, the
communication gear, quite apart from the aircraft with
precision munitions that have the ability in a humane way, to
eliminate the target without civilian casualties or unintended
consequences?
Should we create a united fund, in which the United States
and various European countries collectively provide capital?
And do we begin to have production facilities for such
equipment in other NATO countries? Should we share with our
allies the extraordinary expertise and technical capabilities
that underlie this breakthrough?
Secretary Feith, I ask this question because you have
touched on a critical question, but the solution to it, given
classification, given all of the intellectual property issues,
quite apart from the security issues, is really quite profound,
even if absolutely necessary, if everybody is to contribute.
I mention this because as I said in my statement, special
forces without the gear, equipment, aircraft, or the lift
capability, are limited to very limited missions.
Can you give any insight as to how you think we might begin
to make headway? I do not ask you for the solution, because I
know you and the Secretary of State and others are working very
arduously in these areas, attempting to think about Prague.
Mr. Feith. Senator, the attempt, a few years ago, to
address this problem was the Defense Capabilities Initiative,
which, looking back, we think was not as successful as it might
have been, partly because it was diffuse. There were so many
capabilities cited as deficient, that we did not concentrate
attention on the highest priority problems.
Senator Lugar. There were 58, apparently, on the list.
Mr. Feith. And one of the ways that we are going about
this, addressing this problem now, in the hope that we can
actually get some of these problems fixed, is to narrow our
focus to the highest priority problems. That is why I wanted to
emphasize these four categories of deficiencies.
Another thought that we have is it is time to set
deadlines. And we are going to be working with the allies to
see if we cannot talk about performance the ways serious people
talk about performance, with real time lines to accomplish
different jobs. And we also want to try to use the summit
meeting in Prague to get the highest level of commitment.
And one of the things we find is, you get a bunch of
Defense Ministers sitting around a table, they are all happy to
talk about a commitment to higher defense spending and
remedying deficiencies. It is not that hard to get Defense
Ministers to support that. But the Defense Ministers cannot
always deliver. And working to get the heads of government
committed to these goals, we think, is an important step, also.
You have raised a number of other ideas, talking about the
usefulness of sharing expertise, technology, and the like.
Those are also good ideas and are, I think, part of the
solution to this problem.
And overall, what I think we also need to address is an
attitudinal problem within the Alliance: the notion that there
is something belittling about a country having less than the
full range of military capabilities. Specialization is
sometimes considered a dirty word, but I think it does not make
a whole lot of sense that every country within the Alliance
should have the full range of capabilities.
This is sometimes, when this topic is raised, it is the
response of some of our Allies, is America wants to do the high
end work and wants to leave, you know, the clean-up, as I think
you and the chairman referred to it earlier, leave the cleanup
or the less glamorous tasks to the allies. That is not at all
the case. And specialization does not mean that the United
States would have a monopoly on the high-end work. We would be
delighted if some of our allies could provide some of the
highest-end military capabilities to the Alliance. And we
should work toward that. But it does not have to be the case
that every one of our allies has strategic lift capability.
I mean, if we could get some countries specializing in lift
and other countries specializing in other aspects, that could
be a way of addressing this deficiencies problem and could help
us make sure that our allies are spending smart and not just
spending more.
Senator Lugar. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Thank you.
The Senator from Florida, Senator Nelson.
Senator Nelson. In his visit to Texas last year, what did
President Putin discuss and what did he express about his
concerns over the expansion of NATO next year?
Mr. Grossman. I have to refresh myself, Senator Nelson,
about the specific conversations in Texas. What I can tell you
is that it is my impression that this was not a main subject of
conversation, it was not a subject of controversy; and that for
their own reasons, I think the Russians have come to realize
that the first NATO expansion added to stability in Europe,
made better the relationship between Russia and some of the new
members, and Russia and NATO; and that President Putin, like
many of us, has focused hard on the war on terrorism.
Senator Nelson. Will this be a discussion item when the
President goes, Memorial Day, to Russia?
Mr. Grossman. I think it would not be a discussion, in the
sense we have to be very careful that we are not asking the
Russians for permission to expand. We are not consulting with
the Russians on our expansion. I would be very surprised if the
President would not take the opportunity and perhaps give
President Putin a report on where things stand in the Alliance.
But I want to be very clear, here, that we would not want
to put ourselves in a position of even looking like we were
asking that question of the Russians.
Senator Nelson. The most recent countries that came in,
what have we learned from their entry? Have their defense
budgets met the expectations? And how about the political and
military aspects of their admittance?
Mr. Grossman. First, I think the answer to your question
is, have they met our expectations? And the answer is yes, in
my view. I mean, these countries got involved in NATO, and 3
weeks later they were at war in Kosovo. And so, they are living
proof that they did not join a country club.
They have all contributed in the Balkans. They have all
contributed in Afghanistan, both to the larger war and to ISAF.
Have their defense budgets met the standards that we would
like to see? No. Everybody's defense budgets, with perhaps the
exception of the United States, ought to go up. I mean, if you
look at the chart of NATO defense spending, too many of our
NATO allies are under 2 percent. And we need to increase
defense spending for everybody. I would also say that in terms
of the politics of the expansion, that worked out extremely
well, also.
When the President visited Warsaw last year, one of the
things that every single Pole told him was that their relations
with Russia had never been better since they joined the
Alliance.
We also saw that there were a lot of internal and intra-
controversies between those countries that got settled in the
weeks running up and the months running up to their accession.
So, I think the presentation that we made, that they ought
to have become members, the decision that the Senate took to
amend the treaty to make them members, as we look back on it,
was the right decision.
If I might say one other thing, Senator Nelson, it is that
we have got a better process this time, which is, I think, that
one of the great lessons we learned, was to have a Membership
Action Plan and a Membership Action Program. And we did not
have that last time.
We made good judgments and it turned out right, but we are
better off, now, having a much better and longer and stricter
set of criteria.
Senator Nelson. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Thank you.
Senator Hagel.
Senator Hagel. Mr. Chairman, thank you.
Gentlemen, thank you for appearing this morning. We are
grateful for your service and your leadership.
Secretary Feith, I want to read back one of the points you
made in your testimony. From your prepared statement on page 5,
``To achieve these goals, we believe that allies should seek
both to increase defense spending and to use their resources
more effectively by pooling efforts. At Prague, the United
States will also seek agreements to streamline NATO's command
and force structure. As you know, the United States is changing
its own Unified Command Plan. Likewise, NATO should ensure that
its command and force structures are reorganized for 21st
century missions.''
What is happening with that effort? Can you report any
progress? What's going on? Is there a panel? Is there a task
force? Are we leading that, or what is actually tangibly
occurring to address these issues, especially in light of what
both of you have mentioned this morning, as has been mentioned
by my colleagues, the wide and widening gap of capability? So,
where are we?
Mr. Feith. Senator, there is work underway; analysis of how
the NATO command structure can be modified and simplified.
There are studies that we have been working on within the
Pentagon. We are talking with the allies about them. There is a
general sense that NATO is a little top-heavy. And there are
ways of flattening the organization and rationalizing it, that
will eliminate a lot of wasteful bureaucracy. And we have begun
the consultation process with the allies. It is going to
intensify in the defense ministerial meetings that are coming
up in a few weeks.
Senator Hagel. So, we are at the study phase.
Mr. Feith. Well, we have done studies. We are actually in
the phase of engaging our allies in talking about specific
changes that we are going to be proposing.
Senator Hagel. To actually have NATO do what the United
States is doing, and some of the recent decisions that we have
made, in fact, are changing some of Unified Command structure--
--
Mr. Feith. Yes, sir.
Senator Hagel [continuing]. Would you anticipate that we
are a year away from NATO command structure changes, or what
would you put as a time line?
Mr. Feith. I do not have that schedule in mind. I know that
there is a schedule. I just happen not to have it in my head.
Senator Hagel. When we are talking about that universe of
change command, address the challenges of the 21st century,
which we have heard much about today, which you both live with
daily, the widening gap of capability and all of the
consequences that flow from that. Then, in addition to that, we
are talking about, most likely, inviting new members in NATO.
I happen to be one, as you both know, who thinks it is a
good idea to do that. So, my question should not be interpreted
as slighting off that position I have had since I have been in
the Senate.
But is there some inconsistency here? As you have noted,
Secretary Feith, you say, ``Our first goal at Prague must be to
begin to remedy the capabilities deficiencies within NATO,''
what we are talking about, but yet we are going to load NATO up
with more members.
Is that a complicating factor to what we are trying to
accomplish here: to reinstitute a more capable organization to
deal with the new complexities of the challenges of this new
century? Is it contradictory? Or maybe you could give me an
answer to that.
Mr. Feith. Senator, I do not believe it is contradictory.
The Alliance is a complex organism. And we need to do more than
one thing at a time within it. Addressing the capabilities
problem, I think, we all agree, everybody who has spoken on the
subject this morning agrees, is the top priority project for
the Alliance.
At the same time, there are other very high priority
projects for us, if we are going to preserve the well being,
the relevance, the capabilities of the Alliance, and enhance
the security of the Atlantic community. And expansion of
members is one of those things.
I see no contradiction at all between the effort to expand
members and the effort to enhance the capabilities of the
Alliance. If we do the expansion properly, it will contribute
to additional capabilities.
We saw, with the last expansion, that NATO had greater
capability. The new allies came in and contributed valuably to
the operations that Secretary Grossman just cited in the
Balkans, in Afghanistan. New members have the ability to be not
a drag on resources, but a revitalizing and valuable
contribution to the Alliance.
Senator Hagel. Thank you.
The Chairman. Senator Smith.
Senator Smith. Thank you.
Gentlemen, you have both said that invoking Article 5 was
an important thing and that the NATO allies contributed to the
war on terrorism, but I have heard, also, I think, in your
words, some disappointment in the gap between what different
members can do and what the United States had to do in
responding to terrorism. And I have heard recently from high-
ranking Foreign Ministers in Europe that they are deeply
disappointed in the way the United States responded to the
invocation of Article 5 and now believe it was a mistake to
invoke it at all.
And I think we are all saying the same things in, perhaps,
slightly different ways. Is the gap just so great, now, that it
is inevitable that when action is called for, we have to
disregard NATO and send a message to them that they are just
not important in our national security pursuits?
Mr. Feith. Senator, I do not believe that we have to
disregard NATO, and I do not believe that we did disregard
NATO.
Senator Smith. But Secretary Grossman indicated that we
could have done some things better. What could we have done
better?
Mr. Feith. Well, let me, if I may, having played a role in
this issue, I think that it might be useful to offer you a
worms-eye point of view on this particular subject of how we
dealt with the allies in the days after September 11.
We received, from the allies, an impressive and gratifying,
spontaneous outpouring of offers of support after September 11.
These came at a time when the entire United States, not least
the Government, was stunned by an attack that nobody expected.
We were quickly organizing a response. We were organizing a war
in a place that we did not expect to go to war before that.
There was an enormous amount going on. And pulling together the
efforts of the whole government, working with CENTCOM to
develop the war plan, was an enormous challenge. And as you
recall, after being attacked, we actually went to war within a
month, having had no plan for going to war in Afghanistan.
This involved a lot of work, to put it mildly. And while we
were doing that work, we were giving thought to how we could
best make use of these very generous offers that we got from
many allies, but it was not the easiest thing in the world to
organize the receipt of those offers, the integration of those
forces, into our own war effort. It took a little time.
We have since organized for excellent relations down in
Tampa, at CENTCOM, where we have liaison officers from numerous
countries, from the NATO Alliance and outside. And that system
is working extremely well, now. And I think if you talk to any
of the NATO allies or the other coalition members and ask them
how that operation is going, where General Franks is running
this ``coalition village'' and his people meet daily with the
coalition representatives down there, they say it is going
extremely well.
I cannot say that it went extremely smoothly and well from
day one, because nothing in the government, regarding the war,
went extremely smoothly and brilliantly from day one. It was a
hectic and difficult time in the immediate aftermath of the
September 11 attack.
I think a lot of the comments that you are hearing are
actually vestiges of the few weeks immediately after September
11. We have worked on integrating--I mean, it is hard enough
within the U.S. Government to integrate the actions of
different combatant commanders, let alone different countries,
in an effort like that--within weeks of the kind of attack that
we suffered on September 11.
We have managed to do so. We are taking advantage of allied
forces that have been made available to Operation Enduring
Freedom. We are now benefiting from it enormously. I believe
the allies have the opportunity to take a role of significance
in the war. And they are doing so, and we are grateful for it.
And I think they are, as I said, if you were to check with them
now, you would find that they are quite gratified.
One other point that I would make about this that helps
explain some of the comments, there is an interesting
phenomenon among coalition partners, and that is a phenomenon
that we recognize from our own experience within the U.S.
Government. Not every part of every government speaks all that
clearly and well and easily to every other part of the
government. And one of the things we have found is that the
liaison officers, the military officers that are representing
coalition partners down in Tampa, are thoroughly wired in with
CENTCOM, but there are sometimes problems that what they know
and are being told is not necessarily getting back to the
Foreign Ministries or the Prime Minister's office in those
countries.
And one of the things that we discovered is that to keep
our coalition partners informed and happy, we have to not only
rely on the liaison people down in Tampa, but have direct
contacts from Washington with the other offices of their
government. Because one of the things that they were
complaining about, when they said, you know, ``We, as a
coalition partner, we are not being informed,'' they were
complaining about lacking information that, in fact, their
liaison people had in Florida, but they have their own internal
communications issues.
So, I think we are doing a whole lot better on that subject
now. And I actually think the situation is quite good. But
there was a sense, in the first weeks of the war, that some of
the allies did not feel that they were being responded to as
quickly as they would have liked.
Senator Smith. Do you have a comment on that?
Mr. Grossman. I do, Senator Smith If you would allow me, I
will just make two short comments--three.
One is I agree with Doug. As I tried to say to the
chairman, I think a lot of this is sort of vestige of things
from last September and October.
Second, though, a very important point that he makes,
without the 50 years of practice and working together that NATO
brought to the 11th of September and afterwards, we would still
be trying to set up all of these arrangements. I mean, as
confusing, and perhaps it is not as perfect as it was, without
50 years of practice of this, it would never have happened.
