lcremonni 's List: NATO project

• At an earlier joint press conference with Sarkozy, Obama reiterated the United States' commitment to NATO, describing it as the "most successful alliance in modern history."
• "The basic premise of NATO was that Europe's security was the United States' security and vice versa,"
• But summit co-host France, which is rejoining NATO's high command this weekend after more than 40 years, has rarely seen eye-to-eye with the U.S. on military matters.

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• NATO leaders adopted a Declaration on Alliance Security reaffirming the basic values, principles and purposes of the NATO Alliance.
• NATO leaders also welcomed the French decision to fully participate in NATO structures

• Article 5 of the Washington Treaty -- that an attack against one Ally is an attack against all -- is at the core of the Alliance, a promise of collective defense. Article 4 of the treaty ensures consultations among Allies on security matters of common interest,
• NATO leads the UN-mandated International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan and has ongoing missions in the Western Balkans, the Mediterranean, and Iraq;

• • trying to improve NATOs current forces becuase today they aren't integrated
• Ladies and gentlemen, NATO today is no longer the NATO of 1966, nor even that of 1995 when France first began her rapprochement.  The Alliance has given up its cold-war posture, focused on the defence of territory – while of course maintaining its mission, its very raison d’etre, which is collective defence in case of aggression, Article 5.  It has begun to contribute to international stability and to defend the interests of its members beyond NATO’s borders – in Bosnia, in Kosovo, in Afghanistan, and also quite recently off the cost of Somalia to combat piracy.  In most cases, furthermore, it is doing these things under United Nations mandate.
• NATO must learn to work consistently with all these players in an integrated manner.  Personally I have worked to improve relations between NATO and the UN: I was the first NATO Secretary General to speak before the Security Council in New York; I
• simplification of the chain of command, encouragement of new capability initiatives focusing on the deployability of forces, creation of the NATO Reaction Force, the NRF.  Integrated forces no longer exist: forces are made available to NATO by the nations for a given mission (only a few dedicated forces remain, for practical reasons of consistency, as in the case of air defence).  This reform effort is continuing, and it is close to my heart –

  • trying to create new forces, not separate ones!
• I see myself as a European and an Atlanticist,

  • who is talking? what country is he from?

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