Deputy Secretary General: NATO’s success due to continuous adaptation
Deputy Secretary General Rose Gottemoeller on Wednesday (22 March) outlined how NATO has continuously adapted to deal with changing security environments. Ms. Gottemoeller was speaking at the NATO Transformation Seminar in Budapest, an event that brings together key figures from across the Alliance to discuss the strategic challenges that NATO will face in the near to long term.
The Deputy Secretary General shared a platform with Mr. István Simicskó, Hungarian Minister of Defence and General Denis Mercier, NATO’s Supreme Allied Commander for Transformation. “I am confident that this year’s seminar will inform NATO’s policies today, help us to creatively shape tomorrow and keep our edge for many years to come”, Ms Gottemoeller said opening the event. “NATO has been so successful for almost 70 years because we have continuously adapted and today as we face the biggest challenges in a generation, we must continue to drive that adaptation for generations to come,” she added.
In her speech the Deputy Secretary General highlighted key examples of NATO adaptation, such as the Alliance’s partnership programme which now has a network of forty one partner countries around the world. The Deputy Secretary General praised NATO Allied Command Transformation (ACT), which organised the event. She remarked how ACT, which has its headquarters in Virginia, was a vivid symbol of NATO’s enduring transatlantic bond. Later on Wednesday, the Deputy Secretary General delivered a speech at the Institute for Foreign Affairs and Trade entitled “Adapting to a More Dangerous World”, setting out how NATO is enhancing its collective defence and projecting greater stability to the South and East.