[House Hearing, 106 Congress] [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office] EUROPEAN COMMON FOREIGN, SECURITY AND DEFENSE POLICIES--IMPLICATIONS FOR THE UNITED STATES AND THE ATLANTIC ALLIANCE ======================================================================= HEARING BEFORE THE COMMITTEE ON INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES ONE HUNDRED SIXTH CONGRESS FIRST SESSION __________ NOVEMBER 10, 1999 __________ Serial No. 106-106 __________ Printed for the use of the Committee on International Relations Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.house.gov/international relations ______ U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE 64-589 CC WASHINGTON : 2000 COMMITTEE ON INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS BENJAMIN A. GILMAN, New York, Chairman WILLIAM F. GOODLING, Pennsylvania SAM GEJDENSON, Connecticut JAMES A. LEACH, Iowa TOM LANTOS, California HENRY J. HYDE, Illinois HOWARD L. BERMAN, California DOUG BEREUTER, Nebraska GARY L. ACKERMAN, New York CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, New Jersey ENI F.H. FALEOMAVAEGA, American DAN BURTON, Indiana Samoa ELTON GALLEGLY, California MATTHEW G. MARTINEZ, California ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida DONALD M. PAYNE, New Jersey CASS BALLENGER, North Carolina ROBERT MENENDEZ, New Jersey DANA ROHRABACHER, California SHERROD BROWN, Ohio DONALD A. MANZULLO, Illinois CYNTHIA A. McKINNEY, Georgia EDWARD R. ROYCE, California ALCEE L. HASTINGS, Florida PETER T. KING, New York PAT DANNER, Missouri STEVE CHABOT, Ohio EARL F. HILLIARD, Alabama MARSHALL ``MARK'' SANFORD, South BRAD SHERMAN, California Carolina ROBERT WEXLER, Florida MATT SALMON, Arizona STEVEN R. ROTHMAN, New Jersey AMO HOUGHTON, New York JIM DAVIS, Florida TOM CAMPBELL, California EARL POMEROY, North Dakota JOHN M. McHUGH, New York WILLIAM D. DELAHUNT, Massachusetts KEVIN BRADY, Texas GREGORY W. MEEKS, New York RICHARD BURR, North Carolina BARBARA LEE, California PAUL E. GILLMOR, Ohio JOSEPH CROWLEY, New York GEORGE RADANOVICH, California JOSEPH M. HOEFFEL, Pennsylvania JOHN COOKSEY, Louisiana THOMAS G. TANCREDO, Colorado Richard J. Garon, Chief of Staff Kathleen Bertelsen Moazed, Democratic Chief of Staff Hillel Weinberg, Senior Professional Staff Member and Counsel Marilyn C. Owen, Staff Associate C O N T E N T S ---------- WITNESSES Page Elmar Brok, M.E.P., Chairman, Committee on Foreign Affairs, Human Rights, Common Security and Defense Policy, The European Parliament..................................................... 4 Iain Duncan Smith, M.P. Shadow Secretary of State for Defence, House of Commons, London, England.............................. 9 John Bolton, Senior Vice President, American Enterprise Institute 28 Ambassador Robert E. Hunter, Rand Corporation.................... 30 Peter Rodman, Director of National Security Programs, The Nixon Center......................................................... 33 Dr. Simon Serfaty, Professor of U.S. Foreign Policy, Old Dominion University..................................................... 36 APPENDIX The Honorable Benjamin A. Gilman a Representative in Congress from New York and Chairman, Committee on International Relations...................................................... 50 Elmar Brok, M.E.P., European Parliament.......................... 52 Iain Duncan Smith, M.P., United Kingdom.......................... 57 John Bolton, American Enterprise Institute....................... 65 Ambassador Robert E. Hunter, RAND Corporation.................... 79 Peter Rodman, The Nixon Center................................... 88 Dr. Simon Serfaty, Old Dominion University....................... 94 EUROPEAN COMMON FOREIGN, SECURITY AND DEFENSE POLICIES--IMPLICATIONS FOR THE UNITED STATES AND THE ATLANTIC ALLIANCE ---------- Wednesday, November 10, 1999 House of Representatives, Committee on International Relations, Washington, D.C. The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10 a.m., in room 2172, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Benjamin A. Gilman (Chairman of the Committee) presiding. Chairman Gilman. The Committee will come to order. The Committee on International Relations meets today to receive testimony on European Common Foreign, Security, and Defense Policies--Implications for the United States and the Atlantic Alliance. We are privileged to have before us two distinguished foreign visitors--Chairman Brok of the Committee on Foreign Affairs of the European Parliament, and Mr. Iain Duncan Smith, Shadow Secretary for Defense in the British House of Commons. We welcome you both and also the next panel of distinguished experts on our topic today. The United States has, since the end of the Second World War, supported in various ways what is sometimes called the European Project, the gradual unification of Europe. Postwar statesmen, confronted with a continent largely in ruins, decided that an ever-closer union was the solution to decades of on-and-off war. If Europeans could unite into one entity of some sort, they would be less likely to make war on one another. That project is now being carried out through the European Union. The United States also set its own stamp on European security and defense policy by leading the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Fifty years old, NATO has proven to be the most successful defensive alliance in history. NATO, having expanded several times, most recently to the east, is now being challenged. Some Americans and Europeans call the United States to end its role in Europe because they think that it is time for Europeans to go it alone. Others profess to support a continued role for the United States, but press for changes to European security structures that would leave us without influence commensurate with our contribution, or would undermine other members of the NATO alliance not part of the European Union. I have felt that American support for European unification was appropriate. Presidents of both parties have a long history of supporting unification. If unification is what our democratic, European friends want, we ought to support it, but we should not be blind to the problems it may cause for our Nation. The problems of European unity, as well as the advantages, are noticeable today in the area of our economic relations. That, however, is not the topic of this hearing. But I believe that some of our present trade problems with Europe may be avoided with the advent of greater European political and foreign policy unity. The powers of the EU in Brussels have not been responsible for considering the security implications of decisions on trade and development. These have been solely the concerns of the national governments. If a security consciousness can permeate the EU, it might take a different view of Iran, for example. On the other hand, we need to be concerned as tested security and political structures change. We can't force Europeans to organize themselves in a manner most convenient for us, but we can let them know about our concerns. NATO may have come under some unexpected criticism in this country of late, but perhaps the only thing that is more likely than European agriculture policy to upset Americans is the idea that the EU wants to displace NATO as the main security structure in the Euro-Atlantic area. European political, foreign policy and security unification clearly poses a host of challenges for the United States. We may have a Mr. Europe to call, but will he be able to talk back without checking in with 15 captains? Will European foreign policy be the least common denominator? Will Europeans get together mainly about the fact that they may resent American initiatives? Will Europe really develop a military force that will operate independently of NATO and the United States? Will Europe divert resources and forces away from NATO to create independent capabilities? If so, who will cover the slack created in those NATO functions, especially with European defense spending on the downturn? Will the EU discriminate against the non-EU European NATO allies? These are among the questions I hope we can address during today's session. At this time, I would like to turn to the Ranking Minority Member, Mr. Gejdenson, for any opening statement he might have. Mr. Gejdenson. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I commend you for holding these hearings, and I think it is terribly important for us to develop an understanding with our European allies about security. I feel that it is time for Europeans to take a greater role. The Europeans will hear conflicting responses from Americans. We ask them to take more of the burden and then, as soon as they do, we will be concerned about their going off on their own course. I think as democratic nations with similar goals, it is important for us to be more equal partners, and I think it does make sense for Europe to join together to be able to carry out its responsibilities. The lesson of the battle in Kosovo is that the Europeans have to figure out a way to have the various assets necessary for robust engagement, technologies in air and ground and missile systems. Looking to the United States, you cannot blame our European friends for being confused. We saw the Senate rejecting the test ban treaty, and a hundred Members of the Republican Party, including the vast majority of the Republican leadership, voting against Mr. Bereuter's resolution, simply commending our involvement in NATO. We would have to excuse our European friends if they are somewhat confused by the actions here in Washington. So I am thrilled that you are holding this meeting, Mr. Chairman. It is an important discussion that we should undertake. Chairman Gilman. Thank you, Mr. Gejdenson. Are there any other Members seeking recognition? Mr. Chabot? Mr. Chabot. No. Mr. Sherman. Mr. Chairman. Chairman Gilman. Mr. Sherman. Mr. Sherman. I would like to amplify what the gentleman from Connecticut said about burden-sharing. I think it is perhaps the biggest rip-off in history that the United States has been forced to bear the burden of defending democracy and freedom around the world while a block of countries richer than ourselves does so little, that they do less than half of the combat on their own continent, and do zero to protect South Korea and zero to protect Taiwan. I want to comment on the French and the European reaction to our proposals for missile defense. I don't know whether missile defense is cost-effective. That is a U.S. decision. But for the French to tell us that we need shared risk is to add a level of chutzpah to international affairs. Because what is the risk that the missile defense system is supposed to deal with? It is basically nuclear weapons on ballistic missiles from rogue states. Which country in the world--which democracy in the world--has done the most to make sure that rogue states may get nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles? Well, France. So France says we should have a shared risk, a risk they helped create. Not only that, they insulate themselves from that risk by the policy of accentuating it. That is to say, I don't think that Iranian missiles are going to get Paris if Paris dollars are flowing to create those missiles. So they buy off the Iranians by giving them the tools necessary to destroy Americans, and then say that we should live under shared risk. Obviously, there are nondemocratic countries, particularly Russia, which has a much worse record than France on providing technology to Iran and others; but among the democracies, the French have been the most critical of us protecting ourselves from the risk that they have done so much to create. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Chairman Gilman. Thank you, Mr. Sherman. Is there any other Member seeking recognition? If not, our first panel consists of Mr. Elmar Brok and Mr. Iain Duncan Smith. These distinguished leaders were chosen as representing quite different schools of thought on European foreign policy and security unification. Mr. Brok is Chairman of the Committee on Foreign Affairs, Human Rights and Common Defense and Security Policy of the European Parliament. He is a senior Member of the center-right Christian Democratic party in Germany, and a leader of the Group of the European People's Party-European Democrats in the EP. He is also a long-time participant in the U.S.-European Parliament Exchange, which is how we got to know one another many years ago. He is a long-time observer of north Atlantic security affairs. He visits with us in Washington quite often. We welcome you, Mr. Chairman. This hearing is also a historic step in cooperation between the Congress and the European Parliament. We look forward to our forthcoming joint meeting in Brussels in January. Mr. Iain Duncan Smith is Shadow Secretary of State for Defence in the British Parliament. That makes him the main spokesman for the conservative opposition party on defense issues. He is a graduate of Sandhurst and served with the British Army in Northern Ireland and Zimbabwe. He is known for his special interest in Euro-Atlantic cooperation on a ballistic missile defense capacity and would not, I believe, be offended if I were to describe him as a committed Euro-skeptic. Gentlemen, your remarks will be entered in the record and you may summarize them as you see fit. Chairman Gilman. Chairman Brok, would you begin with your testimony? STATEMENT OF ELMAR BROK, M.E.P., CHAIRMAN, COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS, HUMAN RIGHTS, COMMON SECURITY AND DEFENSE POLICY, THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT Mr. Brok. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Ladies and gentlemen, it is a great honor to address the Congress of the United States and, in particular, the distinguished Members of the International Relations Committee of the House of Representatives on the issue of the European defense and security identity after the EU Summit in Cologne and the Transatlantic Link. Everyone knows the enormous contribution made in the past by the U.S. to peace, democracy and freedom in Europe, especially in Germany. This is something which shall never be forgotten. Exactly ten years ago, I was dancing on the Berlin Wall before the Brandenburg Gate, and I knew from then on that this opening of the Berlin Wall was only possible because of the U.S. Congress and the United States Administration, and we will never forget this in Germany. I want to say this especially, now that we have the tenth anniversary of the fall of The Wall in Berlin. I was in a meeting with Mikhail Gorbachev, George Bush, and Helmut Kohl on Monday; and Helmut Kohl explained the same position, that without American policy over the decades, the reunification of Germany and Europe would never have happened. I would like to thank you for this today. Who could have thought, in the aftermath of World War II, that a Union would emerge out of the ruins of Europe, and that this Union would encompass 15 democratic nations with different traditions but united by common values? Who could have thought that this European Union would be about to welcome 12 new members in the near future, ten of them formerly incorporated in the Soviet Empire? Who could have thought that the mere existence of a European Union would change the whole pattern of interstate relations on the European continent? The European Union is a state under construction. The founding fathers--Adenauer, De Gasperi, and Schuman--decided in 1950 to create a single market for coal and steel products. They had in mind the political unity of Europe, not just the free movement and the control of two items which were vital for producing guns and tanks at that time. The first European Community, for coal and steel, was followed shortly after by the attempt to create, with the support of the United States, a European Community for defense. Unfortunately the corresponding treaty was defeated in 1954 before the French National Assembly. In 1957, the European Economic Community was created, and in 1987, a European single market was established. But the political dimension of the European construction was never forgotten. Every achievement was seen as one more step to the final goal: a politically united European Union, which makes war between its members impossible. The European Union, a name first used in the Treaty of Maastricht in 1992, is the implementation of this political project. Launched by Chancellor Kohl and President Mitterrand, this treaty put on track the European Monetary Union, the Common Foreign and Security Policy, and a policy for justice and home affairs. The EU has statelike features. It has an elected parliament, a court of justice and an executive sui generis. The Union has the power to make laws--called regulations and directives--applicable in our member states, just like Federal laws. Most of them are co-decided by the Council, acting by qualified majority, and the European Parliament. This is a two- chamber model, like in the United States. The Treaty of Amsterdam, which entered into force earlier this year, is a continuation of the political project set in motion in the 1950's. It reinforces the Treaty of Maastricht in many aspects, such as the codecision procedure, but its main features can be seen in CFSP. The post of High Representative for CFSP as part of a new troika has been created. The integration of the Western European Union into the European Union is foreseen in order to give the EU an access to a military capacity; the so-called Petersberg tasks, which were defined in 1992 by the WEU Council of Ministers, have been included in the European Union. A new EU instrument has also been created, a common strategy which makes the use of majority voting in CFSP possible. The success of the European Union can best be measured by the reality of the European single currency, the Euro. The European Union is also the trading power in the world with the most widely-opened market. Finally, the European Union plays an active role in world affairs. The foreign aid of the European Union and its member states in 1997 amounted to $33 billion; that given by the United States amounted to less than $7 billion. This is also part of burden-sharing. The success of the EU is not only the success of the Europeans. It is also your success, the success of the United States and of NATO. Isn't it a good sign for our future relationship that our new High Representative for CFSP, Mr. Javier Solana, was very recently Secretary General of NATO? NATO is an organization which has been preserving peace, democracy, freedom, and stability in Europe for 50 years and which will continue to do so in the foreseeable future. NATO is a free association