And third, I just wanted to pick up on one question that
was imbedded in yours, which is, is this capabilities gap
inevitable? And I think the answer to that question is no, but
we ought to get on this fast. And the reason I say no is that
some of the capabilities that we have been talking about are
not mysteries. They are: buy more ships, buy more planes, buy
some communications, make sure you can sustain people once you
get them to the fight. This is not a mystery. These are things
that you have to spend your money on.
Senator Smith. Well, gentlemen, I think Senator Lugar has
offered some ideas. I do not know if they are right or they are
wrong, but I think they ought to be seriously considered,
because the truth is, if the gap is not closed, then it is
going to be irrelevant in how you fight and defend your nation;
NATO is going to become less relevant.
I also think we have got to have a more focused purpose. I
mean, it used to be the Soviet Union. Today it is weapons of
mass destruction in the hands of terrorists. And that ought to
be clearly stated at Prague.
And, Mr. Chairman, if I may have permission to ask one more
question.
The Chairman. Sure.
Senator Smith. It will be brief.
I am concerned, as we bring in a whole lot of new members,
all of whom I am anxious to see a part of this coalition, that
we do not have a mechanism in NATO for, frankly, suspending or
expelling members that may simply stray away from values that
the Western civilian includes.
As we look at the rise of ultra-rightists or racists or
people who would expel Jews, not return their property, these
kind of things, ultimately, as we take in new countries whose
democratic traditions are just being born, I think we need to
really consider if there ought not to be a mechanism for
inclusion in NATO, because if it is not about values, it is not
about much.
Mr. Grossman. Thank you, Senator Smith. It is about values.
And that is what this is about, because it is about defending
values.
I have been giving this question a huge amount of thought.
Senator Lugar and I have talked about it on a number of
occasions. Here is where I have come to on this question of
suspending or putting in a mechanism to kick people out of the
Alliance. One, we have got a lot better process now, it seems
to me, for bringing people in. As I tried to say to Senator
Nelson, I think the MAP process gives us a much better feel for
who it is that we are taking in, what their challenges are,
what their opportunities are.
Two, that we have made utterly and totally explicit the
fact that values and democracy and long-term commitment to
democracy matter, and you are not getting in the door unless
there is a commitment to democracy.
But third, and here is the part I am debating, is if you
have a process for suspending people or kicking people out,
what I worry about is then it drives people to the bottom.
Everybody is trying to meet those minimum standards. How do I
keep here?
Whereas, with the NATO treaty and NATO being an Alliance of
values, we ought to be making sure that people meet the highest
standard. And I have to tell you that the only way I can figure
out to keep people meeting the highest standards, is to keep
them in, and not figure out a way to kick them out. And this is
a conversation we are going to have to have lots more, because
that is not a complete answer, but it is where I have come to
at the moment.
I did a little research over the last few weeks, and if you
look back at some of the things that were said about Greece and
Turkey, for example, in 1951, when they became members of the
Alliance, ``Oh,'' people said, ``it is too far away. They
cannot possibly manage the Alliance. They are not really like
us in culture or tradition.'' And I think the fact that Greece
and Turkey have been in the Alliance for 50 years has been a
good thing for them and has raised their standards, rather than
lowered them.
So, I do not want to rush to the bottom. And my worry is,
given the way bureaucracies and human beings work, as soon as
you set that lower standard, that is where everybody is going
to head.
The Chairman. Senator Allen.
Senator Allen. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you for
holding this hearing. It is very instructive. And I very much
appreciate your remarks and those of Senator Lugar, and I
associate myself with them. I thank Secretary Feith and
Secretary Grossman for your comments.
Secretary Grossman, your remarks about how historic and
appropriate it is that this meeting is in Prague in October of
this year, it struck me, as well, while I was Governor, we were
on a trade mission, and Westvaco had made an investment, it is
a Virginia company, an investment in the Czech Republic. We
were going into a building to try to get the Czechs to get an
agreement with the Slovaks, so, thereby, Westvaco could get the
export from the Czech Republic into Poland, but Poland wanted
that deal with the Slovaks, which also helped out the mill in
Covington, Virginia, and so, showing all of these deals being
done.
And we go into this building, which was, it was maybe about
an 80-year-old building. It was an old bank. And this was where
the Czech Ministry of Commerce and Trade was located. And I
walked in, and you saw a Star of David, with a wreath on it.
And I said, ``What is this here for?''
And it was in memory of the killing, murder of many Jews.
And they said that this was once a bank, before the Nazis took
it over. And when the Nazis took it over, this was where the SS
headquarters were. Then, after the Communists took over, that
was a Communist office building.
I was thinking, ``What great progress is being made, that
we are talking about something as simple as paper products
being transported.''
And more and more people, obviously, diverse cultures and
people in Central Europe are now enjoying the sweet taste of
the nectar of freedom. And this is all very, very positive.
That is why I am a supporter of the enlargement of NATO,
and signed onto this bill, Senate bill 1572, because I think
NATO, with all of the problems we are talking about here, has
had a positive impact. I think it will help bring more peace
and stability. And I also think it will enhance freedom and
advance freedom when terrorism remains a constant threat.
I think it is vital, some of the issues were mentioned for
expanding the NATO Alliance, as to the threat of global
terrorism. We see that this threat is a more multifaceted
threat. Yes, military is important; logistics, intelligence.
Those sort of efforts are important, as well as there are
corridors. I think it also a good signal to these nations that
have battled back from dictatorships and communism. They have
made tremendous strides; some in different ways, but strides,
as far as freedom.
Now, these countries also want to, not just taste the sweet
nectar of freedom, they also want to be responsible;
responsible in securing it for themselves and for their
neighbors in Europe, as well as for this country.
And then, as far as militarily, on the southern region of
Europe, with that enlargement approach, that would provide a
bridge with the central part of the Alliance with Greece and
Turkey.
There are also a lot of improvements in business, such as,
as far as Virginia companies, Phillip-Morris is the second
largest U.S. investor in Lithuania; not necessarily for
Marlboros, but for Kraft Foods there. And they are the No. 1
taxpayer in Latvia. They have business interests in Romania.
There are Virginia information technology corporations that
have business in Romania. All of those who have come to me have
had positive remarks and experiences in Romania.
Now, Secretary Grossman, you have visited these 8, at least
8 of the allies in Brussels. And what I would like to know is,
as we are going forward with this MAP or this, I want to use
the right term, the Membership Action Plan, which comes up with
an objective criteria for membership, requiring military
modernization, economic/political reform, and so forth. No. 1,
what are the reactions of our European existing members in
NATO? And if you could, share with us how various interested
countries, such as Lithuania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Romania and
other aspirants, are progressing to fulfill the requirements of
the Membership Action Plan.
Mr. Grossman. Thank you very much, Senator Allen.
First, I thank you very much for your comments. As I did in
my statement, I just also would like to join you in another
pitch for S. 1572, for the Freedom Consolidation Act. We would
like to see that passed in a bipartisan way.
The other thing I would agree with you completely, also, is
that we need to look at a multifaceted response to terrorism.
And one of the things that we have all looked at, not only in
NATO countries, but in aspirant countries, is how they have
responded, for example, to U.N. Security Council 1373, on the
financing of terrorism, and what they are doing in the
intelligence and law enforcement fields. And, here, I think we
have seen a lot of progress, as well.
In terms of views, first, of our allies, in terms of
expansion, what I found on my trip was that there is a
consensus forming around President Bush's view that we ought to
have as robust an enlargement as possible. It ought to be as
big as possible. There is nobody yet, thank goodness, ready to
name names. We are way too soon, I think, to name names,
because people have a lot more work to do. But I think,
generally, when I went around, people felt that a bigger rather
than a smaller enlargement would be good for all of the reasons
that you cited.
Second, in terms of what we have found in terms of the
aspirant countries, the aspirant countries are working away on
their Membership Action Plan, but every single one of them has
more work to do. And that is why we are not ready to name
names. People have more work to do in the military area. As you
said, they have maybe more work to do in the democracy area.
People have issues about security and the sanctity of NATO
documents.
So, there are a whole range of things that are yet to be
accomplished, but Nick Burns, when he was around in all of the
aspirant countries, laid this out pretty clearly; said they had
more work to do. And the thing that gratifies us is that every
single one of them seems to want to do the work.
Senator Allen. Mr. Chairman, if I may followup?
The Chairman. Go right ahead.
Senator Allen. I guess if you are having this for a school
report card, you just get a final grade. It would be good to
know where they are.
It is, first, encouraging to hear that our NATO allies in
Europe are, as you said, a consensus is forming that it ought
to be a larger enlargement, as opposed to a smaller
enlargement.
I am not going to pressure you to name names. I could
understand that. Secretary General Robertson asked not to start
backing particular ones. Do you foresee progress, though, that
by October, there will be sufficient action taken, that there
would be the evidence, the progress, the developments along
these requirement lines, that there could be a larger
enlargement of NATO?
Mr. Grossman. Yes, sir. I do.
Senator Allen. Good. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Thank you.
Gentlemen, thank you very much for being here. As I said,
you have always been available, and you know we will continue
to call on you.
I would like to make one brief comment before I bring the
second panel up on a slightly different subject; but what
triggered my thinking was a comment made by you, Mr. Secretary.
And I am not expecting any of you to comment on this, but that
is the cooperation of the U.N. on terrorism.
I would like to make the point, I am going to be making a
longer speech on the floor of the Senate about this today, that
all of the furor over ``the massacre in Jenin'' and the U.N.
sending a, wanting to send an investigative team. I know all
three of the people that Kofi now is suggesting to send. Two of
those people are what you might call, had less than a
sympathetic view toward Israel, that they have expressed over
years. I tried to get a hold of Kofi, the Secretary-General, to
hope that he would expand that team, if we were going to be a
team, so there was more, it was fair.
But, second, I would also point out that it is interesting
the Palestinians and the Fatah chief now is arguing that it was
not a massacre but a victory for the Palestinian people. And I
quote from today's Washington Times, which I seldom do,
``Jenin, West Bank. Palestinian officials yesterday put the
death toll at 56 in the 2-week Israeli assault on Jenin,
dropping claims of a massacre of 500 that had sparked demands
for U.N. investigation. The official Palestinian body count,
which is not disproportionate to the 33 Israeli soldiers killed
in the incursion, was disclosed by''--and I am embarrassed, I
cannot pronounce the name of the official--``the director of
Yasser Arafat's Fatah movement for the northern West Bank,
after a team of four Palestinian-appointed investigators
reported to him in his Jenin office.''
So, I think we should have prospected this so-called
massacre. And I would note that the United Nations, and I am,
as you know, a strong supporter of the United Nations, I think
they shoot themselves in the foot frequently, like this team
that was being put together. And I know he's a great man, Kofi
Annan. I have great respect for him, but I think it was a
serious mistake, the team he picked.
And the closing comment before you leave, so you hear my
comments, not to respond though you are welcome to, if you
wish--but the other point is that since the curfew has lifted,
there have been hundreds of international press there. Now, if
I want to keep something secret, the first thing I want is the
U.N. team in and not reporters. If I worry about something
being reported, the last folks I want are international
reporters wandering all over the site. I find it fascinating
that there were probably hundreds, I do not know how many
international reporters. Every major news outlet in the world
has sent their ``best'' to Jenin. I have not seen any reports
about the stench of bodies coming from the rubble and the rest.
So, I hope we, and I know the President has, but I hope we
keep in perspective a little bit of what is happening and not
jump to conclusions.
But, again, as a supporter of the United Nations, I am
occasionally frustrated by the ineptness in the way in which
they proceed, but I did not want to say that in your absence.
But I am not asking you to comment. You are welcome to comment.
You are both good diplomats, otherwise I will recommend that
you not comment.
I thank you both very, very much. And I will call the next
panel of witnesses.
Gen. Wesley K. Clark, U.S. Army, retired, former Supreme
Allied Commander of Europe, The Stephens Group, he now
represents, but he is representing himself here.
Lt. Gen. William E. Odom, U.S. Army, retired, former
Director of National Security Agency, Yale University and the
Hudson Institute.
I welcome you both. And as you know, this committee, and I,
in particular, have an inordinately high regard for both of
you. You are two of the best. I have to say this while folks
are moving out; I have said this to both of you before, when I
got here as a 29-year-old kid, during the Vietnam war, my image
of every general in the United States military was someone like
that movie--what was that movie? Doctor No?
Staff Member. Dr. Strangelove.
The Chairman. Yes; where there is a general on top of a
bomb, smoking a cigar, riding down on an atom bomb. And I have
found, over my career, that the single most informed group of
people I have come across are you guys with stars and bars on
your epaulets. And we have two of the finest before us today.
And if the room does not clear shortly, I will say more
nice things about you, but really and truly, it is an honor to
have you both here. I know you have gone out of your way to
adjust your schedules to be here.
Why do I not begin in the order in which you were called?
General Clark, welcome; great to have you back. And we are
anxious to hear from you.
STATEMENT OF GEN. WESLEY K. CLARK, U.S. ARMY (RET.), FORMER
SUPREME ALLIED COMMANDER EUROPE; THE STEPHENS GROUP,
WASHINGTON, DC
General Clark. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Senators. Thank you
very much for the opportunity to appear before the committee
today. I did prepare a statement. I would like to just
summarize from it if I could.
First, I want to thank you on behalf of all of the men and
women who have served in the military for your dedicated
attention to our foreign policy needs and especially for your
support of NATO. It has meant a lot to me personally and to all
of us who have served there throughout the years.
Of course, as the hearing has acknowledged, there are many
questions about NATO today including its possible enlargement
and its relationship with Russia, its continued role in the
Balkans. And each of these is an important question. But the
fundamental question is different.
That is a question about NATO's purpose and whether NATO is
going to simply become a cold war relic which is usefully
maintained as one channel of communication to our friends in
Europe, or whether it is going to serve a vital purpose in
facing the ongoing and fundamental challenge to American
security that we face today, including the threat of
international terrorism.
