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Updated: 13-Jul-2005 NATO Speeches

Residence
Palace
Brussels

11 July 2005

Closing remarks

by Dr. Stefanie Babst, Head of NATO Countries,
Division of Public Diplomacy
at the WIIS Conference, Brussels, 11 July 2005

Event
11/07/2005
NATO: New Tasks and Responsibilities

Well looking at the agenda it seems that we have the end which is not surprising because it`s 5 o'clock and we've been on our seats and busy with our minds since 8 o'clock.

So I have the- I'm not quite sure if this is an honour but more or less a privilege I'd say, I mean, to wrap up.

I have to confess that I'm not really very keen when it comes to volunteering for 'wrap up' roles, because (inaudible) you know, either you go and stick for a protocol kind of wrap up and just thank all and everybody who participated in this exercise, in this conference of today.

Or you really try to summarize all the various and very important points being made throughout the course and this will easily lead to another, at least, one and a half hour full lecture of myself so I'm not going to even try and attempt this.

But I would nevertheless like to close with a few thoughts that crossed my mind while listening to the various speakers in the course of this morning and also in the course of today- this afternoon.

And I'm absolutely certain that many of you have taken notes individually on the points and on the various aspects that you probably found interesting, inspiring, new, critical and so on and so forth.

But when it comes to me, I mean I've noted a few, just a very few points. So what is it actually that we can take away from this conference looking at NATO's new roles and responsibilities?

I'd start with three very, very general ones, they almost sound a bit banal but nevertheless I'd like to stress them.

There seemed to me, again in the course of this morning and this afternoon, a rather broad consensus and broad acknowledgement for the fact that yes, NATO's military and political transformation seems to be in full swing. Again, it may sound a bit banal but while looking back just only I'd say a year or a year and a half- or two years ago, I recall having a broad debate outside and also partly inside NATO about the lack of any raison d'ĂȘtre of NATO. It seems to me that we've left that behind and I think that that's a very good thing to do.

Secondly, there seemed to be broad acknowledgement amongst our ranks here that there is a good need for NATO to remain a central forum for transatlantic security cooperation and also to remain a very, very important facilitator when it comes to the convergence of interests and views on either side of the Atlantic.

Again, looking back just you know two or three years ago, I mean it seemed like we had a broad and very vast gap between the two sides of the Atlantic but now looking at the agenda which is currently on our table and also will be ahead of us, I think that we've come to see that there are a variety of very important common transatlantic projects that we have embarked upon already and will continue to embark.

The Secretary General this morning listed his, Jaap described his list of things to do, and while listening to him just mentioning the various issues ranging from the fight against terrorism all the way to Ukraine and Russia and what you have that probably, I mean, Gale Mattox was one of his ghost writers because her list of functions that she presented to us, of NATO's functions, were very much overlapping with that.

So what are the limits? What are the 'to do' things for NATO that were mentioned by many of you in the course of today?

Again just a few thoughts that I would like to offer to you. The first one, I think if I'm not mistaken that was pointed out by many of you, was that there obviously seems to be a need for NATO to develop a stronger strategic consensus among either sides of the Atlantic when it comes to what we actually want to do with this organization.

We heard a lot this morning about NATO's outreach policies and NATO going global, NATO- or the need for NATO to go global but I also heard this morning some views referring to NATO as a 'purely classical collective defence organization'. NATO should stick to its military core function it was said this morning. So at least this strikes me that we need to continue working on finding the consensus about how political NATO should actually become when transforming.

And when it comes to the political transformation of NATO obviously it's not entirely up to the Secretary General, with all due respect, or to NATO Headquarters, to push that political debate within allies or among allies but most importantly it's up to our capitals. It's up to our, you know, governments in order to make use of this transatlantic forum of NATO in order to actually put on the table what we'd like to put on the table to discuss politically.

What also must we do? We must link up more systematically to other international players. This was repeatedly said throughout the day and I couldn't agree more. Yes we need to do much better when it comes to establishing strategic partnerships with the European Union, with the United Nations and also, this was not mentioned today but I would nevertheless add it, also to the OSCE for instance.

When reaching out more geographically, I mean, to a wider region as we discussed throughout today we need to, obviously, underpin our political willingness and our willingness to declare that, you know to declare our intention to do so by as it was said and I think rightly said, by expertise, by financial resources and other humanitarian funding and you can be assured that these thoughts are taken well and brought back to the Headquarters.

Elizabeth, I think it was you, introducing at least to me a new term. You talked about "transformational diplomacy" so I will definitely, probably you will- (inaudible) keep that in the back of my mind because to me it was an argument saying that this is actually what NATO has done while reaching out to partner countries some years ago and this is probably what we should continue doing while reaching out to failed states in order to bring them back into a family of democratic countries.

Yes we need to be better on reconstruction, no doubt about that and Barbara, Chantal and others thought, I mean, are well taken on board of how to do better in Afghanistan, better in the Balkans and obviously also a bit better when it comes to our mission in Iraq.

Clare Short, you painted a picture which was- I mean it was said already, very, very pessimistic and I must personally say I share many of your analytical points when describing the shortcomings in institutions but also the shortcomings when it comes to take on political risk in order to actually meet crises in Africa or in other parts of the world.

But I would, nevertheless, point back in saying, I mean there is also always this picture of this glass being half full and half empty. I personally would point also to the fact that we reach at least a little bit of a half full glass in civil war-torn countries like Bosnia or even Afghanistan. Admittedly I mean we are far from having completed that glass but I would nevertheless make the case that NATO has started at least to make a difference here.

So lots of things on our list to do. And without, again, adding them all or adding more to them, I would just like to say that obviously we're going to continue the discussion on transatlantic issues like that. I very much hope that we're going to continue the discussion also within the framework of WIIS or of other organizations and partners.

Which leads me to my last point which is my list of people and colleagues I would like to thank.

I once again very warmly would like to thank US WIIS and also the German WIIS chapter, I mean you really took on board the bulk of the organizational burden to make this conference happen and so, once again, my very warm appreciation for that.

I would also like to thank all speakers, may it be moderators, or panellists or everybody else who have actively participated in these discussions.

Thanks a lot for sticking with us until the very end at 5 o'clock. Thanks to all those who simply listenand stayed in their seats, that's also warmly appreciated.

And last but not least I would like to thank my own colleagues from NATO. You've seen probably some of them, but you haven't seen the full team because some of our colleagues have been working in our backroom covering our- it went on the NATO website as we spoke so once you go back to your hotel rooms or to your offices and you want to click on the NATO website you'll find your speeches, your photos, your intervention, it's all there. So a very warm thanks to Celeste and to Chris and Walter and George and all the rest who've made that happen.

Thanks also very warmly to my US colleagues James Snyder and Patrick Stephenson, Judith and Miriam for working so hard on this conference. I very much appreciate it.

And also I would like to say a word of warm appreciation to our translators, sitting there in the translation booth, Andrea and colleagues. In fact it was surprising to me this morning when I heard the Secretarial General speaking French but that was a good- an additional reason for you being here and making it possible for us to communicate with the Secretary General in the two NATO official languages. So thanks a lot for that as well.

On that happy note, I shall close on wishing you a nice relaxing sunny evening back here in Brussels and very much hoping that our paths shall cross soon again.

Thank you.
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