of countries on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean, which links Europe, the United States and Canada. Conceived in a geopolitical environment, characterized by the division between two antagonistic blocks, NATO--unlike the Warsaw Pact and the Soviet Union itself--survived the collapse of the Berlin Wall and the Iron Curtain. One can say that NATO won the Cold War in a peaceful way. In fact, since 1989, NATO has shown a remarkable capacity to adapt to the new geopolitical context prevailing in Europe, wherein cooperation has replaced rivalry. But Europe itself is just on the way to doing so. Since 1990, the classical, regional, conventional wars are possible again, implicating the danger that the old rule of violence will come back to Europe. We cannot expect that the U.S. will continue to do the job of preventing or stopping war on the regional level in Europe for us. The way NATO took military action in and around Kosovo to protect a whole population from ethnic cleansing was one of its greatest achievements. At the same time, this war, fought on behalf of common democratic values, acted as a catalyst for Europe's consciousness because it became clear to the Europeans that no diplomatic action could ever be successful if it could not be sustained, if necessary, by military action. The Kosovo War will be considered in the future as a milestone in the history of the EU, because it was the key factor, which led to the declaration adopted on 4 June 1999 in Cologne by the EU's 15 heads of state and government. The aim of this declaration was to provide the EU with the capacity for autonomous action backed up by credible military forces in order to implement the Petersberg tasks. This is to be done by incorporating the WEU into the European Union. Collective defense, however, will remain within NATO. The Cologne Declaration is in line with the decisions taken in 1996 in Berlin by the North Atlantic Council to develop a European security and defense identity within the Alliance. I quote ``taking full advantage of the approved CJTF concept, this identity will be grounded on sound military principles and supported by appropriate military planning and permit the creation of militarily coherent and effective forces capable of operating under the program control and strategic direction of the WEU.'' This is exactly what we are aiming at in bringing the WEU into the EU. What the ESDI will involve in the way of action and planning for action has been defined to some extent in Berlin and Washington. There can be European action within NATO which does not involve all NATO members with, for example, the use of combined joint task forces, and the Europeans may have a chain of command running down from the European Deputy Supreme Allied Commander--Europe. The other aspect of the ESDI is that of participation. Which countries will be involved? There are 17 European countries in NATO--11 of them EU member states and six currently outside the EU, although four have applied for membership. The WEU actually covers some 28 European countries, ten of them being full members and 18 being associated in one way or another. Recently in Bosnia or Kosovo, for example, other countries which may be considered European, like Russia and the Ukraine, have worked with NATO/WEU Members. So where is the ESDI? Is it to be built around the EU, even with its neutral member states, sometimes called ``non- Allies,'' or around the European nations within NATO or around the WEU; or is it a broader concept which could include Russia, Ukraine, Georgia, Armenia and beyond? In my opinion, the European Union should be the focus of ESDI for the following reasons. Within the Amsterdam Treaty, we created mechanisms which will make the CFSP more effective, such as the principle of ``constructive abstention''. This enables member states--and those most concerned are likely to be our ``non-Allies,'' for example, the four countries not members of NATO--to abstain on a decision by the EU to take military action without preventing such a decision being taken at all. The abstainers would not be expected to participate in such military action, although all member states would be able to participate if so desired. Second, we also have established Mr. CFSP, the public face of our common foreign and security policy, together with the foreign relations commissioner, who will make our foreign policy more visible and coherent. He will be supported by a policy planning and early warning unit, a political and military committee, and by the relevant instruments of WEU, such as a military committee, a headquarters, a situation center, a satellite center and an institution for security studies, once the WEU has been incorporated into the EU, which may happen by the end of 2000. The European Union will consequently be able to decide and act more quickly. Third, if the European Union decides on military intervention in order to deal with a crisis, the door must remain open for non-EU members to take part, as is the case in the WEU. If the military action is conducted autonomously, the European Union must be able to invite other countries to take part in it by preserving its autonomy of decision under the CFSP. If the action is conducted by making use of CJTF, the NATO/WEU arrangements will prevail, which means that after the WEU's incorporation into the EU, the EU and the NATO will have to find the best format for their new Cupertino. I am pleased to see that NATO has been adapted in such a way that it enables the Europeans to conduct military operations with the means and capacities of the Alliance, by making use of a European chain of command. Fourth, finally, we cannot ignore the fact that while NATO's remit is limited to military matters, the EU cannot only be involved in, indeed undertake, military action, but also plan and finance postwar rehabilitation. The EU can provide humanitarian aid and economic assistance to reconstruct a war- torn region, and it can decide on political measures such as the stability pact for Southeast Europe in order to bring an entire region closer to Europe and the Euro-Atlantic structures. Fifth, the EU with its common legal order, common market, common currency, common environment and social policy has created a common interest which is the base for a credible security and defense policy. The authority for our common trade policy is entirely in the hands of the Union--a fact that is important for the questions discussed here, too. Consequently, if we do not want to make a Freudian concept out of ESDI, the search for identity, we should be pragmatic and consider that the EU will be the basket in which ESDI will take shape. In fact, the EU can take over the responsibility for European-led operations, the sword being provided by the EU member states and their non-EU partners, a coalition of the willing, and/or by NATO. We know that some people in the U.S., without necessarily opposing the construction of a common security and defense policy for the European Union, fear that this would weaken the Transatlantic Link. For three reasons, I think that this fear is not justified. First, decoupling Europe from the U.S. would not be sensible at all because a strategic link which exists at present between both sides of the Atlantic Ocean is vital for peace and stability in the world. Second, discriminating between the European NATO allies on the basis, for instance, of whether they are EU members or not is not what we have in mind. We should offer everyone the possibility of joining the EU in a military operation if we think that it might be valuable. Third, the issue of duplication is a bit more complex. We should avoid unnecessary duplication, but extra capacity is needed. During the Kosovo war, the means and capacities of the Atlantic Alliance were used in some fields to their maximum. If the Europeans had been able to put more combat aircraft, more air refueling tankers, more electronic jamming equipment, more airlift capacity and so on into the battle, it would have been better for the Atlantic Alliance as a whole. I do not think that American public opinion would understand if the Europeans, in carrying out Petersberg tasks, have each time to ask the U.S. for help. This could lead to isolationism in the United States. Consequently, Europe must meet the need for burden-sharing by being prepared to spend more on its own security and defense policy, in line with the defense capabilities initiative approved in Washington. A strong Europe is in the interest of the United States because it would be a viable strategic partner sharing the same values and many interests. In conclusion, the European Union and the U.S. must work together to secure peace, security and prosperity in the world. A strong European Union, with its economic strength, its own currency and a credible foreign policy backed up by genuine military capacities will be the partner that the United States needs and has always asked for. Our collective responsibilities are immense: We must help Russia to find a new equilibrium after the collapse of its empire; we must help the peace process in the Middle East; we must help Africa to overcome its tribal wars and tackle its problems of underdevelopment; finally, we must make every endeavor to divert Asia from getting into a new arms race, above all when nuclear weapons are at stake. Finally, I am convinced that other countries are willing to join us in order to make the world better. Many of the issues we are faced with nowadays are not of a military nature. They are linked with economic development, illegal trafficking of all kinds, drugs, threats to the environment, ethnic hatred, et cetera. On these issues, it is possible to work together-- Europe, America, Russia, China, Japan, Africa. In order to achieve this, let us start by consolidating our Transatlantic Link on the basis of an equal partnership. A final appeal to you: Trust this Europe which is building itself and giving itself a security and defense dimension. I am convinced that President Truman, General Marshall and Dean Acheson, who helped us 50 years ago, would be proud of what they could see nowadays if they were still alive. Thank you very much. Chairman Gilman. Thank you, Elmar Brok. [The prepared statement of Mr. Brok appears in the appendix.] Mr. Duncan Smith, please proceed. STATEMENT OF IAIN DUNCAN SMITH, M.P. SHADOW SECRETARY OF STATE FOR DEFENCE, HOUSE OF COMMONS, LONDON, ENGLAND Mr. Duncan Smith. Mr. Chairman, first let me start by saying what a pleasure it is to come and address this Committee. Perhaps I can get my House to return the compliment to you or anybody else on this same subject. I am going to try to keep my comments reasonably short, because I know that you have copies of my written evidence. Chairman Gilman. Your full statement will be made part of the record. Mr. Duncan Smith. I will keep it quite narrow. Perhaps I can say from the outset that I want to ask the simple question: is the ESDI leading to a better defense for the Nations of Europe and for the United States, or is it now heading in the direction which is more likely to render the NATO alliance less powerful and less positive? First of all, by summarizing what the threat was, I have to say that I was one of those who for a long time after the fall of the Berlin Wall took the view that the nations of NATO, including the U.S.A., had misread the situation globally and had cut too far and too fast into their defense forces before recognizing exactly what the problems were likely to be over the next 10 or 15 years. One of the key areas is the knowledge that without the two- superpower rivalry, we were likely to see regional conflicts over ethnic wars blowing up much more often than before because the restraining pressure placed by those two superpowers on their allies was now going to be missing. We have seen much of that take place; and as we have already seen, both the U.S.A. and my country and others in Europe to a greater and lesser extent have been sucked into those conflicts. We only have to look at the commitment levels of the armed forces in the United Kingdom to recognize that we are pretty much deployed all over the world involved in peacekeeping operations. I can rightly say up to about a month ago we were nearly 50 percent committed to peacekeeping operations, which is a pretty significant figure. What kind of a threat does that pose to what was the traditional defense posture of NATO, not just because there is a regional threat to Western interests and to trade interests, but then how does that become global? I guess really the main point to be made here was made earlier on by Congressman Sherman, who talked about ballistic missile threats. I have believed for a long time that the proliferation of ballistic missiles is the horse that got out of the stable, and there is no way that we are going to shut that door and keep it in. It's gone. We have to accept that the world that we see over the next ten years is more unstable and one which will progressively find some of these unstable nations armed with weapons of mass destruction with the capability to project them at either the U.S.A. or my country or the countries of Western Europe. That is what makes this issue of NATO all the more important now after a period when too many cynical people had assumed that threats to their homeland were gone. I am glad to see that the U.S.A. has recognized this and started on a ballistic missile defense program. I am fully in support of that, and I wish that the nations of Europe would wake up to that immediately and try to involve themselves with the U.S.A. in that same program. However, this is not happening, and that has got to be a clear concern for the U.S.A. because what the U.S.A. is doing at the moment has a knock-on effect for Europe. I am also interested to note that President Chirac's comments created a storm over here. I noticed that Mr. Rubin-- perhaps I should say on the edge of diplomatic language retaliated in criticism of France, and some might say that he is justified in doing it. But, importantly we are beginning to see the tensions emerging between the nations of Western Europe and the United States, and I believe that much of the reason for that lies at the door of the ESDI process as we see it emerging. There was a major change in direction a year ago. Yes, we have heard about the Petersberg agreements and what we are meant to be doing in terms of more low-level unification in terms of defense in Europe. What I believe happened a year ago was that there was a major change. A year ago my government decided that they would agree with France, hence the St. Malo agreement to accelerate that process and to drive it forward to a much bigger scheme which would involve a much greater range of military capacity in Europe. At that stage, it was said within NATO, but as we have seen from there, through Cologne, I believe actually that it is progressively being moved, by those who would like to see it moved out of NATO, separate from NATO. You will see that is becoming quite clear. Some of the phraseology, both in the St. Malo and the Cologne agreements, speaks louder than any words I can use here. In St. Malo it was made clear that, ``the European Union will also need to have recourse to suitable military means, European capabilities predesignated within NATO's European pillar or national or multinational means outside of the NATO framework''. If you have a look at what was reported by the individual nations and their own press, you begin to see how this was interpreted. In France, it was interpreted for the first time as ``an autonomous capability for action backed by credible military forces'' to take place within the E.U. common foreign and security policy. Around Europe, that became much the same case. It was greeted as a change of heart for Britain. For the first time, Britain apparently was no longer going to block any separate defense capability. It was talked of in Spain as ``the new openness'', and I gather that the German foreign minister, Joschka Fischer, called the St. Malo initiative ``useful from the viewpoint of European policy.'' My point that I am making here is that about 12 or so months ago a shift took place, and critical to that shift was the U.K. At that time, we were told that the U.S.A. didn't have a problem with that because, of course, at the Washington agreement, the Washington meeting, it was made quite clear that the European defense initiative would somehow find favor. Yes, I read the pages relevant to that--page 65 and on the back of 65--and it is quite interesting to note that throughout the bit dealing with the ESDI, what you find is that the organization in Europe which is referred to is the WEU. It is the WEU. Only one reference is made outside of the main points to the EU, and that was in a final paragraph at the end. My point is that since this was agreed, what has happened across the EU is that now, as you heard from Mr. Brok, the WEU is to be wound progressively into the EU. That was never made absolutely clear at the time of the Washington Summit, and I think that tells us exactly where this is going. It is the EU, which is the political body; and if you talk about winding what had previously been a defense identity within NATO into the political body of Europe, what you begin to see is a political military structure that is progressively going to drive itself outside of NATO. We hear, endlessly, justification for this process is that we will do more, it will be done better. Then, as you see from my testimony--I put a series of tables together for expenditure and the quality of expenditure across the nations of Europe; what you see there is quite the contrary. What you see in countries--in Germany and Italy, Spain included--you see a dramatic falling off in defense expenditure. But even that level of defense expenditure hides a truly important factor which is the quality of defense spending. In far too many of the countries in Europe, these are very much dominated by what I would call conscription-based armies, which means you spend a lot of the proportion of your money on troops and very little, by comparison, on equipment. Not much of that is likely to change. Even the German foreign minister made that quite clear about a week ago when he accepted that while they will try to reduce some of that spending on conscription, it will never go away completely. It is seen as a process of social engineering, which is a fair political point, but it leads us to the conclusion that the quality of that spending is not likely, necessarily, to rise to any great degree. Isn't that really the nub of the point? From the U.S.A.'s point of view, you say quite rightly you want the nations of Europe after