The answer to this important question is not yet resolved,
not today, not in Washington, not in the administration. Yet on
this answer hangs the perspective and the basis from which to
address all of the other questions about NATO's membership,
relationships, and the scope of its activities. And the answers
to these, in turn, will determine whether NATO has value and
even whether it survives as an organization.
When we launched the North Atlantic Treaty Organization in
1949, we faced a worldwide challenge and threat, the challenge
of Marxism-Leninism, the threat of the Red army. We knew that
the United States could not survive if the Continent of Europe
were occupied by a power hostile to us, and we fought two world
wars to prevent it. We recognized we could not meet the
challenges and threat of the cold war unless our wartime allies
recovered and resumed their place alongside us.
Now, at that point, we recognized our European allies were
weak, their economies wrecked, their militaries consumed, their
morale and expectations shattered, but we organized, supported
and led these countries, recognizing their sovereign
prerogatives. Consulting repeatedly, we gained the consensus
required to meet the challenges of the day.
NATO was the principal framework for these consultations
and for the exchange of information. It was never a collection
of equals, but in fact, it was a collection of a group of
equals in law. And we acted on the principle of unanimity and
we recognized NATO as the essential underpinning for our
actions.
At the end of the cold war, when some predicted NATO's
demise, urgent problems of instability and conflict in Europe
forced NATO reform and evolution. And with the support and
encouragement from this committee, NATO did evolve and change,
and NATO also acted, as you all know and supported, helping to
enforce a peace agreement in Bosnia, going to war to halt and
reverse ethnic cleansing in Kosovo, and subsequently
establishing the peace implementation force there to provide
stability en route to a final status.
NATO in all of these actions, some completed, some ongoing,
has been remarkably successful. Today we are facing another
challenge: the resentment, despair, and hatred fueled by
extremism and poverty, and the threat of international
terrorism. And it should already be clear that the United
States cannot face this challenge and defeat this threat alone.
We prevailed in the cold war by organizing our friends in
Europe. And if we are to prevail today, we are going to need
the strong and full commitment of those same allies.
Now much has been made this morning of the so-called
capabilities gap. I am very much aware of that gap. I
participated in some of the initial work that went into the
Defense Capabilities Initiative. But to be quite honest, we
lack the proper analytical framework, and we vastly overstated
the requirements, when we are dealing with the forces and
capabilities of our European allies. The Alliance was never an
organization of equals. We never sought, nor should we seek,
mirror images of forces.
We worked in the 1990s to create a new command structure
for NATO so that it could operate beyond the NATO area. We call
it the Combined Joint Task Force. We organized it, voted on it,
exercised it, and we have even funded it. And its equipment is
coming on. I have heard no discussion about using this in the
most obvious place, in the peacekeeping mission in Afghanistan
where, in fact, it could be very carefully used.
And when we look at the Defense Capabilities Initiatives,
it is true: there were 58 initiatives, and they were
overstated. What we need to do instead is, we need to go back
to the fundamentals of NATO. What is it militarily we expect
the Alliance to do today? I would submit that it is not to be
measured in terms of armies, navies, and air forces. Rather it
is to be measured in terms of operational tasks.
We know we have to be able to take down enemy air defenses
and air defense networks. We have to be able to destroy command
centers. We have to be able to attack and defeat land forces.
We have to be able to fight in urban areas to finish the job.
And we have to handle the post-conflict operation. These are
five combat tasks. They can be performed by any combination of
service members or service members from differing services or
differing nations.
We should be using these as a basis for organizing NATO's
forces, not the methods we have been using of the cold war. And
then, from that basis, we can logically draw the requirements.
And I very much support what former Assistant Secretary
Kramer gave in terms of sharpening the focus. We need some
special forces with communications, with laser rangefinders,
and with the kind of courage and hardiness to get in there up
front.
Every nation does not need a B-2. Every nation does not
need satellites. Every nation does not need the long-range
unmanned aerial vehicles. We can share this. What we
desperately need is an organizing rationale for our forces and
a purpose.
But let me go beyond where this discussion has gone so far.
I believe we would be making a classic and egregious mistake if
we believe that the allied contribution is measured by the
strength and capabilities of the Armed Forces or even those
that they commit to NATO. It is not and cannot be.
Now some have included the nonforce contributions, such as
bases, facilities, and access rights. But even this is not
enough. Bombs, bullets, and bases alone are not going to be
adequate to win the war against terrorism. And in some ways it
may be counterproductive in facing the broader challenges that
the United States is going to face in the 21st century.
Instead of just looking for additional manpower, ships, and
aircraft, we need to focus on the problems of eliminating al-
Qaeda through the exchange of information and sensitive
intelligence, through the harmonization of legal and judicial
standards and procedures and the coordination of law
enforcement activities. We need to make the international
environment as seamless for our counterterrorist efforts as it
is seamless to the terrorists themselves.
However, exchanges of information, harmonization,
coordination of activities are extraordinarily difficult. There
is no international organization to do this. In fact, even
though this is mentioned in the NATO strategic concept, the
United States' position in the past has always been: We would
prefer to do this bilaterally.
The problem is that you cannot have effective coordination
when every different agency of the U.S. Government is working
bilaterally with 10, 15, 20 different governments. Getting this
coordination involves compromises in long-standing procedures,
changes in laws, and probably a perceived sacrifice of
sovereignty.
Definitions of crime, standards of evidence, requirements
for extradition, many other aspects of the overall systems of
law enforcement and judicial processes must be worked. That is
the only way we are going to ever be able to root out the
networks, indict and punish the perpetrators, and prevent the
use of our allies and other democratic states as forward bases
and staging grounds for continuing attacks on us.
Beyond simply attacking al-Qaeda and Afghanistan and
elsewhere, we have to ensure we maintain our legitimacy
throughout the process. And we must concert our work in dealing
with conditions in failed states wherever poverty and extremism
may provide the breeding grounds for future threats.
And all of this is simply more than the United States can
do by itself. In fact, U.S. efforts that are perceived as
unilateral can set us back in our efforts. We need to work with
and through multinational institutions, taking full advantage
of the backing of international law and seeking the deepest
possible commitments from our friends and allies.
The experience of over 40 years suggests that all this work
is best concerted in institutional, rather than ad hoc,
relationships. As we heard in a previous panel, military
liaison is not enough. It has to be imbedded at every level of
the government. It has to go from the top down.
If we did not have NATO, we would be in the process of
inventing it or reinventing it today. But I think NATO, if it
were properly utilized, could provide the institutional
framework that we need. We did reference terrorism in the 1999
strategic concept. The NATO machinery is a time-proven
consensus engine. It forces nations to grasp issues and resolve
them in a timely manner.
There has been a lot of discussion about what the real
meaning of the Kosovo campaign was. And I have been told by
some high-ranking members of the Defense Department and other
places that they have learned the lessons of Kosovo, and nobody
is going to tell us what we can or cannot do. They prefer
flexible arrangements rather than institutional arrangements.
But the simple truth is that it was the consensus engine of
NATO that enabled us to break the will of Slobodan Milosevic
and his Russian backers during the Kosovo campaign. Working
with allies is always difficult because, when you deal with
them as sovereign nations, they all have their own sovereign
opinions. And yet what we found in Kosovo was that the use of
NATO was the way to get the camel into the tent with us. We let
them stick their nose into the tent. They came into it. And
when they came to us and said, ``Please, you cannot fail at
this or our governments will fall,'' then we knew we had allied
support.
The question we have to ask ourselves is: What needs to be
done to ensure today that in capitals in our closest allies,
they are treating this problem just as seriously as we are? And
what I would suggest is that it needs to be worked through
institutional channels and that NATO is the most important and
central institution in this process. It can give us the vital
edge in winning, just as it did during the cold war.
Can we operate beyond contiguous areas? Yes. Can we survive
if we admit five or seven or more new members? Yes. Can we
establish a NATO at 20 relationship with Russia and still
remain NATO? Yes, but only if NATO remains a centerpiece of
American security efforts worldwide. Together with our European
allies, we are close to 700 million people. We are one-half of
the world's gross domestic product. We are three of five vetoes
on the European Security Council.
These allies in NATO constitute our base. It is not a
matter of collecting forces. It is a matter of mobilizing our
base. With NATO we can move the world. We can move it
successfully. And we can move it with legitimacy. The
alternative, of course, is to play with the form of NATO, to
preserve the myth, as some would say, but to do the real work
elsewhere.
If that is to be the American approach, then NATO can be
enlarged. It can be altered. It can be showcased. But it will
inevitably lose its relevance and vitality. And the greatest
impact of that loss will be felt not abroad, but here, for NATO
has been our creation, our instrument, and vital to the United
States. We need it every bit as much today in the current
challenge as we have in the past.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Thank you very much, General. I think that
was a brilliant statement.
[The prepared statement of General Clark follows:]
Prepared Statement of Gen. Wesley K. Clark, U.S. Army (Ret.)
Mr. Chairman, Senators, thank you very much for the opportunity to
appear before this committee today. I know I speak on behalf of all the
men and women who have served in the military in thanking you for your
dedicated attention to our foreign policy needs and activities, and
especially your support of NATO.
There are many questions about NATO today, including its possible
enlargement, its relationship with Russia, and its continued role in
the Balkans. I believe each of these is important. But the fundamental
question is different. It is about NATO's purpose, and whether it is
simply a Cold War relic which is usefully maintained as one channel of
communications to our European friends, or whether it serves a vital
purpose in facing the ongoing and fundamental challenges to American
security, including the threat of international terrorism.
The answer to this important question is not yet resolved, not
today, and not in Washington. Yet on this answer hangs the perspective
from which to address questions about NATO's membership, relationships,
and scope of activities. And the answers to these will in turn prove
NATO's value and even determine its survival.
When the United States launched the North Atlantic Treaty
Organization in 1949, the United States and its friends faced a world-
wide challenge and threat, the challenge of Marxism-Leninism and the
threat of the Red Army. We knew then that the United States could not
survive if the continent of Europe were occupied by a power hostile to
us--and we had fought two World Wars to prevent it. We also recognized
that we could not meet the challenges and threat we were to face in the
Cold War unless our wartime Allies recovered and resumed their place
alongside us.
At the dawn of the Cold War we recognized the weakness of our
European Allies, their economies wrecked, their militaries consumed,
their morale and expectations shattered amidst the bomb craters and
casualties. But we organized, supported, and led these countries,
recognized their sovereign prerogatives and consulted repeatedly to
gain the degrees of consensus required to meet the challenges of the
day. NATO was the principal framework for these consultations--never a
collection of equals, but nevertheless acting on the principle of
unanimity and recognized as essential underpinning for American actions
and policies.
At the end of the Cold War, when some predicted NATO's demise,
urgent problems of instability and conflict in Europe forced NATO
reform and evolution with support and encouragement from this
Committee. NATO created a new strategic concept, changed its force
structure, revised its plans, created outreach to former enemies in the
partnership for peace, developed new relationships with Russia and
Ukraine, and brought in three new members. NATO also acted, with strong
support from this Committee, helping to enforce the peace agreement in
Bosnia, and going to war to halt and reverse Slobodan Milosevic's
design for ethnic cleansing of the Serb province of Kosovo, an
subsequently establishing the peace implementation force to provide
stability en route to a final status determination for that province.
NATO in all these actions, some completed, some ongoing, has been
remarkably successful.
Today, the United States is faced with another world-wide
challenge--resentment, despair and hatred fueled by extremism and
poverty, and the threat of international terrorism. And it should
already be clear that the United States cannot face this challenge and
defeat this threat alone. We prevailed in the Cold War by organizing
and leading our friends in Europe. We brought stability to Europe in
the post-Cold War period in conjunction with allies and partners. And
if we are to prevail today, the strong support and full commitment of
our Allies will be required.
We would make a classic and egregious mistake if we were to believe
that this Allied contribution is measured by the strength and
capabilities of their armed forces. It is not, and cannot be. Some
recognize that we must also include non-force contributions such as
bases, facilities, and access rights in the classic Cold-War
burdensharing type of discussion. But even this is not enough. For
bombs, bullets and bases alone will be inadequate to win a war against
terrorism, and may well be counterproductive in facing the broader
challenges of extremism and poverty.
Instead of just looking for additional manpower, ships and
aircraft, we need to focus now on the problems of eliminating al-Qaeda
through the exchange of information, the harmonization of legal and
judicial standards and procedures, and the coordination of law
enforcement activities. We need to make the international environment
as seamless for our counterterrorist efforts must be at least as
seamless as that environment is for the terrorists.
But these exchanges, harmonization and coordination are
extraordinarily difficult. They need the strongest possible
encouragement, protection, and incentives. They will inevitably involve
compromises in longstanding procedures, changes in laws, and some
perceived sacrifice of sovereignty. Definitions of crimes, standards of
evidence, requirements for extradition, and many other aspects of the
overall systems of law enforcement and the judiciary must be worked.
This is the only way that we will actually be able to root out the
networks, indict and punish the perpetrators and prevent the use of our
Allies and other democratic states as forward bases and staging areas
for continuing attacks on us.
Beyond simply attacking al-Qaeda in Afghanistan, and elsewhere with
military and law enforcement methods, we must also insure that we
maintain our ``legitimacy'' throughout the process. And we must concert
our work in dealing with the conditions in failed states and wherever
poverty and extremism may provide breeding grounds for future threats,
as well as against those states who would acquire and proliferate to
terrorists weapons of mass destruction.
All of this is simply more than the United States can do by itself.
And, in fact, U.S. efforts which are perceived as ``unilateralist'' can
even set us back. We need to work with and through multinational
institutions, taking full advantage of the backing of international
law, and seeking the deepest possible commitments from our friends and
allies. And in Europe we have the strongest possible base, over 350
million people, a GDP as large as ur own, and nations whose values most
closely reflect our own.
And the experience of over forty years suggests that all of this
work is best concerted in institutional rather than ad hoc
relationships. The methods must be to gain commitments, to bind
governments, to insure that these issues are so central to the
governments themselves that they cannot afford to fail or neglect them.
NATO could today, if properly utilized, provide the institutional
framework for the vast coordination and concerted activities that must
be worked between states. The problem of international terrorism is in
fact referenced in the 1999 Strategic Concept. The NATO machinery is a
time-proven consensus engine, forcing nations to grasp issues and
resolve them in a timely manner. It was this consensus engine which
enabled us to modernize nuclear forces during the Cold War, and it was
this consensus engine which broke the will of Slobodan Milosevic and
his Russian backers during the Kosovo campaign. To be sure, operating
the Alliance and employing it for these tasks is arduous work. It
certainly was during the Kosovo operation. But there is simply no
better mechanism available for the task. Today, NATO could be central
to our effort against terrorism, instead of peripheral, and it could
today, just as in the Cold War, provide us the vital winning edge.
Can NATO operate beyond it's contiguous areas? Can it survive if it
admits five or even seven new members? Can it establish a NATO at
twenty relationship with Russia and still ``remain NATO?''
The answer to these questions is yes, but only if NATO remains a
centerpiece of the American effort worldwide, if we tend it, consult
with, and use it at the heart of operations.
The alternative is to play with the form, to ``preserve the myth,''
as some would say, but to do the real work elsewhere. If that is to be
the American approach, then NATO can be enlarged, altered, and
showcased, but it will inevitably lose its relevance and vitality. And
the greatest impact of that loss will be felt not abroad but here, for
NATO has been our creation, and our instrument. . . . And we need it
today as much or more than ever.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would be pleased to answer questions of
the Committee.
The Chairman. General Odom.
STATEMENT OF LT. GEN. WILLIAM E. ODOM, U.S. ARMY (RET.), FORMER
DIRECTOR, NATIONAL SECURITY AGENCY; YALE UNIVERSITY AND THE
HUDSON INSTITUTE, WASHINGTON, DC
General Odom. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. It is a pleasure to
be back and testifying----
The Chairman. It is nice to have you back, General.
General Odom [continuing]. Before you again. I think it is
a terribly important hearing, as other people have said. I
endorse that enormously, because I have long been a great
supporter of NATO. Senator Lugar and I have exchanged many
common opinions and views on the first round of enlargement,
and so it is good to be onto the second round now.
I have written a fairly long statement, which I will not
read, but ask you to enter into the record.
The Chairman. Your entire statement will be placed in the
record.
General Odom. I will just touch on a few points in the name
of shortening time, so you can spend more time for questioning
than listening to me read.
I did try to draw a historical perspective, because I think
it is important. It is important to realize, in light of some
of the questions about missions that General Clark has raised
and that Senator Lugar and others raised, the Alliance did not
start out as a military alliance. In 1949, Truman stopped all
the military planning. Every initiative to put forces in Europe
was stopped. It became a military alliance only with the
outbreak of the Korean war.
Senator Vandenberg was promised we would not put troops
there to get him to sponsor the ratification of the alliance
here. The purpose of NATO was, in fact, to put a political
military authority over our allies in Western Europe so they
would not fight each other, so they could cooperate in economic
reconstruction. Europe has never been able to provide that kind
of thing for itself. We gave them a surrogate. And after the
Soviet military challenge became central, we were continuing to
perform this mission throughout the subsequent decades.
Today in Eastern Europe it looks very much like 1948. We
have a band of states from north to south that do not like each
other, have difficulties with each other, have different
legacies. It was the destruction by a hot war as opposed to
destruction by cold war Communist rule that created the
differences. But again, NATO's purpose is bringing them under a
supranational political military authority so they can begin to
create these values that were emphasized by Secretary Grossman
and others.
So I would just make that point for thinking about NATO's
continuing missions.
The next point I wanted to raise is about countries to
admit to NATO. I certainly strongly support 5, 7 if possible. I
have questions about going further right now. I would like to
emphasize a specific reason for admitting the Balkan countries.
We do not have really a good framework for containing an
outbreak of general hostilities in the Balkans. I think General
Clark--I would be interested in his views on this, too.
Bosnia and Kosovo were not contiguous to the external
borders of Yugoslavia. Therefore, containing them was easier
than it would be if war broke out in Macedonia. You could see
the Bulgarians and the Macedonians begin to dispute borders
then, the Greeks, the Albanians, and others. Having Romania and
Bulgaria in the Alliance gives us at least the building blocks
for a larger framework. So I would emphasize that.
On the Baltic States, I am for their inclusion, and I will
not repeat my points as to why.
On Russia, I do not think that deserves a lot of time now,
because it has been pretty adequately covered. I will just say
that I think President Putin has come to recognize what I
remember discussing with Senator Biden here before the first
round of NATO enlargement, that Russia's interests are served
well by prosperity and security in the states between Russia
and the central part of Europe. He does not have the military
power or the economic power to provide either. Only NATO does.
Therefore, Russia benefits from NATO enlargement.
Now to the missions: I agree with what has been said about
new challenges. I may differ a little bit about how we go about
achieving what General Clark wants to achieve, what I have
heard you say, Senator Lugar, and others. Senator Brownback
also emphasized this.
If we have a big open debate about this in NATO, it will
end up with a lot of hot air and no real results. I have gone
back and looked at some of the arguments in the 1950s and
1960s. And it is instructive. We have always had these debates.
We have never achieved a consensus throughout the whole
Alliance, period. It has been constantly a struggle to keep the
Alliance behind simple policies.
I picked up Kissinger's old book, ``The Troubled
Partnership,'' 1965. And, you know, it is deja vu. You would
think we were right back to the arguments of that time. I am
sure we could have had a hearing like this, we would have wrung
our hands about the future of the Alliance.
So I have a more optimistic view about where we can go
without a debate on NATO mission. But I do share the views,
some of the points, that General Clark expressed, on
institutional arrangements. It is my impression, as an outside
observer, that the number of big NATO exercises, like Reforger
were dropped in the 1990s. We also reduced troop levels rather
dramatically.
If we want to run those kinds of training programs to
maintain integrability standards, helping close the military
capabilities gaps, I am not sure we have the capability to do
so. Rather than talking about the new mission, he suggests,
choosing skillfully exercises of the kind General Clark talked
about with his strategic reserve force is a more promising way
to bring NATO to accept it.
I mentioned in my testimony what may sound outlandish to
some people, that the United States should take the initiative
and run an exercise in place of a Reforger which picks up two
divisions, moves them to Europe in 2 weeks, and force the
Defense Department to begin to build the capabilities that
would be required. They will realize that two divisions cannot
get to urope in 2 weeks unless we quadruple the number of C-
17s, which the Defense Department realizes it needs more of, as
a result of the stretch to Afghanistan.
I would then reverse the exercise and let the Europeans
move heavy forces the same way to North America. If you started
doing those kinds of things, you will end up creating a lot of
the coordination, overcoming many of the gap capabilities that
you discussed earlier and have been concerned about. I think we
will never get everybody up to speed on NATO, but we will get a
coalition of the willing that will come along. And then, if
those capabilities are sufficiently exercised, when we have a
particular problem, like Afghanistan, we will have to work the
politics inside the Alliance, generating the consensus to do
such an out-of-area kind of operation. But we will already have
had the operation details for how to do it worked out.
I am not so sure that you will get the kind of interagency
coordination General Clark wants through nonmilitary
departments either here in the United States or among the
allies. That seems to me to be a big stretch. Maybe that is
something to look at way down the road. But right now, a lot of
the capabilities issues and a lot of the debate about the
future of NATO can be best dealt with by very vigorous program
of military activities or the kind NATO once had but we dropped
out of and have just not committed the resources to continue.
That is the main point I would emphasize there. And let me
just end on that point.
The Chairman. Thank you very much.
[The prepared statement of Lt. General Odom follows:]
Prepared Statement of Lt. Gen. William E. Odom, U.S. Army (Ret.)
Good morning Mr. Chairman and members of the committee. It is an
honor to appear before you to discuss the wisdom of NATO enlargement. I
would like to address four topics concerning this important issue: (1)
historical perspective on contemporary challenges in absorbing more
countries into the alliance; (2) how much to enlarge and why; (3) the
Russia factor; and (4) NATO challenges.
historical perspective
Let me begin by offering some historical perspective. Europe's
security needs today are similar to those of the period right after
World War II. The end of the Cold War, like the end of that war, left a
band of weak European states from the Baltic Sea to the Mediterranean,
more connected by wars and ethnic conificts than by cooperative
relations, mutually suspicious, and uncertain about how to pursue
postwar reconstruction. The debates in Europe about creating NATO at
that time ignored the Soviet military threat while focusing more on
economic reconstruction and fear of Germany. Even the United States saw
the Soviet threat as more political than military until the outbreak of
the war in Korea in 1950. The initial purpose of the alliance,
therefore, was not to ``keep the Russians out,'' but ``to keep old
enemies in Western Europe from drifting back toward war'' while
proceeding with economic recovery.
Reconstruction in Western Europe, therefore, succeeded dramatically
because traditional enemies--France and Germany--cooperated in the
European Coal and Steel Community which was soon eclipsed by the
European Economic Commission, based on the 1957 Treaty of Rome. This
story is well known, but we tend to forget that it was only possible
because the United States took a hegemonic role in the North Atlantic
Alliance and maintained large military forces in Europe. This
effectively made NATO a surrogate for a supranational political-
military authority that could keep the peace, something modern Europe
has never been able to do. Although the ensuing five decades have
produced the European Union, this organization is a long way from being
able to assume the governing role that NATO has played.
contemporary problems
Today's parallels to 1949 are striking when we consider Eastern
Europe. Again, we see a band of states from the Baltic Sea to the
Mediterranean in economic distress, mistrustful of their neighbors
because of nationalism and ethnic tensions, and uncertain about how to
proceed. Their problems, however, differ somewhat from those faced by
Western Europe in the 1940s and 50s. Rather than the destruction in war
suffered by Western Europe, they confront a different kind of
destruction, namely, the devastating legacies from Communist party
rule, command economic systems, and Soviet hegemony. Let me describe
each briefly.
Communist party rule. The Soviet regime-type had as its core a
single dictatorial party tightly embracing the secret police and
military officer corps. The post-communist leaders in these states
mostly come from these old organizations, which socialized them in ways
that are inimical to liberal democracy and market economies. Some are
able to change sufficiently to play a positive role in the new
political and economic systems, but many are not. The problem was
different in Western Europe where the Nazi and fascist elites were
deposed and destroyed. No Nazi Party was left to compete in elections.
The old communist elites have not suffered the same fate; they survive
in large numbers and lead successor communist parties and communist-
like parties, actually winning office in a case or two. I am not
suggesting that the communists are likely to re-establish durable
communist regimes throughout the region (although Belarus and Moldova
have such regimes, Bulgaria had one for a couple of years). They have
neither the public support nor the organizational discipline necessary,
but because they play a significant role in the politics of these
countries, they obstruct and slowdown progress in effective reform.
Command economic systems. The old economic system in all of these
countries squandered capital in unprofitable investments for four
decades, making most of their industries unviable in a market economy.
Perhaps more troublesome are the institutional legacies of command
economies. Western Europe did not lose its old legal and economic
institutions, but in Eastern Europe the communists destroyed them, such
as they were; thus they must be rebuilt today. This is a much bigger
challenge than anything faced in Western Europe after 1945.
Soviet hegemony. The effects of Soviet control over these countries
were many, but the residue of a few of them is especially worrisome. A
few former party, military, and intelligence officials, now well-placed
within the post-communist regimes, still have personal connections with
their old Russian counterparts. Not only does this allow Russian
intelligence officers to make political trouble in these countries, but
it also permits cooperative criminal activities with Russian
intelligence and criminal circles. Western European communist parties
after WW II, of course, caused some, but not all, of the same problems
we see today in Eastern Europe.
Nationalism and ethnic tensions. Not something attributable to
Soviet influence, these problems are most conspicuous in the breakup of
Yugoslavia. To presume, as critics of NATO enlargement have done, that
only Yugoslavia is afflicted by them is a dangerous illusion.
The history of Europe from the Protestant Reformation right up
through WW II is a record of religious, ethnic, and nationalist strife.
England's border with Scotland saw continuous war from 900 to 1746 with
two brief pauses. No border in the Balkans can match that record!
It is frequently said that peace is now permanent in Western
Europe, but such a claim may be premature. European leaders would have
laid the foundations for future wars in 1990 had not the United States
overruled them. Lady Margaret Thatcher and President Francois Mitterand
struggled to prevent the reunification of Germany. Suppose they had
succeeded. Germany probably would have reunited anyway, quitting NATO
and expelling U.S. troops, being furious at Britain and France, and
more beholden to Moscow than Washington. That might also have allowed
the Warsaw Pact to survive. British and French handling of the Bosnian
crisis in the early 1990s actually contributed to the spread of civil
war in Yugoslavia. Unlike in the case of German reunification, the
United States did not become involved and overrule until much too late.
In Eastern Europe, Yugoslavia provides a picture of what will
inexorably occur there over the next several years without NATO
enlargement. The Hungarian minorities in Romania, Serbia, and Slovakia,
Poles in Lithuania, Belarus, and Ukraine, the Roma in several
countries, Turks in Bulgaria, and Albanians in Macedonia are other
potential sources for ethnic strife and wars throughout the region. The
Czech government recently used the old Sudeten German issue to sour its
relations with Berlin. And Russia's province of Kaliningrad, part of
old East Prussia, is a potential source of many problems.
Why have most of these ``sleeping dogs'' not barked, or not barked
louder? Because prospective NATO members do not want to spoil their
prospects for admittance. Without that hope, some of their leaders
would feel free to exploit these issues for domestic political
purposes.
Anyone who objects to enlarging NATO, therefore, should be obliged
to explain how we are to deal with the plethora of problems that these
four legacies have bequeathed Eastern Europe if admitting new members
is ruled out. Still, we must face the question, how much enlargement
and how fast?
how much to enlarge and why now?
The answer to how much is at least five countries, although seven
would be better. Thereafter, a long interval should precede any
additional enlargement. The answer to ``why now'' varies.
The Baltic states have been very successful in their political and
economic transition programs. Latvia, having the largest Russian
minority, faces more difficulties but has made impressive progress.