Kosovo to be able to do more and do it better. My answer to you, very simply, to that question, is how do you do it? You have to either spend more and spend it better; no amount of new structures in Europe that we designate in the ESDI are going to change that if, at the end of the day, the capacity of your armed forces is not up to the job of deploying, and deploying in such a way as to resolve the problem of the conflict. Kosovo highlighted that; and the one point about Kosovo that showed that, ironically, the U.K.'s position at the moment is much closer to the U.S.'s than any other nation in Europe, both in quality terms, you will see from my figures--both in R&D and equipment--that the U.K. spends very similar amounts and proportions to the U.S.A., whereas most of the nations of Europe do not. That is the key point. I see this process of the ESDI as a political maneuver that is being hijacked to take away from the real question which has to be answered: how will the nations of Europe ante up to their major responsibilities in defending both Western Europe, with the United States and Western interests which I define inside my submission; and then I come back to ballistic missile defense. I actually believe that there is now a very serious threat emerging from rogue nations. Across Europe, no real discussion is taking place; hardly a word is said about this. You can't provoke any discussion. It is for two reasons: A, they don't want to spend the money; and B, it reminds them very seriously of how important the link with the U.S.A. is because most of the development has been taking place over here. Personally, I wish that would change, and I would like to see all of the nations of Europe recognize the importance of defending themselves against this potential threat. So what I am really proposing is that now, as ever, or more than ever before, it is time for NATO to think of itself again as one unit. In other words, the countries that make up NATO, the nations that make up NATO do have minimum obligations, and that is in terms of defense expenditure and the quality of that expenditure and there is no way around that. That is the key point to be putting across and that is never answered when we get to that question. Ballistic missile defense needs to be taken on as a NATO Program, and it is time the nations of Europe woke up to that, and I think the ESDI allows them to slide away from that responsibility far too easily. I would say that the key to this is the U.K. It is the key because, as I said, of its defense spending and quality of spending and the fact that almost alone in Europe it has the ability to project troops and equipment to places around the globe. Quality is every bit as important in the U.K. as I believe it is over here. We have seen that in Kosovo, in the Gulf. It is a capable ally that is capable of backing up what its obligations are. I think that the trouble with the ESDI from the U.S. point of view is the danger as we get sucked more and more into this political framework, what you get more in terms of the framework is less in terms of the military potency in response to your requirements. I do not want to see that. I believe that the nations of Europe and the U.S. have common purpose in defending Western Europe and the continental United States and North America, as well as joining together to face threats to Western interests around the globe. Now is surely not the time to create an artificial divide in NATO that will only exacerbate the problems and the rows. The comments from Mr. Rubin are an example of what happens if you release some of the anti-American sentiments that are nascent in politicians' minds across Europe. This gets driven away from the core of NATO, and that will only create problems for NATO to act cohesively in the future. I say that I believe what we need to do is restate the preeminence of NATO, restate the reality that nothing needs to be done beyond NATO. NATO has always had the capacity for individual nations to operate by themselves or in groups, operate with the heavy lift, including the intelligence. We need to restate that, restructure around that, and not look for this division. I would urge you here in Congress to think very carefully about offering a blank check to what is going on in Europe. [The prepared statement of Mr. Duncan Smith appears in the appendix.] Chairman Gilman. Thank you very much, Mr. Duncan Smith. We appreciate the testimony of both of you very much. Mr. Duncan Smith, in your September, 1999 remarks at the Enterprise Institute, you stated that European contributions to the ballistic missile defense project would, and I quote, ``require some major revisions to the European project.'' Can you tell us why that case would be your conclusion, and could Britain not lead European support of a ballistic missile project under any foreseeable European security arrangement? Mr. Smith. Yes, I would very much like my country to lead and persuade the nations of Europe, Western Europe, to get on board and come alongside the U.S. in the process, in the development and certainly in the deployment of such defense structures. I believe, typical sometimes of the generosity here, that the U.S. would be willing--from what I understand from discussions with Administration officials and Members of this House, be willing to deploy such a system in Europe; and I think it is up to the nations in Europe to actually face up to that and come alongside and do something about it. I think the problem is that too many in Europe don't want to be reminded of the need to increase defense expenditures, certainly to improve the quality of it. Second, I think the preeminence of the U.S. in terms of the technology and capability would be a huge reminder in this case. Ballistic missile defense reminds them and seems to move in the opposite direction to what is so often stated in these agreements, including Cologne and after. Chairman Gilman. Mr. Brok, you said recently, ``I quite like the idea of including Article V of the WEU treaty, commitment and mutual assistance, in a protocol to annex to the EU treaty to which those countries, so wishing, could sign up.''. Mr. Brok, could you comment further on that? What reaction have you received from the neutral EU members to that proposal? If the EU treaty were to incorporate an Article V guarantee, would non-NATO EU members essentially be receiving a back-door security guarantee from the United States? Mr. Brok. First of all, Mr. Chairman, I do not need to deliver speeches as a member of the opposition party for my internal country affairs on the basis of NATO, because NATO is, in my opinion, much too valuable to misuse it for such purposes. Second, to answer your question directly, I believe that it would be very helpful to increasingly integrate the neutral countries of Europe into our common responsibility. Due to the internal situation of such neutral and nonallied countries, it is with difficulty that they go directly to any defense alliance. But if we put Article V into a protocol of the EU treaty, then it would be an easier after a time of cooperation on that basis, that such Congresses individually sign up for membership, which I think would be in our common interest. I know, for example, that many parties in such countries-- in Sweden, in Finland, in Austria--would like to support such a proposal. It is more or less a problem of the social democratic parties of such countries. Anyway, I can imagine that it will be part of the intergovernmental conference which will take place next year. Chairman Gilman. Mr. Duncan Smith, some of our Members are beginning to question a new strategic concept that has been adopted by NATO at the Washington Summit, which says that the Alliance should be prepared to defend our shared common interests and values when they are threatened. Those who question the strategic concept point out that it seems to bolster the new doctrine of humanitarian intervention that has been used to justify the NATO military intervention in Serbia. Do you believe that NATO itself may be suffering from strategic fuzziness in conceptualizing its fundamental purposes in a new post-Cold War environment? Mr. Duncan Smith. I do think that is a criticism that NATO has to take on board. I have watched with interest the development of this new humanitarian doctrine with some cynicism. One has to look across to Chechnya and ask what is different about the humanitarian option over there; and the answer is, practical politics is the difference. That is what NATO has always been about, deciding how and when it can operate. The same goes for politics of all nations. They decide what they can do and can't do, what is within the scope of their power and capability, and they try to do good within those limitations. Now, I think, therefore, if there is less said about pure humanitarian intervention and more about what we believe to be the defense of natural and classic Western interests and Western values, then we get a much closer concept or much easier concept of how NATO will operate. That brings into clear perspective the justification for the operations in Kosovo, much as it did in the Gulf, and that should form the basis of the doctrine. Chairman Gilman. Thank you. Mr. Gejdenson. Mr. Gejdenson. Mr. Brok, my sense here is that the new proposal simply provides a process within the EU for Europeans to rationalize their defense procurement and manufacturing. Am I wrong on that? Basically what you look to this new process to do--Mr. Smith says I am wrong--is to use the EU's structure to develop a European-wide manufacturing system--what countries are going to be responsible for what, what items they are going to buy--and you feel that will give you a better ability to be an equal partner in NATO, as well as, obviously, some independent ability to act? Mr. Brok. No, I do not think this is the main purpose. The main purpose is to enable Europeans to do something like in the former Yugoslavia where, with certain capacities, we could have avoided war. I think such a capacity must be effective, and this is then a real burden-sharing. Mr. Gejdenson. Do you mean in the military sense? Mr. Brok. Both in prevention policy, and also financial aid and trade could be a part of that. If I could follow my partner from the U.K., then Mr. Marshall pursued with the Marshall Plan a wrong policy; but I think he created a right policy in order to change Europe in a positive sense. Second, I believe Europe must have also military capacities, because if we are to be able to prevent war in negotiations, we must show that we have military capacities to do so. In this way, also, we can be part of a better burden- sharing. If we organize our defense policy in a better way, we can also take more burden-sharing in actions around the world together with the United States. At the moment, we have no capacities to do so. We could also make better use of our budgets in order to combine our abilities. To this procurement and manufacturing question, this may be a result of the internal market, but is not at the output of ESDI. This is output of the common market, when you see the mergers of different companies; and I think this European defense initiative has nothing to do with getting Europe in a better position to American---- Mr. Gejdenson. That wasn't my question, although that is the one that you obviously wanted to answer at this stage. My question really, is that what you have got to do? You can't have each of the European countries trying to manufacture every item; you can't have each of the European countries trying to sustain a defense budget that has every kind of system in it. You have got to rationalize not just the manufacturing, but the choices that you are making collectively, and the EU process will do that for you? Mr. Brok. It will do this in a certain way, that is true. Mr. Gejdenson. I think that is a positive development. Mr. Duncan Smith---- Mr. Brok. If I may say just one more word about it, I believe very much that this European ability will be brought also to the closer cooperation of armies, that we have a common procurement policy. Mr. Duncan Smith. I just wanted to make the point that again this really should be seen in a wider NATO context. If we talk about nationalization of defense production, quite right, you don't want lots of poor-quality companies running around not being able to produce what is required. But then you can't have ``fortress Europe'' defense production. Actually this speaks volumes about a transatlantic involvement, both U.S. and European manufacturers. If you take the politics out of it, what you see across from Germany and Britain are those manufacturers making that decision. They are saying if we can within Europe, we do, but we also recognize that we need to work with the U.S.A. Mr. Gejdenson. It seems to me that the present activities just within NATO haven't achieved those goals, as Kosovo proved. When we went into Kosovo, we had, I think, the best political cooperation we have ever had on an activity, but America was just technologically in a different place and able to operate in conditions that Europeans couldn't. So the current structure hasn't had the political capability of bringing the Europeans to a point where they have made those decisions so they can be an equal partner. Maybe this new structure will then give the Europeans the ability within NATO to come to that point. Mr. Duncan Smith. You are going to see that take place because there is not the defense base to sustain the level. Mr. Gejdenson. Let's assume that you are correct. What is the danger of having a unified Europe, working with a unified United States all within NATO? What is the danger of using the EU to help make the decisions within Europe so that instead of the United States trying to negotiate with Italy, with England, France, Poland, and all of these other countries, that the Europeans rationalize, and in that process there is one place for the Americans to have contact. Mr. Duncan Smith. What you will see from the companies is that they will do it themselves. When you said the capacity Kosovo showed, actually, the U.K.'s capacity is much closer to the U.S.'s because their spending levels and the quality is much higher than the others. If you are dealing with defense budgets that are falling and poor quality, you will end up with a ``fortress Europe'' for the wrong reasons that won't produce that capacity. Mr. Brok. I would like to make one short remark. To work together is to use synergy effects, and therefore a European procurement agency makes sense. But the biggest European armament company, which was set up in France, is owned partly by the United States because of the Daimler Chrysler merger. Therefore, I do not see the danger of any ``fortress Europe.'' . Mr. Bereuter. [Presiding.] Mr. Brok, Mr. Duncan Smith, it is nice to see you both here. I wish I had been here for all of your testimony. We will call on Dr. Cooksey from Louisiana for the five- minute rule. Mr. Cooksey. Mr. Duncan Smith, in looking at your testimony, do these numbers for your defense budget reflect the cost of the war in Kosovo? Mr. Duncan Smith. No, the extra costs from Kosovo would presumably have to be factored in. Those don't have that factored in yet. But in terms of the overall spending, I don't think that they will shift it dramatically. A couple of nations will have an effect. Certainly not in the R&D and procurement side; you will not see any shift in proportionate terms. For a country like U.K., the treasury has already agreed this is an exceptional spend, and therefore it isn't directly out of the defense budget, as it were. Mr. Cooksey. So the percentage of defense spending---- Mr. Duncan Smith. You have to take the peaks out and even out the trend. I think the trends are in here, which are falling budgets, falling quality for the most part. Mr. Cooksey. You made a statement; you said that the political-military structure will drive itself out of NATO. Would you elaborate on that? You predicted that could happen. Mr. Duncan Smith. My concern is that the whole process as we have certainly seen it shift in the last 12 months has moved beyond what was originally conceived, I believe, in Petersberg, which is more about consolidating and procurement and some of the smaller arrangements. It has moved to a much bigger process, which is about moving the European defense initiative into the EU, bringing in the WEU and creating a political- military structure which has a life of its own, and I believe will actually play to this idea. I look back over the development of the European Union over the last 25 or 30 years, and I believe there is a natural process that takes place which begins to create an identity which separates itself. In this case it creates an artificial divide. I have never believed that there was a division between Europe and the U.S.A. in NATO. The beauty of NATO was that it believed in the concept of partnership of nations within NATO. In creating a European dimension, I ask the question, what exactly is it we are going to be doing, where the United States will simply disagree with us fundamentally; and where is the capacity for us to do that in the sense that somehow we will replicate or change direction and have the capacity to develop or deploy forces in the same way that the U.S.A. might do. There are some people across Europe who believe in a counterbalance principle to the U.S.A., and that somehow Europe should act as a counterbalance against some of what they might consider to be some of the more extreme gestures or policy positions of the U.S. I don't follow that, but this allows that process to develop, I believe. Mr. Cooksey. One of you mentioned the anti-American sentiment in the EU, and we are accustomed to that, and I probably agree with it at times, because sometimes we do send a mixed message about what our foreign policy is. What are the sources of that within the EU, the major sources? What countries specifically are those anti-American sentiments coming from? I assume that it is not Germany or Great Britain. Mr. Duncan Smith. I don't want to comment on individuals, but I did raise the point--and I am interested to hear what Mr. Brok has to say about this--the comments Mr. Rubin made in the last 24 hours about the Chirac speech concerning ballistic missile defense. There has always been an element of that around. It exists probably in almost every nation in Europe, some stronger than others. Sometimes it makes its way into policy statements, more often than not, but it is always a developing undercurrent which has to be kept in check as compromises are made on policy. But the concern that I am talking about, is that this process allows that to flourish rather than keep it under tight control. Mr. Cooksey. We expect a certain amount of that. I am from Louisiana, and Louisiana has ties to France, and I was over there a month ago, and I always enjoy my time in France. But in Louisiana we still have a few little Napoleons, and I think there are still probably some in France, too. That may be the source of the problem. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Chairman Gilman. [Presiding.] Thank you, Dr. Cooksey. Mr. Brok. Is it possible to answer the question from my side, or are you not interested in this? Mr. Cooksey. Yes, but I ran out of time. Mr. Brok. First of all, we do this European policy because the present situation is not satisfying. Everyone agrees on this because Europe does not play the role it should play; therefore, we want to make changes, changes in order to play a better role, in order to get more burden-sharing in our common transatlantic interest. I think this is a new dimension in order to achieve this goal, in order to make available the transatlantic relationship on the basis of a partnership, and not on dividing the transatlantic relationship. I can remember that, in the discussion about setting up the Euro-Corps in the beginning of the 1990's, it was said that this would bring the German troops out of NATO. We said no, it would bring France closer to NATO. This is true. The whole European Union and other countries of Europe become closer to the United States with such a European defense identity. Last, I would like to mention anti-American statements you can get everywhere, as you can get isolationist statements everywhere in the United States. Nevertheless, I think that European governments, or the overall majority, and all national parliaments and the European Parliament are in favor of the transatlantic relationship; and certain examples cannot be misused for other purposes, and even I would like to talk about France. We always know that France has a special attitude, but I don't remember a time since 1945 when this made real problems, France was always on the side of the United States. It was like this in the Cuban crisis. It was like this in the Gulf crisis. France was on the spot despite certain statements. Therefore, I would not see any danger that this European defense initiative would be misused against a transatlantic relationship in NATO. Mr. Cooksey. Good. Those are very good comments, and I am glad to hear that. Chairman Gilman. The gentleman's time has expired. Mr. Davis. Mr. Davis. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. With respect to the countries we are discussing this morning, how strong is the consensus and the judgment of each of you as to the nature of the security risk that we face individually and collectively in the years to come? Mr. Brok. I would say that this position is not quite clear everywhere. Too many people still believe that with the changes of 1990, the whole world became more peaceful, and it is not understood that it becomes more dangerous. For example, we face a certain development in the Mediterranean and in Northern Africa: there is more military threat than we have faced in the time of the Cold War, perhaps. To foresee the question of proliferation and other problems, I think we increasingly need to stick together in NATO because of such military risks, to have our instruments against it. But that would mean that NATO has to be changed, and NATO has already changed and adapted to this, and the United States has adapted to this, but not Europe. Our development for a defense identity is in order to enable Europe to adapt to the new situation and give our proper share to the Atlantic Alliance. Mr. Duncan Smith. I agree with the assessment of what faces us, and I think across Europe the nations have actually been more content to assume peaceful outcomes than I suspect that they have a right to. Interestingly enough, your question does unite us in our observation of what the threat is. The question is, how do you deal with it, and what should we be doing? My concern is if you look at what the budget positions are across the nations of Europe, you actually see a very serious determination to reduce the budgets, reduce the defense spending, some of that driven by concerns over budgets that Euro has brought in sharp focus, that is true. The reality is that some of the budget constraints--for many reasonable reasons--that they would have to change some of their social and welfare spending, and perhaps that is too difficult; defense does tend to bear the brunt of that spending reduction because it is an easy target, because there is no general view that there is a threat. I believe there is a very serious threat emerging, and I would like to see that dealt with as each nation recognizes as part of NATO that it has some obligations to have a viable defense capability and to work with the United States, as well as other partners, in developing their defenses in such a way that they meet that threat. That is, in essence, the difference in how we approach it. I don't believe that the ESDI actually does that. I think it panders to a reductionist tendency, rather than to a tendency of improving defense. Mr. Davis. As we discuss the value of a collective force, what lessons do you think we have learned from Kosovo that should lead us to acknowledge the limited value of trying to operate on a consensus or most-common-denominator basis? Mr. Brok. What we have learned from Kosovo and from the whole Yugoslavia conflict is that with proper European capacities, we could have avoided war in the very beginning and the loss of many, many lives in this region before the shooting started in the beginning of the 1990's. I think this is our main concern, to get capacities to prevent such wars. We can only prevent them if we have enough military capacity to show that we can also use military instruments. I think, therefore, if Europe would have had the capacity, it would have meant less work for us and you, because we could have solved the issues together with you. Mr. Davis. It appeared that certain countries had greater difficulty discussing the possibility of ground troops in Kosovo, which ultimately succeeded in stifling public debate regarding the use of ground troops. Obviously, that is illustrative of one of the prices you pay in trying to govern military decisions on a collective basis. Mr. Duncan Smith. In answer to the two questions that you really put together, you have to go back to the start of this, which is the original change of Slovenia breaking away and recognition of Croatia. There was a misreading of what was taking place out there. I think it teaches us lessons in understanding just how powerful some historic animosities are and what the real pressures are ethnically. We have tended over the last 20 years to assume that those tensions were no longer in existence in Europe; and I have to say this has shown that if we worry about the Middle East and other countries, we have to worry about ourselves here, as well, that we don't pander to those splits and tensions. But having said that, recognizing how to deal with it is dealing with it early on, and to arrive at conclusions that all come together within the NATO framework, both the U.S.A. and the nations of Europe. But it does give us a very strong signal about what is likely to be the case in other parts of the world on how powerful some of those tensions will be. Given when we now talk about the likelihood of many of those nations being capable in terms of the ballistic missile threat and weapons of mass destruction, it does make it quite important that we recognize NATO as the one, clearly to deal with some of those threats, both directly to our Nations and to our interests abroad. Chairman Gilman. The gentleman's time has expired. Mr. Hyde. Mr. Hyde. I have no questions, Mr. Chairman. Thank you. Chairman Gilman. Thank you, Mr. Hyde. Mr. Bereuter. Mr. Bereuter. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Gentlemen, I apologize for being late. I would like to have been here. Elmar, you and I have known each other for a long time, and you have been a leading spokesperson on foreign defense. Mr. Duncan Smith has written some things which I find very interesting, relating to ESDI within the European Union and his concerns about it, particularly as it relates to missile defense. I find them to be troublingly compelling. I am concerned, very frankly, about placing the European pillar, or the ESDI, within the European Union despite all of my prior contacts with the European Union and the parliament. My concerns are as follows: we have the problem of membership; Norway, Turkey, and the three newest members of NATO are not members of the EU. In fact, Turkey has had the door slammed in its face, and there is no prospect in the short term of its becoming a member. You have neutrals that are not a part of NATO that will play an increasingly large role in the European Union. Some people see the St. Malo meeting and then the Cologne summit as being the elements that put in place this ESDI concept within the EU; and rather than causing the British to spend more on defense, it may be the unstated view that Prime Minister Blair would be able to spend less on defense in Britain with that initiative. Finally, to name another high point of many concerns, the concern that this is another effort on the part of France to marginalize the influence of the United States. We have supported a European pillar, a strong one, within NATO to use those joint resources with the concept of a joint task force. But the European Union troubles us a great deal for some of the reasons that I have mentioned. I would appreciate anything that you can say, in brief, to try to ease those concerns. Mr. Brok. Thank you. First of all, the main point is that we want to answer a question which was posed to us by President Kennedy and Secretary of State Kissinger, to give the United States a telephone number which is to be called. ESDI is to deliver such a telephone number. I believe that it will make it much easier to do things together. The European defense initiative has nothing to do with keeping Turkey or Norway out. We know that Turkey will get the status of candidate for membership in the European Union in Helsinki, and that we will develop a system of flexibility, a close relationship to Norway, Turkey, and other NATO countries, so that they will be involved in that mechanism as the WEU is already involved in certain European policies. The neutrals cannot stop it because the Treaty of St. Malo has foreseen a decisionmaking procedure in a way that a neutral country cannot veto such questions. Therefore, I think it will bring those neutrals closer to our common purpose in an indirect way and will strengthen this partnership between the United States and Europe as we discuss, for example, Article V of the WEU treaty. I also believe this European pillar of the Alliance has the possibility of synergy effects in budgets. If we use our synergy effect, the budget can be used in the proper way. But that does not mean we will not increase the budget. Also, I believe that, for example, via the European budget, crisis management like in Kosovo can be paid for collectively, which means that even countries who do not play an active role have to take their share in the financing of such crisis management. Therefore, we will have more money for our common purposes than less. Mr. Duncan Smith. May I make two small comments? First, is that I noticed quite recently that Mr. Kissinger has explained those comments by saying he doesn't, I think, believe that will necessarily bring any solution to the problems that NATO faces. The second thing is, sometimes if you have one telephone number, which has a lower common denominator, what you may get when you ring that number is that they are not available; and that is what would worry me. Mr. Bereuter. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Chairman Gilman. Thank you, Mr. Bereuter. Mr. Delahunt. Mr. Delahunt. Mr. Brok, this is a followup to the initial question that Mr. Gejdenson posed to you when you referred to prevention and the existence of an ESDI which would have made a difference in terms of what occurred in the Balkans. Are you suggesting that simply the threat of an effective military force would have made a difference, or do you see it in terms of exerting influences based upon commercial relationships or diplomacy? Can you just amplify on that? Mr. Brok. I think that just economic policy and trade policy cannot avoid war in certain circumstances. It is a very important instrument, and the European Union is using this; and I think it is very important that the European Union has already been granted competence by their member states in this case. But there is something more. In the Bosnia crisis Slobodan Milosevic negotiated around 34 cease-fires. None of the cease-fires really worked because Milosevic knew that the Europeans had no military capacities in order to uphold the cease-fires. It worked only when the United States of America got involved, and then it became possible. Therefore, I think to have our own military capacity would help us in a much earlier stage than such cease-fires in finding a political solution. Mr. Delahunt. So you are suggesting that an effective military deterrent based upon a European concept would have effected an earlier resolution in the Balkans, maybe would have prevented them? Mr. Brok. Nobody knows, but I think there would have been a very good chance. Mr. Delahunt. That is your hypothesis? Mr. Brok. Nobody knows. But from the very beginning we had no chance against Slobodan Milosevic because we had no capacities. I think we want to develop our chance, so that not all of the time the U.S. has to get involved and solve our problems in Europe. Mr. Delahunt. I find your testimony, both from you and from Mr. Duncan Smith, fascinating--and NATO. In terms of the new reality of NATO, particularly the debate, I think, has been provoked by Kosovo. I think it was you, Mr. Duncan-Smith, who talked about the mission, or maybe I am interpreting your words, that the mission of NATO in the past has been a collective defense posture, and now you use the words such as ``defending Western values'' which is clearly more nebulous than defending Western Europe and American national interests in terms of the Soviet Union. Is part of this debate, what we are talking about now, provoked by a lack of clarity in terms of what the new mission of NATO ought to be? Mr. Duncan Smith. What I said wasn't values; I used it very much as add on, as a purpose. I said that we have got to recognize what those values are. They are about democratic governments, liberal democratic governments. Mr. Delahunt. I think you were incorporating a question posed by Mr. Gilman or Mr. Gejdenson. In Kosovo the situation was a humanitarian premise, and I think you incorporated that or encapsulated that into your Western values. Mr. Duncan Smith. If you just have a woolly description of humanitarian support, you don't have a clear idea what is going to happen or who is going to do it. I think that is the important purpose for NATO, just to decide where its relevant spheres of influence are, and I think to that extent that process is a developing process. Mr. Delahunt. Again, the point that I am trying to make is that this debate, which is one that is very worthwhile to engage in, is in my own sense, really now a lack of clarity and an unease about the rationale and the mission of NATO in the aftermath of a bipolar world. Mr. Duncan Smith. I agree, but I also say, if we really step back and examine what the threats are, what is likely to emerge and what is emerging--something that both of us have touched on--I think they in many senses help define what NATO is all about as well. If you perceive there to be no threat, you really do have a problem with deciding what NATO is for. I am saying that there are regional threats to our interests, legitimate trade interests as well as interests with countries who share our values in those areas we consider to be partners. Mr. Delahunt. I think we can agree to that. Mr. Duncan Smith. And ballistic missiles adds to that as a direct threat to the nations themselves, the homelands of Europe and the United States. That threat is developing. I hope and believe that the nations of Europe have got to wake up to that very quickly. Mr. Delahunt. I wonder if you can define what threats will predicate a NATO response? Again, I think we are struggling to get to this clarity issue, and I think that is one point from which to have the debate about definition for NATO. Mr. Duncan Smith. I agree. The first one that is clearest-- and this is the best focus--is ballistic missiles, weapons of mass destruction, which I think are emerging very fast. That, if nothing else, I believe is and should be a NATO-driven policy. Mr. Delahunt. When I see in terms of ESDI--and this is just from a distance, and someone who is not necessarily conversant with the nuances of the issue--here we see a Europe with a common currency. There is a European Parliament and obviously a trading block, and now the beginning--and I guess this goes to your point, Mr. Duncan Smith--in terms of a common defense predicated within that political structure. There is a real trend there. Mr. Duncan Smith. You ask the critical question, which is, what is the end destination for this European trend; and those of us in my particular case, many of us believe that a state called Europe is not a good option and not a viable option. We would say that has limits, and I think we have reached the limits. Chairman Gilman. The gentleman's time has expired. Mr. Brok. Mr. Brok. I would like to make a short remark on this. The European Union is not a state, but it has a political purpose. The European Union acts like a state, and it is not just about trade. That is the classical British conservative misunderstanding. It is not a trade association; it is a common market with a common environmental policy, with a common legal order like a state; it has a common currency. I think that it is very clear that, in the long term, we cannot have such an entity where regions have different quality of security. But this entity has the interest you are talking about. We have a common interest because we have a legal order, a common market and a common currency. Our own social environmental policy is much more than trade, and because of this---- Mr. Duncan Smith. It sounds like a state. Mr. Brok. Yes, the European interest must be combined with the interests of the United States of America. Therefore, the vast majority of the European Parliament and the member countries of the European Union are looking forward to the development of a transatlantic marketplace. We have to combine our interests in more areas than just defense, because that goes deeper and will keep us longer together than just the defense question. Therefore, discussions about a transatlantic marketplace are of very high importance for the subsequent development of NATO in order to keep the public opinion that we have a collective interest; and therefore, collective defense and collective security policy makes sense. Chairman Gilman. Mr. Hyde. Mr. Hyde. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I didn't intend to ask questions, but the more I think about what I have heard and the subject matter, the more I have questions. First of all, I am a big supporter of NATO and I am a big supporter of the European Union and all of that, but I can't help wonder--and I would be most interested in your responses, both of you--how relevant is NATO to the real present threat to the West which is in the Far East? It is China, it is India, Pakistan, it is Iran. It's Libya, it is North Korea, and the real danger spots are over there where nuclear proliferation is occurring. Iraq--God knows what is going on in Iraq; we don't. I am just wondering, here we have this marvelous working structure to protect us from the Soviet Union--and parenthetically, I don't write that off; the Soviet Union is very much a work in progress, but the real threats right now for a major confrontation are out of the area of NATO. I just wonder what your comments are vis-a-vis the relevance of NATO to the threat from the Far East--from India, Pakistan, and North Korea? Thank you. Mr. Brok. The United States is the only superpower left in the world, and it has a global point of view. Most Europeans are only able to look in our neighborhoods. That is one of the problems. But even if you look in our neighborhoods, we have a lot of common interests. You explain the situation in Russia, for example. You mentioned the Mediterranean. There are a lot of interests which we share and on which we have to work together. But I also believe that an emerging European Union would be better able to have a more outward look to other parts of the world in order to have a real burden-sharing with you. I think the question, for example, of proliferation is a global question. It is a question of common interest. Until now, the division of Europe, the political division of Europe, the political method of the lowest common denominator of political directors from foreign offices made Europe unable to consider real strategy and policy on these questions. I believe that we must be able to develop our policy in such a way that we, for example, can come together with you on questions like proliferation, the possibilities of preventive strokes, and so on. I have not given up the hope that we can keep proliferation in certain corners and that we have justice stand up for such defense systems. I think we still should fight for a world where proliferation has no chance politically, by accepting treaties, but also by being ready to do our job in a certain way of crisis management. Mr. Duncan Smith. I think NATO is hugely relevant in the sense of the threats that you are talking about. We are talking about proliferation, and you have got threats from the Middle East. I made a speech recently, I called it the Iron Chain of Proliferation; it stretches from the Far East to the Middle East. Clearly, in the U.S. you look to the Far East and you see North Korea and others posing a possible threat to mainland United States, as well as to your interests and possibly to already deployed troops. My answer is simply that NATO is the only organization that could be effective against that because the threat is, by its very nature, global. I agree with the assessment of the Soviet Union. My concern comes back to the simple point, for too long in Europe they have considered NATO to be about the defense of Western Europe; and that is really where we need to push, from being an inward- looking process to an outward-looking process. My concern about ESDI is that it actually panders to an inward, isolationist view of Europe regarding its involvement and its obligations, both within NATO and generally in the global trade. My concern is, that is happening at the moment: There is being an internal focus, and more is less here. Because I keep coming back to the simple fact, talk is cheap. But if you look at the budgets, you actually see what they mean, which is that they don't intend to be able to project power. The one nation which has historically believed in power projection alongside the U.S. has been the U.K. it still has that enshrined in its strategic defense review. To do that requires equipment and it requires political commitment. I sense that, perhaps is not there, and I think that is my concern, that too often when people talk about the development of Europe, they refuse to say that the end result is a European nation. My answer is, if that is the case, then it would be an inward-looking one that actually takes it away from global responsibility. That is the wrong turn. Mr. Brok. You, Mr. Duncan Smith, and I agree that the present European performance is not good. Mr. Duncan Smith wants to continue the present method which has brought us to such a situation. The supporters of European defense identity want to use new methods and ideas to make it better for the transatlantic relationship. Chairman Gilman. The gentleman's time has expired. Mr. Payne. Mr. Payne. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just may ask the gentleman, Mr. Duncan Smith, when you mentioned ``Western values,'' could you explain what that is? Mr. Duncan Smith. Yes. I referred to them as a backup to what I was talking about in terms of NATO, what NATO is about, and I simply define them in the document that you have got as being those of liberal democracies who believe in free trade under the rule of law and the law of property; and those are the main principles, it strikes me, that Western Europe clearly and the United States, North America, and many others around the world would consider themselves to be about. They are the key elements that stop people from going to war with each other. We find that where those are enshrined with decent democratic institutions---- Mr. Payne. And social justice? Mr. Duncan Smith. Yes. Mr. Payne. Would South Korea be a part of Western values or the Philippines, India? The oldest democracy in Asia is India. Would you consider them a part of your notion of Western values? Mr. Duncan Smith. Is that addressed to me? Mr. Payne. Yes. Mr. Duncan Smith. I think that all those nations that strive to emulate those values are actually working toward what I loosely call ``Western values.'' I am simply talking about the values that started in the West. But they are what I sense, at the end of the day, are the most powerful structures. But all I am saying is that they are an observation. What NATO has protected over the last 30 or 40 years is the existence of those from a totalitarian regime whose desire was to overtake all of that and get rid of it. Mr. Payne. I think that when we are looking for allies, and we are looking, as you mentioned, to people to have democratic values, I think when we put in a superficial kind of a barrier, saying ``Western values'' would almost mean that it then excludes values of people that are not in the West, even though they may not have the connotation of what you see as Western values. Mr. Duncan Smith. It is not meant like that. Mr. Payne. Let me ask you, where do you find Russia in the new Europe, with glasnost and perestroika--and 10 years ago the world witnessed the fall of the Berlin Wall. The U.S., in the early part, was very generous about loans and aid. Then NATO expansion started, and Russia felt that NATO expansion was, in essence, a way to contain Russia. Don't get me wrong, I just would like to know what Europeans' view of Russia in the future is, and I am still working with the majority here to try to figure out what our position with Russia is going to be, friend or foe, in the future. How do you see Europe's position in the new Russia? Mr. Brok. I think Russia is a country in transition. To answer your first question, it is always a question between values and interest. The bigger a country is, the more interests play a role which may be, from the point of morality a wrong position, but that is a classical question between the two issues. I believe that we really have to help Russia to develop toward democracy. It is not a full democracy now; and this is also in our common interests--it is in our own interests in terms of security and defense. Therefore, the European Union has set up major programs in order to help Russia to set up better administrations to get democracy more deeply rooted, and to help on the economic side in order to support Russia's transition toward a democracy and our common interests. Mr. Duncan Smith. Going back to Western values, I don't want you to assume that I am using that as an absolute. Of course, governments have to deal with different variables and different types of expression of that. But also there are times when some would pervert those processes and create instability in those regions and, therefore, nations of Europe have to decide how they might deal with changes to those. Examples are Pakistan and Chile. I am not saying that they are absolutes; far from it. I recognize that politics is not about that. I am saying that those are the things that people strive for. I am not saying to use it as an absolute. Mr. Payne. Thank you very much. Chairman Gilman. Thank you very much. Dr. Cooksey. Mr. Cooksey. Mr. Brok, I will ask you this, not only in your capacity as the Chairman of the Foreign Affairs, Human Rights, Common Security and Defense Policy Committee of the European Parliament, but also in your experience as a private sector businessman, a role I highly regard. I have some concerns about the difficulty that you are going through in Germany. Do you feel, as you make this integration, over the next ten years that you will be able to keep Germany's same commitment to a common European foreign policy and a common defense and security policy that existed when you were just West Germany? Is it difficult to conform the East Germans to this concept? Mr. Brok. It was the position by the German Government in 1990 that the membership in NATO was a condition for unification. Chancellor Kohl didn't accept any proposal for German unification without NATO membership. Major German parties in parliament, besides the former Communists, have this position nowadays. Even the Green Party has developed in such a way. So the German support in the German parliament for NATO membership as a unified Germany is nowadays stronger than it was ten years ago. Mr. Cooksey. That is good to hear. That is reassuring. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Chairman Gilman. Thank you, Dr. Cooksey. I want to thank our panelists for your patience and excellent testimony and for traveling to be with us. I would like to invite Mr. Brok and Mr. Duncan Smith to sit up here on the dais for the balance of the hearing. We will now proceed to panel number two. I would like to ask our next panelists to take their seats. We are on a roll call vote, but our vice chairman is on his way back and we will continue right through. I think I will ask you to speak in alphabetical order. Each of our experts has a deep understanding of Europe and its importance to the United States, but differing perspectives on how the United States ought to deal with a unifying Europe. The Honorable John Bolton has served the United States as Assistant Secretary of State in charge of the Bureau of International Organization Affairs in the Bush Administration. He was Assistant Attorney General in charge of the Civil Division during the Bush Administration. During the Reagan Administration, he was in charge of Legislative Affairs at Justice, and prior to that was Assistant Administrator and General Counsel of the Agency for International Development, and served in the White House counsel's office. He is currently Vice President at the American Enterprise Institute. The Honorable Robert Hunter is at the RAND Corporation. He served until recently as America's Ambassador to NATO. Ambassador Hunter was Vice President of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, was involved in the Clinton and Mondale campaigns, and was on the National Security Council staff in the Carter Administration. He has also worked on Capitol Hill, as well as in the Johnson White House. The Honorable Peter Rodman is Director of National Security Studies at The Nixon Center. He has served on the staff of the National Security Council in the Bush and Reagan Administrations and in policy planning in the State Department. He also was on the staff of the NSC during the Nixon Administration. Professor Simon Serfaty came to the United States in the 1960, and is a graduate of Hunter College in New York. He has a Ph.D. from Johns Hopkins and was associated with that institution for many years before taking up his present position at Old Dominion University. He is also associated with the Center for Security and International Studies and runs, among other things, a highly regarded program to bring experts on European affairs to the Hill for talks with senior staff. He has written 15 books and monographs, including one entitled ``Taking Europe Seriously.'' Gentlemen, thank you again for being here. Let us begin in the order I introduced you. Your written statements will be entered into the record in full, and you should summarize them in your oral remarks. After we hear from the panel, we will turn to questions. Chairman Gilman. Mr. Bolton, why don't you start? STATEMENT OF JOHN BOLTON, SENIOR VICE PRESIDENT, AMERICAN ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE Mr. Bolton. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I must say, speaking as a strong supporter of NATO, I think NATO is at a crisis point for its future. I think that the crisis is caused not, as some would say, by inward-looking or isolationist views of the United States, but by the conscious and not--very--hidden agenda of many European nations to develop a separate security and defense identity, one that would, at a minimum, distance themselves from the United States and, in the most disconcerting option, create them as an alternative. I think that a fully effective ESDI--and I think it is a long way from happening because of the split between rhetoric on some European leaders' part and the reality of their actual defense and political structures--but a real ESDI would result in the fragmentation of NATO and the collapse of the Atlantic Alliance as we know it. I think that the original idea underlying the Marshall Plan, whatever utility it has had and did have during the Cold War, is confronted with a very different set of circumstances today. The continued development of the European Union is not something that the United States should be---- Chairman Gilman. Gentlemen, I am told that I have two minutes to vote. Mr. Bereuter is on his way back. The Committee stands in recess. [Recess.] Mr. Bereuter. [Presiding.] I understand that you were in mid-statement when I went to cover the vote. I am sorry that we are having to do this. Please proceed. Mr. Bolton. [Continuing.] What I was saying, is that it ignores reality not to think that a European Security and Defense Identity, if it came into being, would have a dramatic impact on the internal decisionmaking and effectiveness of NATO. I have tried in my testimony to give some examples of what has already happened in the playing out of a closer European Union in the economic area. When the G-7 now meet on trade questions, they meet as four: Japan, the United States, Canada, and the EU. It is hard to deny that that changes the dynamic, it changes the perspective of the European Union representative. In the context of the United Nations, which is a small example here, ten years ago when the Western group of nations met, although the Presidency of the EU might give an ``EU'' perspective, other EU members also spoke. The Brits would speak, the Italians would speak, the French would speak. Today in Western group meetings, the EU presidency speaks, and all of the rest remain silent. This difference in the political dynamic has already affected NATO. I think it will affect it more so in the future, and I think it is just inherent in the logic of a separate European identity that it will develop an agenda different from ours. If the Speaker of the House came to this Committee and said: ``I would like another International Relations Committee as an alternative to this one,'' one might well ask why that was necessary. It would be to pursue a separate agenda. I find that very troubling, and I think we have seen it play out, for example, in the context of the breakup of Yugoslavia. Even within the EU, the differences that were debated produced a policy that led to incoherence. The German push to recognize Slovenia and Croatia, I think helped precipitate the disintegration of Yugoslavia and everything that flowed from it. I think we have seen that despite the State Department's conventional wisdom--that the European Union sometimes favors the United States, sometimes works to its disadvantage, but on balance it is useful--has been proven conclusively wrong time and time again in the context of Middle East policy where the European Union's lowest-common-denominator position has been nothing but trouble. I think the same is true for the European Union in the context of European Monetary Union, where the purpose of a single European currency is precisely to be an alternative to the dollar. I think Mr. Brok said just about as clearly as one can say in the third paragraph of his statement, ``The European Union is a state under construction,'' which implies it will, when it finishes construction--if it does--be a direct alternative and perhaps opponent in some instances of the United States. I think we have seen that play out most recently in the case of Kosovo where, on a number of issues, there was just a fundamental disagreement between the European Union vision of what to do and the American vision, first, on the question of whether to seek Security Council approval, where the European view clearly was to seek it and ours was not. Second, as we have seen in recent testimony on the Senate side on internal NATO decisions on targets and other military matters, that there is just a different way that the Europeans viewed what they were after in Kosovo. It is not just the tactical decisions themselves, but the larger political agenda that it reflects. The unseemly and corrosive public debate over use