Bringing them into NATO will help sustain what is being accomplished in
these countries.
Some observers insist that the Baltic countries are militarily
indefensible. This judgment is wrong on two counts, technical and
strategic. On the first count, given the great lethality of U.S. and
NATO forces against the greatly deteriorated Russian military, a local
defense is highly feasible in Estonia, the most exposed of the three
countries. On the second count, Berlin was indefensible during the Cold
War, but the strategic context prevented a Soviet attack on it. The
same holds for the Baltic states today. If Russia invaded them, it
would risk general war with Europe and the United States. The strategic
question, therefore, is the defensibility of Europe, not the Baltic
states. Thus the indefensibility objection is a red herring, not to be
taken seriously.
Romania and Bulgaria can arguably be given a higher priority than
the Baltic states, not because they are better prepared. Far from it.
They face large internal difficulties. Romania, surprisingly, has done
more to get ready for NATO membership after its disappointment in 1998
than most observers expected. The key reason for including both
countries now is stability in the Balkans.
Bosnia and Kosovo are terrible problems, but compared to civil war
in Macedonia, they could look small. It most likely would lead to the
country's breakup, which could bring Bulgaria, Albania, Serbia, and
Greece into a conflict there. In other words, a general Balkans war
could arise from it unless NATO creates a framework for maintaining
security in the entire Balkans. Making Romania and Bulgaria NATO
members is the most obvious way to begin, because it puts NATO astride
all countries there rather than entangled on one side or the other.
This probably explains why Turkey and Greece are uncharacteristically
cooperating to support Romanian and Bulgarian admission.
Slovenia and Slovakia might as well be included if these other five
countries are. Slovenia is well-prepared, but Slovakia needs to make
greater progress.
the russia factor
After the dire warnings about Russian reactions to the first round
of NATO enlargement failed to materialize, new ones should not disturb
us this time. Russia is now conciliatory toward enlargement, and for
very good reasons.
Stability and economic prosperity in the states of Eastern Europe
are very much in Russia's interest. Civil war and poverty are not.
Russia lacks the military power to prevent the latter and the economic
power to provide the former. Only a U.S.-led NATO has both. Several
Russian political and economic leaders have come to recognize this,
especially Putin, who seems determined to integrate Russia's economy
into the West.
Then why not include Russia in NATO? First, its policies in the CIS
and Chechnya are incompatible with NATO membership. Second, it is too
big and its problems too intractable for Putin to achieve broad Russian
integration with Western economies any time soon. Third, inside NATO
Russia would periodically play a spoiling and blocking role that could
fatally weaken the alliance. Fourth, the seven states now seeking
membership want security against Russia. Russian membership, some of
them have warned, would be dangerous for them. We should not
underestimate their fears as an important subjective political factor.
All of these reasons argue strongly against upgrading Russia's link
to NATO beyond the 1999 ``founding act.'' Until Moscow uses this
connection constructively for several years, it would be unwise to
allow it greater access to NATO deliberations and policy discussions.
whither nato?
Serious questions need to be addressed about where NATO is headed
with enlargement. Will it lose its vitality? Is it being diluted so
that it amounts to little more than OSCE? Does it really have a mission
today? Is NATO being displaced by the EU's moves to take over
responsibility for Europe's security?
Dilution is a danger if more than the seven candidates now being
considered are admitted. That must wait until the present prospective
members are successfully integrated into NATO. Experience already
gained from the three new members shows that it takes time. For
example, the Czech Republic is creating serious problems, especially
with the increasing signs of unpunished criminal activities by high-
level government officials. No doubt, some of the candidates for
admission this year will prove troublesome once they become members.
Still, dealing with these problems is a major reason for enlargement.
If the Czech Republic were outside of NATO, our leverage for solutions
would be less.
At some point, however, troublesome new members could prove more
than NATO can handle. For that reason, the alliance ought to consider
amending the treaty to establish rules and procedures for expelling
members that have become a danger to NATO from within. Alternatively,
it needs to review the measures it contemplated in the past when the
domestic politics of a member country appeared to endanger the
alliance, e.g., Portugal in the early 1970s when it appeared headed
toward a revolution and possibly a communist regime coming to power,
and Greece when it became a military dictatorship for a time.
The analogy with OSCE is instructive on the dilution issue, not
against expansion, however, but as a strong reason for not including
Russia or increasing its status in Brussels. The weight of the mature
liberal democratic countries in an expanded NATO must greatly exceed
that of countries still struggling with internal transformations into
liberal regimes with market economies. U.S. hegemony guaranteed that in
the early years of the alliance and still does to considerable degree,
but change in Western Europe added to NATO's capacity to handle the
proposed enlargement today.
NATO's mission has become a matter of debate. That is unfortunate
and to a large degree the fault of the United States, which seems
confused about it. It has always been ``missions'' plural, not
singular, and there have always been lingering differences between
Europe and the United States over them. If NATO proved highly effective
for fifty years with these differences, I do not see the need to iron
them all out today in a major public debate. It cannot lead to
agreement, and that cannot be good for NATO.
More important, if we consider the traditional NATO missions, it is
not at all clear that the United States would be better off if they
were changed. It is clear, however, that the United States deserves
most of the blame for neglecting two of its most serious missions. Let
me review them.
1. Providing a substitute for a European supranational political-
military authority. This oldest and implicit mission remains valid
today, and NATO enlargement gives it added importance in the decades
ahead. We need to be more conscious of it without talking more about
it. The Europeans know its importance but do not like to admit it. If
the European Union achieved a political federation with an effective
central government, it might well displace NATO, something the United
States cannot oppose, not least because Washington was the original
sponsor of European integration. The danger today, however, is that we
could forget this mission while the Europeans create unjustified
illusions about EU defense capabilities. The combined misunderstandings
could precipitate a premature U.S. withdrawal from Europe, catalyzing
the slow but sure process of growing tensions and instability in
Europe.
2. Training for coalition warfare. The coalition that fought the
Gulf War against Iraq was greatly facilitated by NATO interoperability
standards and practices. No other organization but NATO provides the
development and maintenance of interoperability essential for effective
multilateral coalition warfare. If we did not have NATO to provide this
service, we would have to invent it. In a word, NATO needs no direct
enemy to justify its existence. This training mission alone is enough.
The greatest threat to NATO's future has been U.S. neglect of this
mission since the end of the Cold War. It requires a yearly set of
large-scale exercises involving multi-national operations. And those in
turn demand a series of smaller scale national level training endeavors
to prepare for them. Large-scale NATO ``combined'' exercises have
virtually ceased. The militaries of the new NATO members, Poland,
Hungary, and the Czech Republic, therefore, have had neither the chance
nor the demand to become involved in such training at more than a very
low-level. Their national defense staffs are not forced to become
operationally involved on more than very limited small unit operations.
Thus they can drift along with little change from their old communist
military practices.
One of the reasons for the huge gap in military capabilities
between the United States and Europe is the lack of a regular and
demanding combined exercise program. If, for example, the United States
began an annual exercise, projecting three to six heavy Army brigades
to Europe, almost entirely by airlift (C-17s can carry M-1 tanks), to
participate with NATO forces, that would draw them into demanding
operations, showing up their ``gaps'' and needs for modernization.
Their defense ministries could not easily ignore them.
The Cold War REFORGER exercises accomplished this with the Central
Front scenarios, but the United States had weapons and equipment
already deployed in Europe (POMCUS stocks), making the lift
requirements relatively small. Today, such exercises should involve
lifting ALL of the weapons and equipment in very short time periods. A
score of fast RO/RO ships and a fleet of 300 C-17s could put two U.S.
heavy divisions in Europe in two weeks.
On alternate years, heavy brigades of European forces should be
projected on the same high-speed basis for exercises in the United
States and Canada. If the United States offered the lift and invited
European militaries to ``play'' in this game, their military commanders
would likely jump at the opportunity. The professional enhancements
offered and the chance to show their own governments what their real
shortfalls are in capabilities for operating with U.S. forces would be
powerful incentives to European officers. The new NATO member states
would scramble to be the first to participate.
Two major gains could result from such training. First, it would
show up the EU's ``common security and defense policy'' for what it
is--little more than a piece of paper. And it would do so without any
public comments from U.S. officials, comments that infuriate European
leaders without changing their behavior.
Second, the technological gap between U.S. and European forces
would likely narrow. Moreover, it does not exist in some areas,
something that exercises would force the U.S. defense department to
acknowledge. And it would be especially helpful for military reforms in
NATO's new member states.
3. Out-of-area operations. The Europeans long opposed so-called
``out of area'' operations. The crisis in Bosnia changed that. As
Senator Lugar argued at the time, NATO had to go ``out of area or out
of business.'' The biggest obstacle to NATO's undertaking the operation
in Bosnia was initially Britain, supported by France, but then the
United States itself became a hurdle--ambivalent and unwilling to
commit troops to the enterprise for the decades-long operation it would
obviously become.
When Washington finally became engaged, it did not put NATO fully
in charge but left the United Nations involved as well. The resulting
feckless organizational arrangements have caused much slower progress
than could have been achieved. The task was defined as
``peacekeeping,'' a term given operational meaning by the United
Nations' experiences in the 1950s. It should have been defined as
transforming the political and economic institutions of all the
republics of Yugoslavia, i.e., the task the United States carried out
during its occupation of Germany between 1945 and 1955. UN
``peacekeeping'' allows only very specific and limited activities,
which cannot create the new institutions needed there. Only military
occupation and governance can.
The Kosovo operation produced much the same kind of ineffective
arrangements for accomplishing the long-term transformation task, again
because the United States never really took it seriously enough to
accept the full scope of the challenge involved.
I review this record briefly because it is the backdrop for the
occasional proposals for turning NATO in an alliance committed to
fighting terrorism everywhere. Gaining a consensus on a comparatively
limited ``out of area'' operation in the Balkans proved difficult
although it deals with a problem within Europe and directly threatening
Europe's internal well-being. Moreover, the United States was and
remains the reluctant participant although its role is critical to
success.
To convince all countries in NATO to commit to a vastly larger and
more ambiguous mission, making NATO the vehicle for the war on
terrorism, would be infinitely more difficult, probably impossible.
Because one country's terrorist can be another country's freedom
fighter, the United States could rue the day it signed up to such a
mission. We already have this problem with Russia over the war in
Chechnya where the United States does not consider President
Maskhadov's forces terrorists although Russia does. Within NATO the
problem exists between Turkey and Europe over Kurdish insurgency
groups. The United States has been generally more aligned with Turkey
on this issue than with its European allies.
There will be times that NATO can reach a consensus to act ``out of
area,'' but it will be on a case-by-case basis. And in some cases, the
United States itself may be the spoiler. At the same time, a few NATO
countries are likely to be willing to form ``coalitions of the
willing,'' to use Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's felicitous term, in
support of military operations far out side of NATO's region. And the
multilateral training and interoperability provided by NATO will make
those coalitions far more effective if the United States has pushed
ahead with NATO exercises of the kind suggested above. If it has
neglected that NATO mission, ``out of area operations'' and
``coalitions of the willing'' will be far less effective.
4. Collective defense, as prescribed by Article 5 of the treaty,
remains a core NATO mission, just as it was during the Cold War. It is
no longer pressing in the way it once was, but it still deserves a lot
of thought. Enlargement contributes to it. Some out-of-area operations
can improve the alliance's collective defense, e.g., the ones in the
Balkans do so in the long run by preempting the spread of civil war and
instability. Diverse and varied NATO exercises also improve collective
defense if they are properly conceived. In sum, all four foregoing
missions contribute in different ways to this basic NATO mission.
This brief review should demonstrate why NATO need not worry about
new missions. The present puzzlement about them reflects forgetfulness
about the alliance's old missions and especially the constant
disagreements about them.
For example, most European countries never took the Soviet military
threat as seriously as did the United States. As Henry Kissinger
pointed out in his book, ``The Troubled Partnership'' (1965), the
United States focused on the technical military issues at the expense
of the larger political consensus issues in the late 1950s and early
1960s. De Gaulle's image of Europe's future clashed with the U.S.
image, and dilemmas of managing nuclear weapons employment strategy
remained irresolvable. In fact, technical progress was slowly achieved
while political consensus on all the big issues never was reached.
Today's debate over the ``military gap'' has much in common with the
gaps that troubled the United States in NATO's early decades. Looking
back to how it narrowed them suggests that slogging along with military
house-keeping to overcome the ``military gap'' today is a better
approach than engaging in a major political debate over NATO's purpose.
conclusion
Let me end by applauding this committee's efforts to put the case
for NATO enlargement--pros and cons--before the American public.
Admitting new members is not a step to take lightly. Moreover, if the
United States continues to let the alliance drift without leadership
and direction, and if it spends more time condemning the EU's military
planning than improving NATO's military activities, enlarging NATO will
yield few of the results and possibly contribute to the alliance's
decline.
I strongly favor enlargement this year not only because it serves a
broad range of interests, including those of Russia, Europe, and the
United States, but also because it should force the United States to
wake up to most of these long neglected tasks.
The Chairman. Since there are three of us, maybe we can go
to 7-minute rounds. OK? Actually, the three of us have all
worked a lot on this. Why not just feel free to interrupt, if
you have a follow-on question?
Senator Lugar. Can I introduce a statement?
The Chairman. Yes.
Senator Lugar. I ask unanimous consent that the statement
by Senator Enzi be entered in the record at the front end of
the hearing.
The Chairman. And again, I invite my colleagues, at least
on my time here, to jump in and follow up.
General Clark, you talked about the CJTF in Afghanistan. It
seems to me a pretty interesting and important notion and
concept. I mean, you both made a generic point, we do not have
to reinvent the wheel. NATO, which is now viewed and discussed
only in terms of military and interoperability and procurement
and the like, is, it started off something far beyond that,
unrelated initially. And I think its most significant role in
50 years has been the initial responsibility it had, which was
not in effect military.
Now obviously, it played a gigantic role, the dominant
role, in the ultimate victory over communism. But the initial
role still is the reason why, I think, we must remain a
European power, why it is so vitally important. To use your
phrase, general, it is the platform for everything else.