of ground forces which the United States is, in part, to blame would be a further split within the Alliance that I worry about. So, Mr. Chairman, I think that we have come past the point where we can all say, ``We favor NATO, we favor the European Union; we favor greater European political cooperation and a common European Security and Defense Identity,'' and act as if those two are entirely consistent. I think the evidence is clear that they are not consistent with the continued vitality of NATO. I think that represents a real challenge for the United States. I believe NATO should be prepared to expand its activities out of area. I think that is something that is very much under threat. It is important that we stitch ties of economic cooperation more closely across the North Atlantic to help prevent that. That is not something that most European Union members have in mind. We are at a very troubling time for NATO and a very critical point in its future: whether we will see a second 50th anniversary. Mr. Bereuter. Mr. Bolton, thank you. [The prepared statement of Mr. Bolton appears in the appendix.] Mr. Bereuter. Ambassador Hunter, you may proceed. STATEMENT OF AMBASSADOR ROBERT E. HUNTER, RAND CORPORATION Mr. Hunter. Thank you. It is an honor to appear before you and the Committee today. Let me first compliment the Chairman and yourself for holding this hearing. I think it is very important that the American people understand exactly what our stakes are in international security and in Europe and the best way of going about it; and I also thank you personally and, through you, other Members of the Committee for the extraordinary bipartisan support that you provided the whole time while I was NATO Ambassador. We are able to be effective abroad and especially effective in NATO only when we have the strong support of the Congress. I understand that you will be leading a delegation to the NATO Parliamentary Assembly this weekend. Mr. Bereuter. We hope so. Mr. Hunter. I salute you on doing that. Let me cut to the bottom line. First, the Europeans are working to complete European integration. This has been a U.S. goal for more than 40 years, and the progress that they are making and the steps that they are taking are underscored by the fact that we have just reached the 10th anniversary of the opening of the Berlin Wall and the effort, as President Bush said, to create a Europe whole and free. Second, both CFSP and ESDI are very much a natural progression taking place over a long period of time. This is the last act of devolving sovereignty, giving up national control of your military forces, and that is not going to happen simply or easily. I welcome the major step taken to appoint Javier Solana to be, in the English phrase, ``Mr. CFSP.'' The EU's choosing a man with such distinguished service at NATO augers well for the Atlantic Alliance as well as for Europe. There are some doubts here about the way that this is going, but it is not going to happen suddenly. We have a long time to help the Europeans get it right. Third, let's be clear. Virtually every European country sees NATO as continuing to be preeminent. When push comes to shove, NATO is their bottom line in terms of where security gets done. They see the U.S. role as continuing to be absolutely critical, and I don't think any of them, including the French, are going to risk that engagement. Fourth, we should welcome, I believe, this development and be clear in our fundamental support before we get into the details, frankly, because there has been a lot of uncertainty in the past in Europe about whether we are really prepared to see them create a strong European pillar. ESDI is, in fact, a major element in getting the Europeans to take more responsibility, something we have long urged them to do, whether it happens through NATO on a particular occasion or ESDI on a particular occasion. This is going to help over time to encourage the Europeans to be more outward looking, rather than less. Very little of what we are talking about today is new. As you know, Mr. Chairman, back in 1996 NATO struck a basic bargain with the Europeans, from which I think everyone gains. I had the honor of negotiating this for the United States. The agreement was that, in order to ensure the primacy of NATO and to make sure that resources were not wasted, ESDI was to be built within NATO, not outside it, and with a doctrine that some assets could be separated from NATO, but they wouldn't be separate from it. The NATO chain of command is to be preserved. There is to be one NATO, not two; not one for what we call Article V operations and one for non-Article V. NATO primacy is underscored. This is the place, it is all agreed by all 19 allies, for dealing with transatlantic security, and everyone recognizes that that does mean the preservation of U.S. leadership. Frankly, from our perspective, I think we have to recognize that continuing to be engaged buys us a lot of influence in Europe, far beyond defense issues. It has also been agreed that NATO has the first call on forces, including institutions like the EUROCORPS; and also, if NATO assets were transferred to ESDI, NATO could have them back any time it wants. On the European side of the bargain, there was agreement on certain kinds of NATO assets could be transferred to ESDI on agreement of the North Atlantic Council, where we have a veto. I could go through the list; it is extensive. The basic thing is, we struck this bargain. It has been negotiated and agreed, and this is something that I believe is very much in our interest. Now we have a new debate in the last several months, partly because of Kosovo--a recognition that there is need for better burden-sharing and for the Europeans to be able, if not yet willing, to do more in their own backyard. There is also a new European desire for a greater capacity for self-reliance, something that we have been urging on them for decades and should welcome. However, I believe, that most of the new impetus for ESDI is not Kosovo, but the decisions taken by the British and French governments last December at St. Malo. If you read the document agreed at that meeting, you will see that the only thing that is new, building on the Berlin decisions of 1996, is to move the executive agent for ESDI from the Western European Union to the European Union, in time, followed up by the employment of Javier Solana in his new role. It is true that some, particularly in France, want to increase the degree of European military independence from NATO through ESDI, and perhaps even to complete with us. Let's be clear, this is decidedly a minority view, and I don't think that anyone is prepared to risk the transatlantic ties. We have on this side of the Atlantic expressed some concerns about ESDI in terms of the three D's: discrimination, decoupling and duplication. ``Discrimination'' really means Turkey. Yet it was agreed in 1996 that, if Turkey doesn't get to take part in what WEU does, it will not get any NATO assets--period. We can veto the decision, and we should do so. German Defense Minister Rudolph Scharping said last week that Germany stands fully with us on this matter. Next is ``decoupling.'' If we look fundamentally at the Transatlantic Alliance, we are engaged with the Europeans in NATO and they are engaged with us because our respective interests, if not identical, at least are fully compatible. Frankly, if they weren't, we would not have a NATO alliance, much less anything we are talking about today. My real concerns about decoupling are three: first, decoupling by accident. If because of a desire to build their institutions, what the Europeans say they are able to do militarily runs ahead of what they can actually do, we in the U.S. might think that we could do less before it is possible. Second, I do have a concern that the EU might create a ``European Caucus'' within NATO, in which all ten WEU Members in NATO, today, and more later, would take the same positions and have to refer back to the European Council to change their views. I think that would be very dangerous for the effective working of NATO, and we have to oppose it. Third, if there is too much talk about CFSP too soon, it could indeed produce a lowest common denominator among the Europeans. One thing on which we have to work with the Europeans--and this is an absolute bottom line--is to get them to be more outward looking, whether through NATO or through ``coalitions of the willing.'' Regarding ``duplication,'' there will be some of that. The Europeans have to be able to make decisions and have some command and control. But none of the allies, including France, will spend the money to do excessive duplication. In fact, I am more worried that they will not spend money even to fulfill their NATO commitments; very worrying is the fact that Germany is planning to cut its defense spending by a substantial amount. Now, where do I think the real problem is today and what should we be focusing on right now, as opposed to later? That issue is about capabilities, not structures. Here, I believe the most important thing we have to get done within the Alliance right now is the so-called Defense Capabilities Initiative (DCI). Whether that helps NATO or helps ESDI or both, DCI is, I think, the critical factor. This was dramatized by Kosovo, where the United States flew about 80 percent of the sorties--in part, of course, because collectively the Alliance wanted to sustain as few casualties as possible. Let's be clear: if there had been a ground campaign, most of the fighting would have been done by Europeans. Thus Kosovo was not just a matter of our pulling European chestnuts out of the fire. The most immediate issue within DCI, which is still undersolved, is the role of the defense companies within Europe and across the Atlantic. We are now seeing something we have pushed for finally taking place within Europe: greater consolidation of European defense industries. The U.K. has taken the lead. We now see the potential creation of a European Aerospace and Defense Company with Germany, France, and Spain. The real question is whether that will be protectionist or outward-looking. Are we going to have transatlantic teaming and some common procurement, or will we see a ``fortress Europe?'' This is a central risk. Here is something on which we Americans have a lot to say, particularly because we have the bulk of the high technology that is needed to make NATO work in the future; and here I think we in the U.S. are falling short in three areas. First, we need to speed up the licensing process for high technology transfers so Europeans can start doing things with us. Second, we need to start thinking about buying effective defense goods from Europe if we want them to buy from us. Third, we have to face up to a critical issue about technology transfer to the Europeans--not just providing them with the ``black boxes,'' but also with what is inside of them. The Europeans have to be willing at the same time, to protect our technology so it doesn't fall into the hands of other states, especially that are hostile to us. But I think we need a ``rule of reason'' here. Otherwise, if we find a ``fortress Europe'' and a ``fortress America'' in defense procurement, we will all lose. It is here, with the Defense Capabilities Initiative and this transatlantic defense industry relationship, that we really need to focus now. Thank you. Mr. Bereuter. Thank you, Ambassador. [The prepared statement of Mr. Hunter appears in the appendix.] Mr. Bereuter. Mr. Rodman, you may proceed as you wish. STATEMENT OF PETER RODMAN, DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL SECURITY PROGRAMS, THE NIXON CENTER Mr. Rodman. Thank you very much. First, I want to commend the Committee and the Chairman for the leadership that you have shown on this issue we are discussing. The Committee's engagement on the issue has been timely and important, and I believe it is having an effect on the unfolding debate across the Atlantic. Now, Americans have always wanted the Europeans to do more on defense. We have always wanted the Europeans to coordinate more, to improve the effectiveness of what they are doing in defense. Since the Balkan crisis in particular, Americans have welcomed the prospect that Europeans might be able to act autonomously. So it is important to stress that the debate here is not about America wanting to see Europe weak. It is not about America wanting to keep Europe divided. It is not about America wanting to keep Europe in a condition in which it is not capable of acting effectively on its own. On the contrary, the issue boils down to whether this European drive for autonomy strengthens the Alliance or divides it; whether the manner in which the Europeans go about this is going to compete with NATO or complicate NATO's procedures. That is the question. On one level it is a very mundane question. Maybe there is some procedural formula, some institutional formula, some way of linking the EU tightly to NATO in this field. Maybe ingenuity will come up with some way of doing this. But it is also a profound issue, because if it is not done the right way, what we have for the first time in 50 years is a competing defense organization, and that is a revolution in transatlantic relations. The European Union, of course, is now developing not only the Common Foreign and Security Policy, but St. Malo does imply a new defense institution of some kind. This is coming about because the British, who for years had resisted this, have now reversed direction, as Mr. Duncan-Smith was describing in the first panel. This is a new departure. The question inevitably arises, how does this new EU entity relate to NATO? How does it fit into NATO or link up to NATO? The disturbing answer is that we don't know yet. We don't know how this new defense entity is going to link up with NATO or coordinate with NATO or whatever. What we see, what we read is ambiguous. St. Malo was ambiguous about the Europeans wanting to have the option of acting ``inside or outside of NATO;'' and the French, of course, stress that St. Malo is about giving the EU a capacity outside of NATO. The Cologne EU Summit was disturbing to many people here because, again, the language seemed to suggest that the emphasis was on what is independent of NATO, not what is coordinated with NATO. President Chirac gave a speech at Strasbourg on October 19th, where he spelled out the French view of an all-European chain of command, a procedure whereby Europe would have its own military committee, it would make decisions, convey the decisions to a European general staff, which would give orders to European forces--again, all of it outside of NATO. What is more disturbing to me is, in President Chirac's speech, he even ruled out the idea of discussing how this relates to NATO. He was vehement on the point. He said it is ``premature.'' He said it is ``putting the cart before the horse,'' there is ``no need for it at the present time.'' Whereas, on the contrary, I believe the sooner we resolve this institutional question, the better. As I said, there may be a formula. It would certainly make use of the Berlin formula that Ambassador Hunter described whereby the Alliance has already set up a procedure for autonomous European action within the Alliance framework. But the French seem to be resisting the idea of discussing now how these institutions are going to relate. That is a mistake, and I think it is imperative--now, at this formative stage of European institution-building--to address this question and try to find some formula to reflect what Ambassador Hunter said, the primacy of the Alliance. Even President Chirac talks about the Alliance being the ``centerpiece of Europe security.'' I would like to see some operational reflection of that principle in the EU's deliberations. I have to say that the resolutions that were passed in the House and the Senate recently could not have been more timely. House Resolution 59, which was your initiative, Mr. Chairman, which passed overwhelmingly, and Senate Resolution 208, which passed unanimously on November 8th, both expressed the kinds of concerns that we have been expressing--the fear that this might evolve in a way that divides the Alliance. These resolutions were especially timely because the EU is about to meet again in Helsinki in mid-December. The EU will have one of its semiannual summits in Helsinki to carry this project to the next stage. It is important, as the Europeans meet again that they understand the American view. It is important that they not be misled by our silence into thinking that the trend has American acquiescence or American support or does not portend some serious consequences in European-American relations. The expression by Congress of this concern is enormously important, and I hope it will have an effect on how the Europeans go about their project. As Ambassador Hunter pointed out, the French view is not the unanimous view in Europe, and there are many in Europe who do pay attention to what we think, who do care about the American connection, and who might well share the concerns that we are all expressing. The last point I would stress is that, of course, the administration shares the same views. Deputy Secretary of State Strobe Talbott gave an important speech in London on October 7 reiterating the Administration's concern about the evolution of the EU defense project. It is the Atlanticists in this country that are expressing these concerns, it is not the isolationists. I think the isolationists in this country would be happy to see Europe go its own way; they would wave good-bye and would not be unhappy to see NATO fall apart. But it is the Atlanticists, including the Members of Congress who have passed these resolutions, and it is the Atlanticists in this country who do value the Alliance, who are expressing these concerns. If the Europeans seem to think that the Alliance is dispensable, it is reasonable to fear that there might be a reaction here strengthening the hands of isolationists in this country. Again, I commend the Chairman and the entire Committee for the leadership it has shown on these issues. Thank you very much. Chairman Gilman. [Presiding.] Thank you, Mr. Rodman. [The prepared statement of Mr. Rodman appears in the appendix.] Chairman Gilman. Dr. Serfaty, please proceed. STATEMENT OF DR. SIMON SERFATY, PROFESSOR OF U.S. FOREIGN POLICY, OLD DOMINION UNIVERSITY Mr. Serfaty. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you, too, for the opportunity to be here this morning. I have provided a prepared statement, and given the eloquence of my friends and colleagues on this panel, I will limit myself to a few short points. Chairman Gilman. Without objection, the full statement will be made a part of the record. Mr. Serfaty. First, the war in Kosovo, as well as the war in Bosnia and the Dayton Accords, were about the unfinished business of Europe, namely the need to attend to the pre-Cold War legacies of territorial and ethnic conflicts which the Europeans, left alone, cannot manage by themselves for lack of capabilities and institutional unity. That business is unlikely to go away for the indefinite future, and our commitment to the management of that business is unlikely to fade either. Second, that such would be the case is a matter of interest. Quite clearly, we have in Europe a range of interests, the likes of which are not matched anywhere else in the world. There is now between the United States and Europe a complete relationship that is not found anywhere else, to repeat, outside of the Western Hemisphere. These interests shape our commitments, and not the other way around. It is on that basis that we remain supportive of the European allies in the management of that unfinished business. Third, discussions in Europe about the need for common foreign policy and the desirability of a European security and defense identity are not new. In fact, these discussions have become so repetitive over the past 50 years as to become, frankly, boring. Yet these initiatives are more serious today than they have been at any time over the past 50 years. That this would be the case has to do with an unprecedented level of consensus amongst the European allies, including the big three--Germany, France, and the U.K.. France has become more pro-Atlanticist over the past few years, while the U.K. government, as Mr. Duncan-Smith was suggesting this morning, has become more pro-European than at any point over the past many years. Fourth, a stronger, more coherent and more united Europe is a goal which the United States has been seeking for the past 50 years. Any sort of ambivalence about the fulfillment of that goal would mark a dramatic change in what have been established U.S. policies since 1949. This being said, however, there are legitimate questions about the complications and the dilemmas and the ambiguities which the development of an ESDI or of a CFSP, might introduce--and there are many more D's than the three usually mentioned. I have counted at least five of them: A duplication of NATO resources and capabilities that would be wasteful; A decline of the EU states' commitment to NATO that would be self-defeating; A re-distribution of authority between well-established NATO mechanisms and a newly created EU bureaucracy of standing committees and competing military staffs that would be far too ambiguous; Some discrimination toward NATO states that do not belong to the EU, like Turkey, which would be troubling; and a dangerous back-door diversion of NATO security commitments to non-NATO states that do not belong to the EU. All of these concerns are real, and we should be aware of them. But they are premature at this point because this is no more, or no better, than the beginning of a process that is going to take a number of years before coming to its end point. Indeed it is incumbent upon us to influence the process even while it unfolds in order to prevent those outcomes which we fear or might fear. Fifth, in the context of that process, what the Europeans are most likely to do is not so much to spend more on defense as to stop spending less, and spend better. Only later might they spend more. I suspect that in the next few years, the Europeans will adopt criteria for defense convergence somewhat comparable to the criteria that were developed for their economic and monetary union. The first of those criteria will be defined in terms of comparable percentages of research and development and procurement spending, for example, and convergence in the professionalization of national armies or in the area of privatization of the defense sector. I suspect that these initiatives will be announced at the end of the French presidency in December 2000, with the year as a possible point of arrival. Sixth and finally, I must say a few words about enlargement because enlargement defines the ``C'' of CFSP and the scope of Europe's common foreign policy. Europe's commitment to enlargement to the East is certain and credible, but there should be a more reliable, more readily identifiable, more transparent time line as to its form and schedule. Our concern over enlargement should not be that the EU will renege on this commitment. Our concern has to do with the back- door commitments might develop as the WEU becomes part of a larger EU. I would like to think that between the EU Summit of 2000, December and the next NATO summit in the latter part of 2001, we will begin to work toward a progressive convergence of European membership for both of those institutions. Over time, NATO states in Europe that do not belong to the EU should become members of the EU, and EU states that do not belong to NATO should become members of NATO. That guideline has been implemented since the 1949 Washington Treaty and the 1957 Rome treaties, and it ought to be the flashlight that will help us move toward a convergence of the two institutions that shape the Atlantic community. Mr. Chairman, the way to approach the debate on CFSP and ESDI and other related matters is with a vision statement that does nothing more than stay the course. We are coming to the end game of the process that started in 1949. U.S. policies toward Europe have been extraordinarily successful to the benefit of both sides on the Atlantic. Those policies were shaped by two fundamental ideas: the idea of a strong and united Europe on the one hand, and the idea of a cohesive and coherent NATO on the other. These ideas were never deemed to be contradictory or conflicting. They were always compatible and complementary. The way to approach the 21st century is to keep that vision afloat and to stay the course. Chairman Gilman. Thank you, Dr. Serfaty. [The prepared statement of Mr. Serfaty appears in the appendix.] Chairman Gilman. Let me open up our questions with Mr. Bolton. You have identified some of the major pitfalls that face the transatlantic relationship as a process of an ever-closer union as realized by the EU. Do you believe that the policy of the U.S. should be to stop the development of Europe's common foreign and security policy of the ESDI entirely? If so, how can we accomplish that without risking a permanent rift in our relations with our allies? Mr. Bolton. I don't think that we can stop it, but I think what we should do very clearly is say to the Europeans, that number one we are not indifferent to what you are doing. Number two we do have legitimate interests in it. I think that the Europeans have operated certainly during the last six or seven years, and before that, on the assumption, because of repeated official statements, that we do simply welcome continued integration on political and military matters and that we don't have any concerns about it. I think, and I was sort of in mid-sentence when we broke; let me go back to that thought. It is certainly true, in the Marshall Plan, we welcomed closer European economic integration. It made good sense as economic policy for them, and it suited our purposes in dispensing Marshall Plan aid; but the circumstances of Europe in 1999 are very different from the circumstances of Europe in 1949. Accordingly our interests have changed as well. Although I don't usually quote John Maynard Keynes, somebody once said to him, ``Well, you have changed your opinion. You have changed your policy.'' and he said, ``Sir, when the facts change, I do change my opinion. What do you do?''. I think that the real threat now comes from a European identity that sees itself, defines itself, in large measure as something different than the United States. This is playing out in a number of respects. I think it has consistently played itself out that way in the former Yugoslavia and in dealings with states like Iran and Iraq. The most current example is the subject of missile defense, and there had been reference here earlier today to President Chirac's speech last week where the idea that somehow the development of missile defense is--U.S. development of missile defense--is a threat to the Europeans of separating ourselves out. This is not only wrong factually, but shows the hidden agenda not just of the French, but of many others beyond France who won't say it publicly in a hearing like this, but say it privately very effectively. That is why the French and others in Europe don't refer to us as the world's sole superpower, they refer to us as ``hyperpuissance,'' or ``hyperpower,'' and they don't mean it as a compliment. Think of ``hyperthyroid.'' That is what they are worried about the United States, and that is driving a wedge between us and Europe. Chairman Gilman. Thank you, Mr. Bolton. Mr. Hunter and Dr. Serfaty, let me address a similar question to you. You call for continued U.S. Involvement in European integration. Accepting for the moment that it is in our national interest to continue that involvement, what are the most important things that our Nation can do that it is not doing now in that regard? We also note that Britain, France and Germany want to avoid a U.S. veto on the use of NATO assets for strictly European operations. I would ask you both if you can comment on that. Mr. Hunter. First, Mr. Chairman, I think we should not overreact to some things that we are hearing, particularly statements out of France. When it comes to the bottom line, the French are with us whenever we need them to act. However, when we get to a point where there is less of a challenge, overall, and the French have a chance to act in terms of their own political opportunity within Europe, they take that opportunity. But it is also true that other states in Europe don't agree with the French view. Whether in public or private, I hear something very different from what Mr. Bolton is saying. The Europeans very much stand with us. As I indicated in my testimony, Mr. Chairman, in terms of what we do right now, it is most important to continue pressing for the Defense Capabilities Initiative, to get Europeans to do things so that, either through NATO or ESDI, they can work effectively with us. In that context, we have to be very careful that we don't get a ``fortress Europe'' and a ``fortress America'' in terms of defense companies. There are steps that we need to take to make sure that U.S. technology and U.S. weapons get into the hands of Europeans where they can actually work with us. Chairman Gilman. Dr. Serfaty, would you care to comment on that? Mr. Serfaty. There is very little I can add to what Ambassador Hunter just said. We tend to hear different views of selective speeches as they are being made by President Chirac and others. The French president has said many things over the past months. Two short points, though. John Bolton said our interests have changed since 1949. Of course, they have changed, but they have changed in the direction of being genuinely overwhelming. The range of economic, political, military security, and cultural interests that did not exist in the late 1940's now make disengagement no longer meaningful, let alone possible. You can argue that those interests have become so significant as to not be possible to leave them up to others to protect, but I happen to think that the Europeans can be helpful in that context, and that we can work them out in such a way that those interests are protected by contributions from both sides. As to what to do, I would rather have suggested what not to do. I think that U.S. statements that tend to question such European initiatives are often used by European states as alibis for not doing what they did not want to do in any case. Chairman Gilman. Mr. Rodman, you point out that there is a gap between European rhetoric on an independent defense capability and the reality of their actual capabilities in an environment of sharp cuts in defense spending on the continent. You also pointed out the experience in Kosovo, which made this gap glaringly clear, has fueled the debate in Europe and driven it in a direction of putting the Alliance unity in possible jeopardy. Do you believe that our Nation should put a higher priority on assisting Europe to address that ongoing gap between U.S. technology and Europe's defense capabilities and, in effect, treat the European debate on CFSP and ESDI as a manifestation of some kind of an inferiority complex? Mr. Rodman. We do have an interest in helping the Europeans expand their capability, partly for burden-sharing reasons and partly for the health of the Alliance. A relationship of dependency is very unhealthy and corrupting. So I take no comfort in European weakness. The fact that this CFSP or this St. Malo initiative may fall on its face does not give me pleasure, because we may end up with the worst of all worlds: we may end with a Europe that still does not have the capability to do very much, and yet they will have created an institution which complicates NATO's unity. We need to persuade the Europeans that we are not trying to keep them weak, we are not trying to keep them divided. This is not a divide-and-rule strategy for American dominance. I agree with what Ambassador Hunter said. We need to look at the issue of defense industries and see if barriers on our side are impeding proper business mergers or tech transfer that would help the Europeans improve their effectiveness. We need to do that. But my bottom line is that I think that the unity of the Alliance is the formula for Western unity, and I don't want to see them complicate that. Chairman Gilman. Thank you, Mr. Rodman. I regret that I am going to have to go to a Policy Committee. I am going to ask Mr. Bereuter if he would conclude the remainder of the questioning. I want to thank our witnesses and also Karen Donfried and Paul Gallis of the Congressional Research Service, who helped our staff prepare for this hearing. Thank you very much. Mr. Bereuter. Mr. Bereuter. [Presiding.] I recognize the gentleman from Louisiana, Dr. Cooksey. Mr. Cooksey. I will try to review some of your testimony that I missed. I want to paint a scenario and I want someone to disagree with me and prove me wrong. Mr. Bereuter. Dr. Cooksey, excuse me. I have a recorded vote in Banking so if you will take the Chair while you are doing your questions. Mr. Cooksey. [Presiding.] ESDI becomes larger, and as it becomes large, NATO becomes smaller. Rogue nations, rogue missiles, and there are no leaders in Europe; and quite frankly, I don't think that there are any great leaders anywhere in the world right now. I am not impressed with many people. There are a lot of people that have these titles who are very effective in the medium of the day, which is television. They are very good television communicators. Let's say that the rogue missiles from the rogue nations start falling on Europe. Is there a leader out there in Europe who has the courage to maintain a strong transatlantic relationship, who has the courage to tell his people that they have got to commit to maintaining a strong military, so that they can either intimidate these rogue nations into behaving or respond in a very forceful manner when it does occur? Mr. Hunter. Can I try that? Mr. Cooksey. Sure. Mr. Hunter. I think it has been remarkable how far we have come at NATO in the last ten years from a time, right after the Cold War, when a lot of people wanted to wrap it up. It was argued that there were no more threats. We will have a big party and off you go. We have managed to reconstruct NATO according to a number of propositions, including integrating the Central European states, including even trying to engage Russia. NATO is acting in a strange place that is far away from virtually all of the allies, called Bosnia and now Kosovo. That took a lot of American leadership. America is an effective European power in the post Cold War world-- I am pleased to say, begun by President Bush and carried on by President Clinton, with the solid support of the U.S. Congress throughout. The major task now, as you put it directly, is to get the European allies, individually and severally, to take more seriously precisely the kinds of threats that you are seeing. That leadership, right now, still has to come from America, but in time it also has to come from individual European countries and all of them collectively. I can't name for you any particular leader. We will have to press the Europeans as we have been doing. In fact, the allies in the last few days did put higher on the agenda the question of missile defense, but we will have to be very smart in the handling of this issue, if this is not to become a major divisive issue within the Alliance. But the leadership in the foreseeable future has to come from here, not from any individual European country. Mr. Cooksey. That said, do you think that their position, their posture, or the position that these leaders are taking is because they are playing to their political audience, that they feel that there is a sentiment out there that they need to spend more money on social programs and just blow off their military requirements? Mr. Hunter. I am afraid that there is a lot of that, Mr. Chairman. Leadership requires making tough decisions, and they have to understand what is required for their security. I am pleased that a number of things have been done, but it is a long way from here to where they have to be. Mr. Cooksey. Mr. Bolton, I notice in the first two paragraphs of your statement you said that we should openly acknowledge that the aim to align the foreign and defense policies of the EU's members into one shared and uniform policy is at times motivated either by a desire to distance themselves from United States influence or, in some cases, openly by anti- American intentions. That basically addresses the question that I asked earlier. What is your position on this, or do you think that we have a lot of great world leaders out there that I have overlooked? Mr. Bolton. Unfortunately, you have not overlooked them. I think the experience that we have, we have to look at what has happened, the concrete experiences, and try and extrapolate from them. It is that as the Europeans withdraw from American leadership, or in the term of a program that some of them use, ``American hegemony,'' that they are less likely to stand with us in crisis situations. Let me make two examples: first, dealing with Iran where the Europeans have consistently sought economic advantage in dealing with Iran despite our efforts to try and prevent that; and right next door, in the case of Iraq, where the anti-Saddam Hussein coalition has broken apart in front of our eyes with the French taking a