But can you expand for me a little bit on how, if you were,
if Senator Lugar were President and you were Secretary of State
and he said, ``OK. Afghanistan, coordination from this point
on,'' how do you engage the CJTF? How do you deal with that?
General Clark. Well, the central idea behind the CJTF was
to be able to operate outside the area of the major NATO
commanders and to do so by bringing in other non-NATO members.
And so you would form a command structure. You would have a
core of it from the NATO elements, but you could bring outside
players in. It could be Chinese, it could be Russians, it could
be Pakistanis. And you would put them inside that command
center.
And so the question is: Can you form a command center and
deploy it? And does it have the communications it needs to
coordinate? And then does it take its guidance from the North
Atlantic Council? And then you would have to, of course,
augment the Council appropriately.
But all these mechanisms have been talked out for a long
time. You could have done it in the case of Afghanistan. You
would have simply said you would want General Franks to be the
NATO CJTF commander. And he would have a carved-out portion for
the U.S. special capabilities that are U.S.-only classified
capabilities, just like we did during the Kosovo campaign. You
have a U.S.-only NATO, if necessary, and so forth, so you
protect sensitive national information. Then you buildup the
command center around it.
But the important point is not the military point. It is
the political point. It is the fact that NATO and NATO
governments are going to have to engage and agree, ``Are we
going to bomb here? Are we going to do this?''
We have to provide them the information. We have to build
the case. And they, in turn, have to accept their
responsibilities for acting on that case, making decisions, and
carrying it to their own public.
The Chairman. Now there is an obvious reason why I asked
the question, because I, quite frankly, am beginning to wonder
whether it is the military, whether it is the Defense
Department and the civilian leadership, whether it is the
administration, or whether it is us in the Congress, or a
combination of all.
But I thought we did learn, and you and I have had many
conversations on this, we did learn some important lessons from
Bosnia and Kosovo. I am not at all sure we have learned many
lessons from Kosovo to Afghanistan at all. And granted, I only
spent 5 days on the ground in Afghanistan. So I am not going to
extrapolate from that the universe.
But I have not met anyone that wears a uniform, who is on
the ground, from colonel to one star, British, German, anyone,
Turk--although I did not meet any Turks at the time--who
suggests that there is any possibility, any real possibility,
of achieving the agreement masterly reached by the President of
the United States in Bonn, to put an interim government in
place with a mechanism to provide for the historic way in which
Afghanis chose an elected leadership, a Loya Jirga, and an
ultimate government 2 years down the road, that was probably a
loosely federated democratic republic, that had a military that
was untrained, in training, that was multiethnic, that probably
by that time would be in the area of 20,000 moving to 40,000.
I have not found one single person who says you can get
from here to there without a significant increase in security
capability and requirements on the ground. I found myself, and
I am going to ask you both to comment on this. I found myself
confronted with the following dilemma. And I will not name the
military personnel wearing non-American uniforms with whom I
met in the International Security Force in Kabul, which was,
when I was there, about 1,700, working toward 4,800 or 5,000.
Every place I went and every political leader I met from
various NATO countries made the following statement, ``If you
want us in, you have to be in.''
I actually had an interesting meeting; I think we both did.
I am about to say something that I am not positive on, but I
think Senator Hagel was at the meeting when Kofi Annan came
down.
And Kofi Annan was saying, ``Hey, no blue helmets here. You
guys have to do the hard job'' which is an unusual thing for a
head of the United Nations to say. And Kofi Annan was saying to
us that ``You have to understand, if,'' in my phrase, if the
big dog is not in the hunt, no one else is going to be in the
hunt.
So I do not, basically, I do not care how you guys work it
out, but you have to work out something that satisfies the
British, the Germans, the Turks, and/or anyone else that CJTF
would envision and I realize that is not the operational
organization right now, but you have to make sure the big dog
is on the ground.
If you are there, you may find they are really willing. I
found the Turks excited about taking over command until they
found out that we announced, I would argue prematurely, we
wanted no part. We were not going to be any part of the
International Security Force.
Then, I thought we were going through a period where that
was just a way to avoid the political dilemma, which I fully
understand--I am not being critical--the administration may
have about nation-building, because of 2, 4, 6, 8 years of
beating up the other team about nation-building. So I thought
it was going to be OK.
Basically, here is the deal, guys: We are staying on the
ground, going after al-Qaeda and the Taliban. We will get that
job done. It is going to take us awhile, but we are on the
ground. We may not be part of the force, but we are here. Do
not worry. And extraction capability resides with us, and we
will do it.
But then I found without, again quoting administration
officials, very high-ranking administration officials, when I
continually raise the security issue in Afghanistan, say, ``Do
not worry.'' One very high-ranking official said to me, ``Well,
it is--do not worry. Izmail Khan has everything under
control.''
I am serious. This is not a joke. I am being very earnest
about this. And my response was, ``Well, Izmail Khan. We have
always worried about Izmail Khan and the Iranians.''
One of the things I thought the purpose of an international
force was was to let this government mature, let this
government come into being. And the only way that government
has any chance--is if you keep the six surrounding countries
out of the deal, so they do not think they are invested in the
outcome, et cetera.
So I am thoroughly confused right now. And I am not being
facetious. It seems to me that it is still not too late,
although it may be, that something has to happen here. I am
convinced the administration is going to reach the conclusion
that with 4,800 troops in Kabul, extended 3 months under
Turkish leadership, a U.N. mandate evaporating, will increase
concern about our longevity in the deal, because rightly or
wrongly--and I am not making any assertion--our allies assume
the reason we do not want to be there is we want to amass a
significant force to be prepared to go into Iraq.
Therefore and I want to conclude with this--this is a long
non-question, but it is the core of what I think one of the
problems is.
The case I keep trying to make is: One of the reasons why
the Europeans and the Arab nations are worried about us going
after Saddam is not that they like Saddam. As one prominent
Arab leader, one of the most prominent Arab leaders in the Arab
world said, ``Hey, he tried to assassinate me twice. I do not
like him.'' It is that they have no doubt we will take him
down, but they have great doubt as to whether we are going to
stick around and help build a stable nation so there is not
chaos in the region.
And they now are looking and saying to me, ``Afghanistan,
if you are ready to leave Afghanistan before it is secure, what
the heck are you going to do''--and so I have two questions.
One, is my concern, not illegitimate, but out of proportion
to how I have described the problem? And two, if it is not,
what is able to be done, based on where we are at the moment?
That is a heck of a question. But, General Clark, we will
start with you and then General Odom.
General Clark. Well, I think the concern for security in
Afghanistan is well-founded. And I have favored an expansion of
the mandate and structure of the ISAF for some time and have
said so on a number of occasions. But I understand also the
dilemma that the administration is in with the overhang of the
expectations for moving against Iraq and elsewhere.
And the United States Armed Forces, as two of the
commanders stated, are stretched thin, unless you call up the
National Guard and Reserves and get very serious about this. It
is probably very difficult for the administration to do that in
the absence of knowing what they are going to do and making the
firm decisions on war plans. But at some point, I think that
will come.
In the meantime, what is going on in Afghanistan is a
holding action. It is a gamble. It is a calculated gamble that
you can use the forces that are there, attack the remnants of
al-Qaeda, show strength around the country, particularly in the
eastern part, and intimidate and cow the opposition so that
Hamid Karzai will survive, that the Loya Jirga will happen, and
there is a chance.
I think there is a chance. But there is one other factor in
that, you know, we do have allies that are in there now. The
Turks are in there. They are going to put, I think, the latest
I heard was 1,100 people on the ground. And for some of our
allies and friends, participation in ISAF may be a good
alternative to participation in U.S. action elsewhere in the
region. So there may be some countervailing recruiting pull for
ISAF, as we go forward with plans elsewhere.
But in the near term, I think what we have to do is
recognize that the creation of the Afghan National Army is an
enterprise fraught with difficulties. And we have to be
preparing some kind of a fallback position that, as we begin to
phase out the active combat operations with the 5,000 to 7,000
troops and airmen that are there we move toward a more active
participation in ISAF, because I think in the near term there
is no alternative to an enlargement of its mandate and some
involvement on the part of the United States, if active combat
operations there decline.
The Chairman. Let me just--and then I will yield to you,
General Odom. Well, actually, I will withhold.
General.
General Odom. I think your point is exactly right and
should have been asked early on. It is easy to go in and knock
off Saddam. We did not think it was going to be so easy to go
in and knock off the Taliban Government, but it has proved to
be easier than we anticipated. But the bigger question is what
you do next.
I am not sure. I think the dilemma we face now is whether
we get into what is called nation-building in Afghanistan and
stay with it for 10, 15, 20 years or not, it is an issue we
have to face. And if you are going to intervene someplace else,
if you are going to invade Iraq, you certainly are going to
take on a nation-building mission there. If you do not, then
you will create a situation that is as bad as what you have
right now.
You can, of course, make an argument that it is too risky
to stay involved in Afghanistan and just say, ``We are going to
take the calculation that political instability is inevitable
and get out.'' And I do not think we ought to leave our allies
trapped there, if we do.
There is another terribly important point about what you
said that I want to underscore. If you are going to have a
common policy for an occupation, the United States had better
have the lion's share of the troops on the ground. In Kosovo
right now, there are 6 armies. And they all talk directly to
their national governments, so you do not have a common
occupation policy.
If the United States had put in 40 to 50 percent of the
troops, we could impose a working policy. The model is Germany
1945. We had the lion's share of occupying forces in Germany.
Therefore, the British and the French coordinated their
policies with us. ``Nation-building'' is now a bad odor, I
know, because of Vietnam. But we have had successful nation-
building: Germany, Austria, Italy, South Korea, Japan, other
places. So one failure should not put this whole issue of
nation-building in such bad odor.
And I think it has to be brought back. When we make these
decisions about where to go to war, we have to think about the
next act, what we do after the war.
Let me just end this by commending to you an article that
Sir Michael Howard wrote a couple years ago in Survival. I
think it was his IISS speech, ``When are wars decisive?''
Winning the military victory is only the first criterion, in
his view. For the second victory has to be so overwhelming,
that you destroy the old elites and make it clear that the
outcome cannot be reversed.
Then third, a new elite has to be cultivated that wants to
bring that country into the Western international system. That
certainly is what we ought to be doing in Kosovo and Bosnia.
Whether we should try to do that in Afghanistan is an open
and very debatable question. Whether it could be done in Iraq
strikes me as a debatable question.
So that is how seriously I take your point.
The Chairman. Senator Hagel.
Senator Hagel. Mr. Chairman, thank you.
I wanted to also thank the two of you for appearing here
today and for your selfless service to this country over many
years. This country has depended on the two of you many times
over, and we are grateful for that service. And you continue to
each contribute.
And this kind of exchange is important, as you know,
because it further develops a base of understanding for us and
knowledge and appreciation for all the complications here that
go into these policies. And people like you can give us that,
and we appreciate it.
Following up a bit on where Chairman Biden has taken this:
As you know, there has been some conversation about the
possibility of peacekeeping troops in the Middle East, if we
would get to that point. There has been conversation about the
possibility of a NATO force, should the United States be in
that force, if it would come to that, if we have a peace to
guarantee, if both parties would want us in. All those things
have to obviously fit.
I would be very interested in each of your thoughts about
that issue. Take it wherever you like. It is my opinion that we
are going to have to face this question. And it is probably
sooner rather than later. And I am not advocating that we do
that. But I think the reality of what we have before us demands
us to think this through a little bit sooner rather than later.
General Clark.
General Clark. Senator, I think it is a critical question.
First, I think that the sequence has to be right. And I think
that the right sequence for consideration of introduction of
U.S. troops or peacekeeping troops is a sequence we had in
Bosnia from 1995 on. That is, get in agreement; then let the
cease-fire fall out during the process of getting the
agreement. And then if there are tasks that have to be
enforced, then you can put in a force so that it has pre-agreed
authorities to go with the responsibilities that are given it.
It is absolutely foolhardy and likely to be ineffective, as
well as dangerous to the people that are involved, to put a
force in with hopes and responsibilities but no authorities
from the parties it is engaged with.
This is what happened to UNPROFOR in the early days in
Bosnia. They were responsible for everything. They were
authorized to do nothing. And they ended up getting people
hurt, lots of people hurt, and failing. And the consequences
are still being felt from that.
So what we learned in the Bosnia mission is: The
authorities for the force have to be greater than its
responsibilities. And that is what we secured through the
agreement.
So I would not want to put a force on the ground until
there was a comprehensive peace agreement, until the tasks of
that force were clearly laid out. What are they? Are they to
search for terrorist cells inside Palestinian encampments? Do
they have the authority to go through every police desk in
Gaza, to search tunnels, to go into a cell when people are
under interrogation, to view the records of that interrogation,
to search for wire tapping?
I mean, all of those authorities were written into our
police annex in Bosnia, for example. They have not all been
implemented well, but they gave total assurance to the
international community that we had the authority to do
whatever was necessary to maintain the peace.
And I think that is the precondition for putting any forces
in. Obviously, in the best of circumstances, I would not want
any forces in there at all, because I think, I would like to
see us get a comprehensive peace agreement out of this that
would obviate the requirement for enforcement activities. And
then we are out of it.
If we do have to put a force in there, and it is a NATO
force, it has to include American forces. Our views, our forces
are the bona fides of NATO moderation and of NATO perspective
in there. We cannot turn responsibility like this over to the
European Union, for obvious reasons, nor would they accept it,
nor would the Israelis accept it.
So if we write a peace agreement that requires enforcement,
then we are going to be involved in it. And we should be
endeavoring to write a peace agreement that does not require
enforcement, that has some very clear, openly acknowledged
phases and meets the needs well enough that it can be enforced
by the parties who are benefiting from it, not by us.
Senator Hagel. Would you keep the possibility on the table,
that if it would require, and all of the pieces were right, as
you suggested, that that NATO force, obviously with American
troops, should be on the table as a discussion?
General Clark. I would not take it off of the table,
because I think it is premature to take anything off of the
table that could lead toward a resolution of the problem there.