very different view than they did just a few years ago. This is, in part, largely driven by domestic concerns, the question that you were raising a minute ago that Iain Duncan Smith touched on, and in this country, Richard Cooper of Harvard has commented on, that the European leaders are faced with much higher social welfare costs in their countries than we are faced with. Although they have desired the common currency for both political and economic reasons, its coming into being makes it harder for them in what is now a continental competitive economy to keep those welfare costs high. Since they don't see the same threats out there as we do from a defense point of view, it is tempting and it has been the fact that defense budgets are falling. This is in the course of a situation where in the Balkans there have been active military roles that the Europeans have wanted to play, and their defense budgets are still falling. So I see this as a real problem for NATO, where the rhetoric about the strong European pillar is not backed by the reality of defense expenditures. I heard Mr. Brok say that, in the case of France, although I think it is applicable to other European countries, we Americans should take comfort from the fact that their rhetoric is at one level, but their actual performance is something different. This doesn't give me an awful lot of comfort. I ask the question, what if some day the French performance matches their rhetoric? What if they actually do what they say? Mr. Cooksey. As they did with the Persian Gulf? Mr. Bolton. Exactly. So I am very concerned about this. I think it is self-deceptive not to acknowledge that we have a major crisis that we are facing in terms of NATO effectiveness and unity. Mr. Cooksey. Mr. Rodman, did you have a comment on my question or scenario? Mr. Rodman. About the scenario or the anti-American motivation---- Mr. Cooksey. I noticed that you had your hand up. Mr. Rodman. I would second what John was just saying about the motivation. It is not hard to find quotations from European leaders--in addition to the French--who say that the motivation of the European project is to make Europe autonomous from the United States, to make Europe into a counterweight of the United States, to give Europe the ability to act independently of the United States. I think Maastricht reflected that. The collapse of the Soviet Union had two effects. One was that the common threat was gone; that is obvious. Second, it left us the ``hyperpower,'' and Europe is the continent where the idea of the balance of power was invented. Europeans, by reflex, see the imbalance of power across the Atlantic as a problem, and maybe the biggest problem, in their foreign relations. So there is a structural problem in the international system which compounds all of these technical disagreements that we are having. So, I agree with what John said in the paragraphs of his statement you were quoting. Mr. Cooksey. I will close with a comment. I was in the Air Force 30 years ago, and I had occasion to speak at the War College group, the NATO War College group, or a similar group, near Rome. Anyway, one of the messages that I gave them was that in this period when we don't seem to have any great leaders, that once they finish their time in the military they should go back home, take their uniforms off and then become involved in the political process, because that is a kind of leadership. I think these people have a lot of training in leadership, where a lot of leaders now have training in television skills. Mr. Hunter. I think that is exactly right, and I appreciate your saying it. When I was at NATO, people asked me what my toughest job was. I said that is simple: making sure of the support of the U.S. Congress and the American people and the next generation. When you talk about leadership in NATO, I recall what someone once said about a modern weapons systems: designed by geniuses to be run by idiots. What we have to do is try to make sure that these institutions are powerful enough and the common interests are powerful enough that you don't have to have a Churchill or a de Gaulle or a Roosevelt to make them work. Mr. Cooksey. All great leaders. Mr. Hunter I am less pessimistic. I don't see, except for the French maneuvering for short term advantage, a wave of anti-Americanism. I have been struck, even on issues like Kosovo, by the extent to which our leadership is being responded to and respected. There is grumbling in the ranks, but it is nothing even compared to the time of the Cold War. Mr. Cooksey. Thank you. You have been excellent witnesses, and your statements are quite thorough and detailed. I happen to agree with a lot of what you are saying, and that is the reason that I think you are such great witnesses. Mr. Bereuter. [Presiding.] Thank you, Dr. Cooksey, for taking over. This panel, in combination with the first, probably constitutes the most informed discussion that we have had about ESDI in this country and its implications for America. I thank you for your generous time and your patience. I have just a couple of concluding questions and observations to which any of you might wish to respond. First of all, I know it is untraditional, but it seems to me that the West was not prepared for the end of the Cold War, and therefore we had an inability to come to grips with the use of force early in the Yugoslav disintegration when it might have stopped the whole chain of events that is still unfolding. In any case, we didn't have a clear commitment with those concepts in place, theoretically at least. If you have a combined joint task force concept operationally, you have then, it seems to me, opportunities for coalition of the willing to pursue things that not all would agree on; and so maybe it does call into question for the first time--this is the untraditional part, I think--that there really is no need for a separate European pillar, really no need for a special entity inside or outside of NATO. Ambassador Hunter, given the things that you enunciated as coming out of the 1996 agreement, it seems to me as you see what is unfolding now in Brussels, you must be concerned that some of those objectives and those elements of agreement are not likely to be met. I would think so at least. I would think that it is inevitable that there would be a European Caucus within the North Atlantic Council, and that they will have to run back to Brussels, not just back to their national capitals, and this is going to be an impediment to rapid, concise action. In some cases, the trade problems that we have with the European Union are going to spill over into defense issues. That seems to be inevitable. Another unrelated observation, someone mentioned, when it comes to the chips being down, the French will be with us on crucial elements. They were with us in the Persian Gulf, but the largely untold story is that they were totally ineffective. They didn't have interoperability, and I think it was a wake-up call to them. Before we squabbled about commander slots down in Naples, it looked like they might move more directly to full involvement in NATO. Finally, I think that the three ``D's'' as enunciated by Secretary Albright and others--it seems to me that duplication and decoupling are just very, very likely if any kind of effort is developed to put the ESDI within the European pillar, within the European Union. I think, despite the best intentions, that is going to be what happens; and I would expect, given the proclivity of the Europeans to cut their defense expenditures all the time, it will mean a weaker NATO, it will mean a weaker European pillar within NATO. I will stop talking and see what you gentlemen would like to say in response to those observations. Mr. Hunter. I appreciate, Mr. Chairman, your being very direct on that. As I indicated before, maybe my most important concern with the structure as it is evolving is the possibility of a European Caucus within NATO. If we got to a position where some 11 countries, or 15 or whatever it would be, would sit around the North Atlantic Council table and, instead of wrestling with the problems and coming up with solutions, the way the Council actually works, would run back to the European Council for new instructions, it might become ineffective and we might then diminish our interest in NATO. I think this point needs to be made very, very forcefully to the Europeans. Regarding France, I think you put that very well, what happened regarding the Persian Gulf and their subsequent incentive to move back toward NATO. In fact, short of France's actually rejoining the integrated structure, it is doing a lot with NATO right now. I don't think that the French have gone far enough, and I think they still have to recognize that. Also, when we talk about two of those three ``D's'', we will have to press very hard. If in any way this became a matter of decoupling, the Europeans would be the losers just as much, if not more, than we. If they did try to disperse rather than keeping the focus on the transatlantic capabilities, they would be the poorer. With regard to WEU's being absorbed by the European Union, yes, there are some real problems, and it is will take a while to shape it. In his speech in Strasbourg a week and a half ago, President Chirac actually delayed the moment when this would happen, delayed the demise of the WEU; but the cultural and political developments that are involved in this are extraordinary. If the Europeans don't get it right, they will find that they have more integration but less security. Mr. Bereuter. Mr. Rodman has looked at President Chirac's comments in Strasbourg, and he drew the conclusion that Chirac vehemently opposed the idea of finding an institutional link between the EU and NATO. That is very troubling, and I don't think that we can dismiss a comment like that from the President of France. Mr. Hunter. President Chirac said it was premature to talk about this link, but he has no agreement with the other allies. He is isolated. Mr. Bereuter. We will get to all four of you. Mr. Rodman. Mr. Rodman. I think there is clearly inevitability in the European project. There is enormous momentum behind the European idea--psychological, political, social, emotional, ideological even. They are building Europe. The Atlantic idea does not have that momentum, no matter how much we try to remind them or to champion the cause of Atlantic unity. It is not a coincidence that Javier Solana sees the EU job as a promotion. Our job is to harness this European energy somehow and keep it within the Alliance framework, and that is why I was upset by what President Chirac was saying, because the sooner we face the institutional question, the easier it may be to solve. To go back and supplement the beginning of what I said, one wise thing that President Chirac said, is that European publics see are more likely to spend more on defense if they are asked to do it in the name of Europe than if they are asked to do it in the name of the Alliance. I add that to the list of things that suggest that the European idea has enormous power. We should not try to stop it, but somehow to harness it and make sure that in the security arena the Alliance is the major institution of Western unity. Mr. Bereuter. Do you think that his conclusion is likely, that, in fact, they will be more willing to put up money for Europe? Mr. Rodman. I believe that is the domestic political reality. But the battle is not lost if we can make sure that the European institution is somehow in the Alliance framework. Mr. Bereuter. Dr. Serfaty, did you have a comment that you wanted to make? Mr. Serfaty. The European idea is an American idea. It is one that was made possible in the aftermath of World War II in order to force the nationalisms of Europe into a cage from which there would be no escape. This was a way for us, in the United States, to avoid the kind of shuttle diplomacy which we had been engaged into during the previous 50 years, in 1917 and 1941. That idea, which is an American idea, has now come to the end game. In 1999--2007 the 15 members of the European Union are going to make decisions that might be tantamount to the recycling of the national states into member states of an institution to which they belong. We do not know yet what kind of governance will be set in place, or what types of capabilities will be available, and how they should be used. I believe we should rejoice over the fact that this idea is indeed being fulfilled, and because it has worked so well to the benefit of American interests over the past 50 years--economic, political, cultural and security--we should do whatever we can over the next several years to help manage the fulfillment of the emergence of a Europe. I am not concerned about that Europe entering into an adversarial relationship with the United States. President Chirac would be surprised and flattered to see that his speeches in Strasbourg and elsewhere were heard and listened to as carefully as apparently has been the case here. That was not the case in Europe. The meaning of the idea of Europe is precisely the devaluation of the influence of any one nation-state that becomes more and more sensitive to the discipline of the collective way of the institution to which it belongs. Mr. Bereuter. Thank you. Mr. Bolton. Mr. Bolton. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I do not think that the ``European ideal'' is inevitable. There is a real disjunction between political elites on the one hand and the average citizens of Europe on the other, and what they think the final destination of the European enterprise is. I don't think that it is an American idea playing out. I don't think that it is an American idea that the insular, protectionist, isolationist economic policies that we see increasingly coming out of some directorates of Brussels are in our interests. I fear that same insularity that we see in so many economic policies emanating from Europe would emanate from a common European security and defense identity as well. I think the risks, if we are not more assertive about American interests, are that ``European correspondence,'' the flow of policy at low levels through European foreign and defense ministries that already exists already forms an informal caucus in NATO; and it is one of the reasons that I am pessimistic and nervous about it. We have already seen it play out, as I mentioned, in the context, not nearly as important to be sure, of Western European group meetings within the United Nations. It is just incredible where you have discussions and when you reach the outer limit of what the European Union consensus is, the Western group meetings stop and all of the Western Europeans and other governments get up and walk out of the room so the European Union can come to its next consensus. If we are not careful, we will be at that point in NATO in the very near future. Mr. Bereuter. Gentlemen, you have provided a good background brief for Mr. Davis and me to go to the Amsterdam meeting of the NATO Parliamentary Assembly tomorrow if we can ever get out of here and adjourn. It is extremely helpful. I think this was an outstanding contribution that you helped provide for us and for the listening and reading American public. Thank you for the generous amount of your time and for your testimony today. The Committee is adjourned. [Whereupon, at 1:03 p.m., the Committee was adjourned.] ======================================================================= A P P E N D I X November 10, 1999 ======================================================================= [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.001 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.002 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.003 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.004 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.005 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.006 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.007 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.008 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.009 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.010 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.011 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.012 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.013 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.014 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.015 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.016 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.017 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.018 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.019 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.020 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.021 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.022 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.023 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.024 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.025 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.026 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.027 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.028 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.029 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.030 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.031 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.032 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.033 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.034 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.035 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.036 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.037 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.038 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.039 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.040 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.041 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.042 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.043 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.044 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.045 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.046 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.047 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.048 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.049 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.050 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.051 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.052 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.053 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.054 [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4589.055