But here is what is critical about that: Thus far,
terrorism has proved to be an effective weapon in the views of
the Palestinian Authority. They have used it. Yes, a lot of
destruction has been brought to bear; but on the other hand, a
lot of public heat has come against Israel. And Israel has
basically lost the public relations battle. And so terrorism
has not been invalidated as a weapon. In fact, if anything, it
has sort of been confirmed.
We know that any peacekeeping force we put in there is
going to be effective in deterring or enforcing actions on the
Israelis and, overtly, on the Palestinians. But to deal with
terror, no. Can we stop suicide bombers with a NATO mission on
the ground? No, we cannot do it. We will be less effective than
the Israelis.
So what we have to understand is that we keep this force on
the table, but if we do not get a peace agreement and the full
support of outside powers like Saudi Arabia and Egypt----
Senator Hagel. Exactly.
General Clark [continuing]. That completely cuts off any
possible resources for Palestinian terror to reemerge, then we
are building ourselves a long-term problem.
Senator Hagel. Thank you.
General Odom.
General Odom. I would add to that, that this is a good
example for making the distinction between peacekeeping and
nation-building. This is really quite different from what we
are doing in Bosnia or Kosovo. It is really quite different
that what we will be doing in Afghanistan, if we go down the
road you are suggesting.
This is really to presume that there is a settlement, and
many of the things he said, obviously, have to occur before you
get to a settlement. If you are going in there to deal with
terrorists, I am not for going in. It seems to me that that is
just a hopeless endeavor.
If you are going to go in that way, you might as well say,
``Well, I am going to go in and occupy both Israel and
Palestine and we are going to be the political authority as an
occupation force. We will operate a military government.''
But if you can pull off these other things, such as support
from the outside, and there is a genuine faction in the
Palestinians that seem to accept whatever it is, then I could
see putting a force in there in those conditions. But it
strikes me as very unlikely right now.
I would end my point by saying it is terribly critical, in
my view, to have the Europeans and the Americans both involved.
This issue can end up dividing the United States from Europe,
and we do not want that to happen. That is not to the United
States' advantage. It is not to Europe's advantage. And I do
not think it is to Israel's advantage.
So keeping us all together on that issue strikes me as
probably the most critical thing about thinking through the
alternatives in the future.
Senator Hagel. Thank you.
The Chairman. Can I followup on an aspect of that with both
of you?
I will start with you, General Clark. The EU as a force--
Macedonia is about to be a handover. There is a ``peace
agreement,'' quote/unquote, there. I am, I think it is fair to
say, one of the biggest boosters of NATO and along with some of
my colleagues here in this committee, and a strong, strong
supporter of doing all we can to get it right in NATO, I do not
want to offend our European friends. But I am very concerned
about the ``handoff,'' quote/unquote, in Macedonia.
But again, you were on the ground. You are the guy that ran
the show, not the entirety of it, but you are the guy that got
us to the point where there are not people hiding up in the
mountains and tens of thousands of people being killed like the
couple hundred thousand people that were killed before we did
it the right way in Bosnia.
Tell me, just talk to me a minute about the EU taking over
the baton from us, which is scheduled to occur----
Staff Member. It is not for sure yet.
The Chairman. It is not for sure, but if it is, we are
talking about scheduling, it being something, A, to be decided
upon and, B, as a matter of fact, I suspect one of the reasons
why Prodi and Patton want to talk to me today at 5 o'clock may
have something to do with that. Maybe not. But talk to me about
that for a minute.
General Clark. Well, Senator, my view on it would be that
there is, assuming that all generally stays at the same level
of discomfort and low-level violence that it is right now in
Macedonia, that it will not make any practical difference
whether the EU is running the mission or not, because there is
close and continuous coordination between the European Union
forces on the ground, Europeans, and the Europeans who are
running the force in Kosovo.
The Chairman. KFOR.
General Clark. Right. The only difference is that the
United States' voice will be missing in deciding what the
missions are in the force in Macedonia. But we will have a U.S.
Ambassador there. The real question is, will the United States
still be interested in the outcome? It is my impression that
the whole move to the European Union force has been driven by
Washington----
The Chairman. Right.
General Clark [continuing]. Not by the Europeans. And I
understand the need to conserve resources. I understand the
need to withdraw forces from the Balkans if they are not needed
there and so forth. But I think, as General Odom indicated,
these are long-term problems.
General Odom. Yes.
The Chairman. Yes.
General Clark. When you go into an area and you attempt to
rectify it, the military does not do the nation-building. The
military puts the stability there so that nation-building can
take place. But that nation-building will not take place
without strong leverage from outside powers and especially from
the United States.
So the European Union does have some leverage, but not
much, even though it is economically dominant. The principal
leverage will come from the United States. The question is: If
things start to go wrong, will the United States step back in
and exert that leverage, or will it not?
And this is the start of a pattern that is going to, it is
going to be troublesome if it is the start of a pattern in
which we go in at the start, we withdraw, we go somewhere else,
because these are decade-long problems that require
persistence. We are going to end up destabilizing countries
rather than stabilizing them, if all we do is enter and leave
and turn the problem over to others less capable.
The Chairman. I would agree, yes. You are right.
General Clark. So that is the concern.
The Chairman. Especially since, as you talked about in your
statement, that in Prague the organizing rationale and purpose
of NATO is a little bit in flux here. And one of the reasons
why I agree with General Odom's recommendation about the
expansion of NATO, particularly including some of the Baltic
States and Balkans, is for that very reason, as part of the
stability.
I mean, I am not where I was; I pushed very hard in the
first round for Slovenia, not because I think people in Peoria
or in Salisbury, Maryland or in Seaford, Delaware, were going
to rest easier--and I do not mean to denigrate Slovenia--rest
easier knowing the Slovenian military is with us, but as a
window to the rest of the Balkans saying, ``You behave
correctly, you can become part of NATO.'' One of the two
methods of being permanently integrated into Europe are NATO
and the EU. And if we have to go first with NATO, so be it.
And so I am even more inclined to give the benefit of the
doubt and a close call to Bulgaria and Romania. And Romania has
had some, how can I say it, regression. But, so that is the
reason why I think it is important that your recommendation,
General, as I read your statement relative to that area. But do
you have a view on the EU and its role?
General Odom. Speaking bluntly, I think it will be a
disaster to turn it over to the EU. And I do not think it will
be a force-heavy requirement for the United States to play a
very significant role there. General Clark is much more
familiar with the details over there, but I suspect a battalion
reinforced is a big enough capability in that country to deal
with these ragtag Albanian dissidents or any parts of the
Macedonian Government forces that might make trouble. It is the
presence that is so critical.
The Chairman. Yes.
General Odom. And we will have as much say there as we have
troops. If we do not have troops, we will not have any say.
The Chairman. Right.
General Odom. It will go to pot, and I hate to contemplate
how to get back in effectively.
The Chairman. Last question. And I am sorry to keep you so
long, but having you both before me is a great opportunity, for
me anyway, and for us.
And I will end with this: General Clark, you talked about
the need for seamless cooperation and coordination relating to
what everyone acknowledges is, in a sense, the greatest concern
of the war of the future. And that relates to terrorist
activities and it relates to the breakout, if it occurs, in my
words, not yours, of ethnic conflict in Europe and other
places. And I was intrigued by your raising the possibility,
because if I understand it correctly, I agree with you, raising
the possibility, I would argue the necessity, of somehow
integrating institutionally the elements of the war on terror
which we talk about fighting, that are almost as critical as
what we think of as the military component of that war. And
that is: I do not know how you actually engage in that war
without integrating the non-military----
General Clark. Right.
The Chairman [continuing]. Intelligence components of these
various governments, i.e., the FBI and Scotland Yard. We can go
down the list.
I do not know how that will happen absent a successful
coordination in what every European leader recognizes is a
serious possibility, particularly as it relates to the prospect
or the possibility, on which I have held extensive hearings,
including secret hearings, on access to weapons of mass
destruction, either rudimentarily made nuclear weapons, of
fissile material if it is available, radiological weapons,
biological weapons, chemical weapons.
That is a genuine and legitimate concern that every
informed nation in the world has, particularly us. No one
pretends the desire does not exist among the terrorist
organizations to gain access to this.
And so, I agree with your assessment, and I am doing all
that I can to avail myself of all of the information in the
hands of our Government, within the domain of the Federal
Government, but there is no effective coordination right now.
There is coordination on an ad hoc basis, but not seamless, you
know, cooperation. And so you talk about the need for there to
be an institutional relationship.
And I will end with this: It would seem to me that this
could be, if we could ever articulate it well enough and sell
it without creating more of a bureaucratic drag within NATO
than need be, that the debate about our failure to participate
in the International Criminal Court could, in fact, dissipate a
great deal.
One of the reasons why we do not want to be part of the
International Criminal Court, and one of the reasons why the
last President said there had to be changes for us to be there,
and I have said there had to be changes, and this
administration has flatly, as I understand it, rejected the
idea, which I do not--is that we have not done the things that
you have said.
We have not rationalized the rules of the road. And this
seems to me to be a way that is difficult, but, to begin to try
to rationalize the rules of the road, if there were an
institutional coordinative capability.
Am I getting the drift of what you are suggesting
correctly? And can you expand on it a little bit?
General Clark. Yes, sir, you are. And that is, what I am
suggesting is that you enhance the use of NATO to deal with
problems of information sharing and judicial and legal reform.
Now, in reality, every ambassador has an FBI representative or
a CIA representative and they all have somebody who can deal
with law and so forth. But NATO does not. And we have always
said we want to deal with these things bilaterally because
these agencies in our own Government like to work on a case-by-
case basis. Can we extradite so-and-so? Can we take specific
action against a ship, such-and-such, which is registered
somewhere carrying this set of parts to this prescribed
country?
And the problem with that is that we have so many issues
right now that we have a, probably a 5- or 10-year backlog in
trying to work our way through this. We need to jumpstart the
program. This is very, very tough stuff.
The European Union is working right now to harmonize some
of their laws, but that does not let us in the door directly.
We are aware of it through our ambassador there and through
their ambassador here, but we need to do more on a day-to-day
basis, on an issue-by-issue basis. I think we need an
institutional framework.
And the NATO framework is as good as any other. Yes, when
you add more issues, it becomes difficult. And to be very
candid with you, people in government hate NATO issues. The
cables are long; the language is abstract. People are arguing
over where the comma is and where the sentence is. And it is
very unpleasant to do that kind of work.
But it just happens to be the kind of work that is
necessary to bring agreement forward between countries. And I
would very much like to see us move toward a broader definition
of what NATO does, not only a geographic extension of its
conventional activities, because the world we are moving into
requires a deeper level of cooperation between governments. And
if we cannot create a multilateral structure that can handle
these issues, we are not going to be able to be safe in the
global environment on which our prosperity and freedom depend.
The Chairman. I will never forget sitting around that very
large table with you, a group of U.S. Senators, when you were
directing the operation in Kosovo. I am not reporting any
specific conversation, but the issue at the time was, when we
Senators marched in to sit with you on our fact-finding trip,
was whether or not someone, whoever was picking targets, and
that the difficulty that existed was in dealing with sovereign
nations who are part of an institutional structure called NATO
and conducting a war in Kosovo.
And some of my colleagues, and it surprised me--most of
them were of the World War II generation--some of my colleagues
were insisting that there had to be in the future the ability
to eliminate that kind of confusion.
And I kept thinking to myself, ``What the hell would
General Eisenhower ever have done if these guys were in the
room?'' I cannot think of a more difficult task than being in
the midst of a life-and-death struggle, having to deal with the
personalities and the heads of state of all of the allied
countries and deciding on things like when and if D-day, where
D-day, whether or not to go into--I mean, I--has there ever
been a time--you are both military historians, by your
backgrounds. Has there ever been a time where there has been a
collective action of allied countries where there has not been
the needed, difficult and painful process of reaching
consensus?
General Clark. Well, no, but normally it is handled on an
ad hominem basis.
The Chairman. Yes.
General Odom. I would like to offer a dissenting view on
this right now.
The Chairman. I would like to hear it.
General Odom. If you look at Governor Ridge's problems in
homeland security, you run up against the Constitution and the
Federal system. Now, you can eliminate his problems by
canceling the Constitution. Now, you know this very much, sir.
You cannot even get coordination across agencies. There are at
least nine agencies that deal with the border controls. They
are in five departments. And we, I think legitimately, could
create a border control department, put those agencies in it,
and make some progress.
Consider Europe. Just look at the EU trying to coordinate
these things seamlessly. It may be a good goal to go for, but I
suggest it is a goal like the horizon. You will approach it,
and it may be healthy to try to approach it, but you are not
going to reach it. I think it unrealistic in a policy time
horizon of 4 to 8 years.
The Chairman. Well, that is----
General Odom. If we get off onto a debate of this kind, it
will be more counterproductive than productive, in that you do
have to deal with that group of people that are giving you a
hard time. And General Eisenhower did not have an easy time of
it either, dealing with DeGaulle and Churchill and Montgomery
and a few other tough guys to get to support one course of
action.
The Chairman. That is kind of my point. I guess what I am
trying to say here is that we seem to have gotten ourselves
into, up here, not you all, we in the Congress, have gotten in
this sort of false debate, in my view a false debate. And it
really comes down to--and I realize this is a philosophic--it
seems to get down to, the alternative to the hard slogging you
had to do sitting there, and you got it right. You got it done.
The alternative to that hard slogging is to go it alone. I
mean, I do not know how you do it. I do not know what the in-
between is. And given those options, it seems to me it is an
incredibly easy choice, that the very hard slogging has to take
place.
General Odom. Yes. There are some in-betweens. I said in my
statement that if NATO has no foreign enemy, if it does not
declare war on terrorism, we would still need it because it is
the only place we train for coalition warfare. You need it as a
training area.
The Chairman. I agree.
General Odom. And then if you have these capabilities, you
do not have to go with a NATO flag, but you could go as a
coalition willing to do other things. I do not mind a NATO flag
if NATO wants to go on the operation. But I think we can manage
NATO and exercise it in a way that it gives us, de facto, this
interoperability, as we had in the gulf war.
Let me add one point, having had more than a little
experience with dealing with the multinational intelligence in
NATO. It is better not handled in NATO. It is----
The Chairman. It is better what? I am sorry.
General Odom. It is better not handled in NATO.
Multinational intelligence is not intelligence. There are other
ways to do this, and if you try to get NATO agreement on them,
you run into the sovereignty issues. If you leave it to the
professionals, it is amazing how far you can get toward de
facto multinational cooperation without a problem. Those
problems I would want to surface. I suspect a lot of the law
enforcement cooperation is of the same order.
And until we have our own intelligence structures more in
line, particularly the FBI's with the other intelligence
community, we are not in any good position whatsoever to begin
to interface with a changed or even the contemporary situation
in Europe.
General Clark. I think all of those concerns are valid. The
question is, putting those concerns on the table and looking at
what the task is ahead, how can you succeed? You cannot succeed
in this campaign with bombs and bullets. You cannot. I mean,
you cannot use bombs and bullets in Germany and France and
Italy and Spain. That is where the terrorists are.
Now I was in Germany last weekend, and we finally got, 2
weekends ago, and we finally got traction with Germany. You
know how? Because the mosque that was blown up in Tunisia
killed, I think, 17 Germans, and they finally realized that the
terrorist threat was real, and they would actually make changes
in law. So maybe that is going to take some traction.
The Chairman. Yes.
General Clark. But we do not have our allies engaged on the
domestic side in the way we are engaged in this country. And
until they are, we are not going to resolve this problem. It is
a very clear social sciences problem. It is: How large and
complex a system can you create before the system fails? We are
trying to go to a global system in trade, in communications,
and in many, many other ways. And we are at the boundary; we
are at the horizon right now. Can we push it further? That is
the challenge.
The Chairman. Well, this is tough, hard work. I think you
meant to say a synagogue was blown up, not a mosque.
General Clark. I am sorry. Yes.
The Chairman. Yes.
General Clark. I said----
The Chairman. I think it was a synagogue, not a mosque.
General Clark. Right.
The Chairman. It is not, I mean, it is relevant either way,
because it got the Germans' attention. Germans were killed and
it got German attention.
Well, gentlemen, I think we all agree on one thing, that
the hard part is now beginning. That is not to suggest that the
sacrifices made by our military thus far and the risk we have
taken as a Nation has not been difficult, but compared to what
we have to do to coordinate this from here on out is really
going to get tough.
And because of the accumulated--and I am not being
facetious--the accumulated wisdom of men like you and women out
there who have thought a lot about this, we will get through
it. But it is going to be painful. It is going to be a painful
ride. And, you know, I do not see any simple solutions here,
but I do see solutions. And with you all, we will get through
it, and we will figure it out.
And with that, I thank you both for coming. I apologize for
keeping you so long, but you have a lot we can learn from you.
And we are adjourned.
General Clark. Thank you.
General Odom. Thank you.
[Whereupon, at 1:15 p.m., the committee adjourned, to
reconvene subject to the call of the Chair.]
----------
Responses to Additional Questions for the Record
Responses of Hon. Marc Grossman, Under Secretary of State for Political
Affairs, to Additional Questions Submitted for the Record by Senator
Gordon Smith
administration support of the freedom consolidation act
Question. I and many of my colleagues are co-sponsors of the
Freedom Consolidation Act. The bill, which passed the House
overwhelmingly last session, support the vision of NATO enlargement
articulated by President Bush in his Warsaw speech. Is the
administration supportive of this legislation and do you believe that
it would be useful in your deliberation with our allies?
Answer. Secretary Rumsfeld and Secretary Powell plan to jointly
send letters to Senators Daschle, Lott, Elden, Helms, Levin, and Warner
to express the Administration's strong support for the Freedom
Consolidation Act. A draft of the letter is attached.
The Honorable Joseph R. Biden, Jr., Chairman,
Committee on Foreign Relations,
United States Senate.
Dear Mr. Chairman:
The Administration strongly supports S. 1572, the Freedom
Consolidation Act. This bill, which reinforces the efforts of European
democracies preparing themselves for the responsibilities of NATO
membership, will enhance U.S. national security and advance vital
American interests in a strengthened and enlarged Alliance.
Speaking in Warsaw last June, President Bush said that ``Yalta did
not ratify a natural divide, it divided a living civilization.'' From
the day the Iron Curtain descended across Europe, our consistent
bipartisan commitment has been to overcome this division and build a
Europe whole, free, and at peace. The 1997 Alliance decision to admit
Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic brought us a step closer to
this vision.
Later this year at NATO's Summit in Prague, we will have an
opportunity to take a further historic step: to welcome those of
Europe's democracies, that are ready and able to contribute to Euro-
Atlantic security, into the strongest alliance the world has known. As
the President said in Warsaw, ``As we plan the Prague Summit, we should
not calculate how little we can get away with, but how much we can do
to advance the cause of freedom.''
We believe that this bill, which builds on previous Congressional
acts supportive of enlargement, would reinforce our nation's commitment
to the achievement of freedom, peace, and security in Europe. Passage
of the Freedom Consolidation Act would greatly enhance our ability to
work with aspirant countries as they prepare to join with NATO and work
with us to meet the 21st century's threats to our common security.
We hope we can count on your support for this bill, and look
forward to working closely with you in the months ahead as we prepare
to make historic decisions at Prague.
Sincerely,
Question. Secretary Grossman, you recently traveled to eight NATO
capitals including Brussels. What is the current atmosphere in Europe
regarding enlargement? Does Europe have a sense of what this round of
enlargement is all about?
Answer. All of our NATO Allies support further enlargement. A broad
consensus is forming behind President Bush's vision of the most robust
round possible, as long as aspirants are ready to assume the
responsibilities of membership. In our talks, Allies shared the U.S.
view that the events of September 11 highlight the importance of
building the broadest, strongest possible Alliance.
Allies have agreed that the question of which countries should be
invited to join NATO should not be addressed until later this fall.
They, like us, are continuing to assess aspirant countries' efforts to
meet reform goals through the Membership Action Plan.
Question. Many of the aspirant countries, if not all, have
contributed to KFOR, SFOR, and Operation Enduring Freedom in
Afghanistan, and the phrase that I hear being thrown around by these
countries is that we are already acting as a ``de facto'' ally. While
the United States is greatly appreciative for their assistance, what is
the administration doing to ensure that acting as a ``de facto'' ally
is not a guarantee for NATO membership?
Answer. While we welcome the support of the aspirants in the
international efforts to fight terrorism and stabilize the Balkans, we
have made clear that their efforts receive no guarantee of either an
invitation, nor of any protection that is due to Allies under Article V
of the Washington Treaty.
Question. Have the aspirant countries done enough with regard to
property restitution?
Answer. Both the U.S. Government and prominent NGOs maintain an
active dialogue with all the aspirant countries and with the Jewish
communities in each of them on restitution issues. In the context of
that dialogue, aspirant countries are not only conducting the necessary
historical research, but are also undertaking the framing of laws and
responsive measures. For example, Romania has twice extended the filing
deadline for restitution claims, and other aspirant countries are
continuing to evaluate their restitution programs.
We have strongly supported these actions and underlined their
importance in the context of NATO's commitments to democracy, the rule
of law, tolerance, and pluralism. As in countries that are already NATO
and EU member states, resolving the issues of restitution is a complex
undertaking. We have consistently encouraged and built upon the
aspirant countries' political will to resolve outstanding issues
rapidly.
european defense capabilities
Question. Addressing the growing capabilities gap between the
United States and its NATO allies has been placed on the agenda of the
Prague Summit. In your view, what are the costs of this capabilities
gap continuing to grow and how can we persuade our European allies that
it is in their interest to put more resources toward their defense?
Answer. Current and projected levels of Allied defense spending are
a source of significant concern. Allies need to invest more in defense
if they intend to field a 21st century force. It is estimated that
overall European Allied defense spending will fall roughly 1 percent
from 2001 to 2002. The downward budget trend is unlikely to reverse
soon because Allies are dealing with sluggish economies and continued
domestic pressure to increase spending on priorities other than
defense. Moreover, Europe's fragmented defense industries and
investments in outdated force structures are two major contributors to
their capabilities shortfalls.
To address the capabilities gap, we are encouraging our Allies to
concentrate in the immediate future warfighting requirements in four
areas:
Defense against weapons of mass destruction.
Strategic lift and logistical support.
Communications and information connectivity.
Precision guided munitions, unmanned aerial vehicles, and
other combat systems.
Over the next several months, we intend to work closely with our
Allies in developing a new capabilities initiative for the Prague
Summit that will produce tangible, significant improvements in these
four areas. These needed improvements will provide key military
capabilities to the entire range of NATO missions, ensuring strong and
relevant contributions to the war on terrorism by NATO.
Question. Slovakia has national elections scheduled in October
shortly before the Prague Summit. The party of former Prime Minister
Meciar is polling very well. I believe it is the view of Slovakia's
neighbors, NATO allies, and the EU that when Mr. Meciar was in power,
the actions of his government fell well below what we would call
upholding Western values. In fact, when he was Prime Minister, the
other Visegrad countries would not even meet together with him. How
will the administration view the inclusion of Slovakia into NATO should
Mr. Meciar's HZDS be part of the governing coalition?
Answer. NATO is not simply a military alliance but is a community
of countries with shared values. NATO is open to countries that can
show an enduring commitment to democracy, free markets, and the rule of
law, and add to the security of NATO. In making invitation decisions,
the United States and our Allies will take into careful consideration
the extent to which a country shares NATO's commitment to these core
values.
Prior to the election of the Dzurinda government in 1998, the
former Slovak government did not demonstrate a record of commitment to
democracy and rule by law. There is no evidence that Meciar or the
party leadership have changed. There is also no reason to believe that
Meciar or his party, should they return to power, would share the core
values and principles of the other Member States of the NATO Alliance.
Almost every European official who has visited me has indicated that
the return of Meciar or his party to government raises serious concerns
about Slovakia's NATO candidacy.
The current Slovak government has passed a significant number of
laws since 1998, as well as amending the constitution, in order to
guarantee that Slovakia will be a democratic country that is ruled by
law.
We believe that a cornerstone of democracy is informed voter
participation. We encourage all Slovak voters to understand the issues
and vote for whomever they believe can best lead the Slovak Republic in
the future.
______
Responses of Hon. Douglas J. Feith, Under Secretary of Defense for
Policy, to Additional Questions for the Record Submitted by Senator
Gordon Smith
administration support of the freedom consolidation act
Question. I and many of my colleagues are co-sponsors of the
Freedom Consolidation Act. The bill, which passed the House
overwhelmingly last session, support the vision of NATO enlargement
articulated by President Bush in his Warsaw speech. Is the
administration supportive of this legislation and do you believe that
it would be useful in your deliberation with our allies?
Answer. On May 7, Secretary Rumsfeld and Secretary Powell jointly
sent letters to Senators Daschle, Lott, Biden, Helms, Levin, and Warner
to express the administration's strong support for the Freedom
Consolidation Act. The text of the letter jointly sent by Secretary
Powell and Secretary Rumsfeld to Senators Daschle, Loft, Biden, Helms,
Levin, and Warner is attached.
May 7, 2002.
The Honorable
United States Senate.
Dear Senator:
The administration strongly supports S. 1572, the Freedom
Consolidation Act. This bill, which reinforces the efforts of European
democracies preparing themselves for the responsibilities of NATO
membership, will enhance U.S. national security and advance vital
American interests in a strengthened and enlarged Alliance.
Speaking in Warsaw last June, President Bush said that ``Yalta did
not ratify a natural divide, it divided a living civilization.'' From
the day the Iron Curtain descended across Europe, our consistent
bipartisan commitment has been to overcome this division and build a
Europe whole, free, and at peace. The 1997 Alliance decision to admit
Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic brought us a step closer to
this vision.
Later this year at NATO's summit in Prague, we will have an
opportunity to take a further historic step: to welcome those of
Europe's democracies, that are ready and able to contribute to Euro-
Atlantic security, into the strongest Alliance the world has known. As
the President said in Warsaw, ``As we plan the Prague summit, we should
not calculate how little we can get away with, but how much we can do
to advance the cause of freedom.''
We believe that this bill, which builds on previous congressional
acts supportive of enlargement, would reinforce our nation's commitment
to the achievement of freedom, peace, and security in Europe. Passage
of the Freedom Consolidation Act would greatly enhance our ability to
work with aspirant countries, as they prepare to join with NATO and
work with us to meet the 21st century's threats to our common security.
We hope we can count on your support for this bill, and look
forward to working closely with you in the months ahead as we prepare
to make historic decisions at Prague.
Sincerely,
Donald H. Rumsfeld,
Secretary of Defense.
Colin L. Powell,
Secretary of State.
european defense capabilities
Question. Addressing the growing capabilities gap between the U.S.
and its NATO allies has been placed on the agenda of the Prague summit.
In your view, what are the costs of this capabilities gap continuing to
grow and how can we persuade our European allies that it is in their
interest to put more resources toward their defense?
Answer. Current and projected levels of allied defense spending are
a source of significant concern. Allies need to invest more in defense
if they intend to field a 21st century force. It is estimated that
overall European allied defense spending will fall roughly 1 percent
from 2001 to 2002. The downward budget trend is unlikely to reverse
soon because allies are dealing with sluggish economies and continued
domestic pressure to increase spending on priorities other than
defense. Moreover, Europe's fragmented defense industries and
investments in outdated force structures are two major contributors to
their capabilities shortfalls.
To address the capabilities gap, we are encouraging our allies to
concentrate in the immediate future warfighting requirements in four
areas:
Defense against weapons of mass destruction.
Strategic lift and logistical support.
Communications and information connectivity.
Precision guided munitions, unmanned aerial vehicles, and
other combat systems.
Over the next several months, we intend to work closely with our
allies in developing a new capabilities initiative for the Prague
summit that will produce tangible, significant improvements in these
four areas. These needed improvements will provide key military
capabilities to the entire range of NATO missions, ensuring strong and
relevant contributions to the war on terrorism by NATO.
-