Experience covering and handling some of the biggest issues in world affairs. I am sitting with four of the people i would reach out for insights and thoughts. Cant say i got that many of them. One better to speak about the milestone of the Nato Alliance at 70 and the challenges we are facing. Im going to ask each of the ambassadors to start off by talking about how nato was brought home to them by the unique issues and may be a little bit of their reflections on what nato meant to them at the time. Evening, everybody. I want to thank the ambassador who is our host and who has done such a great job. It is a national and internationally known present as of all of you and his efforts. Say iing to be brief and was ambassador to nato between august 31, 2001 and march, 2005. My Great Fortune was our deputy i arrivedion not knowing as much as i wanted to know about nato. We were hit hard. Everybody in this audience remembers where we were. Ahead of theours withcoast, in a meeting our fellow ambassadors when the word came in. We were cut off from washington for a number of hours. As you may remember, the White House State Department and Defense Department were evacuated. The Defense Department was hit physically. Significant damage. A threat of another bombing, which evacuated the building. We cannot reach anybody. We simply watched the twin towers fall on cnn like everybody else. The phone started to ring inside our mission. We are state department and Defense Department. We report to the president through colin powell. The phone rang. One of my first phone calls was to the canadian ambassador. You thought about invoking article five . If you havent read the treaty today, is the key part of the contract among the allies. An attack on one of us shall be an attack on all of us. 1949 so whenn in europe was attacked, they thought by stalin, the u. S. And canada would come across the the for the third time in 20th century. We were attacked on 9 11. The ambassador said, i think they will support you if you want military assistance. Worked the phones with all the allies that day. They called home to get permission to agree to go to war with us. The next morning, september 12, we invoked article five for the first and only time in nato history. Here is what it meant to me. Before we went down, to make that vote, i called condoleezza rice. I said, the allies want to invoke article five. We need the president because personal authority. I said, go for it. I said great you are giving us the authority. She said, go for us. She said, the president had a really bad day. Go for it. I said, i will take that as my president ial instruction. She said, it is good to have friends in the world. Memory of 9 11. Our allies, canada at that time, 17 other allies stood with us. They went into afghanistan with us. Us. Of them are still with they suffered over 1000 combat deaths. Buy an Alliance Like that in the world. The russians and chinese do not read they do not have a single country that will fight for them. I look at toledo as a jewel. Nato as a jewel. For any american to say this alliance is an important is not important and vital, they do not know what we know. I am going to jump across the line. We have talked about this before. 9 11 11 kind of encapsulated nato represented. You followed nick. Yourself. Enced that i was with nick as his deputy and then i came back. Into until 2008. Ands a congenital optimist he drove that article five home. It was my job to worry. Or lesser that day optimistically. Had 21 allies around the table. Some were clear they would stand with us. Others didnt know what it meant. We didnt know actually who had hit us. They did not know what we would do in response. They did not know what the legal response would be. That meant their young men and women had to go who knows where . We had folks who were representatives of coalition governments. Governments that required parliamentary approval. Meet to doposed to the invitation on the 12th. At 12 30, we had one smallentative from one nation crying on the couch of the secretarygeneral of nato because he could not get his government to say yes. This is what it means to be the deputy. We had another who had to have a parliamentary seating. The parliament did not come together. A country she knows well. They did not come together until 12 45. I remember various military commanders getting out the treaty to make sure we could do it. I do not quite remember condi saying, go for it but she did say, dont f it up if i recall. Havee did say good to friends in the world. I remember thinking in the day after the worst day in American History since pearl harbor, if we do not get these other votes, we will not only be the victims of 9 11, we will have ruined a nato but it did not go that way. We had a happy ending. Back, 2005, we had had the iraq war which had been divisive within the alliance. France were very opposed. Worried about needing protection. Hard to get nato patriot batteries there to protect turkey in the event of a counterstrike. I spent those years trying to convince allies, george w. Bush and his second term was more ally friendly than in the first term. Trying to get them to go to afghanistan. We learned, these nato militaries at the time were very wellequipped for Territorial Defense and putting tanks on their border, but getting out to afghanistan and maintaining their equipment out there and actually fighting an enemy who fought in the shadows was a harder thing. We spent a lot of time retooling allies for distance, this friend kinds of capabilities. Finding niches for all of them. Which i think is a better way to go, mentor allies, work with them. Build capabilities they need. Then simply yelling at them with a bully pulpit. Sometimes that drives them in the wrong direction. Makes them harder politically to join us. I remember traveling to nato with secretary clinton. Va was the ambassador. We were trying to get more countries to commit more troops. Him. Into i said, who are you trying to get to give more troops . He said, we dont do voltage diplomatic conversations. I remember a few i roles. Being anmber it important task. To convince allies, the u. S. Is going to put more skin in the game but they have to as well. I inherited a very healthy alliance. There was the decision which the ambassador will remember. We had a big debate. When you have some time, he can we needed to do in terms of more troops to afghanistan. The decision was, yeah, we can probably do 40,000 more troops but the u. S. Will only do 30000 and the allies will have to do 10. The white was a diplomatic secret. By the way. O 10, it wasnt just me. It was a government effort. Everyone in the state department, the Defense Department. We got the troops to surge. We have continued this operation. The of the training of troops, afghan forces, they are nonamerican. That continues to be the case. That is part of what it means to be an alliance. Let me talk about one particular vignette that tells you something. We debated whether to go into libya. Natos ambassador to the United States, every country at that moment learned what we thought in brussels might not be what we thought in the capitals. About what weate were trying to do. Go through the history of nato. Other than to say, the president this wass. Decided going to involve nato. The u. S. Would take the initial lead. Because arab countries are more involved. The process,of they should take the lead. They should take carry the bulk of the operation. We would help them get started. The kind of forces we had. Intelligence, surveillance capabilities. Targeting capabilities. Ourad some intelligence allies did not have. We would provide that but the allies would have to do the operation. The president said, we will lead but we will hand it off to someone. Thoughtn washington about who they would hand it off to. I said,t decision came, that is interesting. Who do you think is going to take the lead. The french, who really wanted to get into libya . British oront see dutch or american writers being the brits, they dont have the capacity for a multinational force. We had to sell back to washington the idea nato should take control of this operation. There is a reluctance. Say, maybe not. Of theind a coalition willing. We had to educate people about the importance of nato. Why it is part of the operational system. The military understood it, the diplomats a little less so. You spend your time in brussels, not only spending a lot of time talking to your colleagues. Spend a lot of time educating washington about the importance of the alliance. Why friends ought to be part of what we do in a day to day basis. Coming to the Nato Alliance as ambassador, having seen it from that end, you come in. That was a time dealing with ukraine. On crimea. Igns while they sought nato take a turn into areas not necessarily considered part of its charter. Nefending against russia aggression, it kind of seems like this is back to basics. I fall 2013. D in early i thought, what a great place from which to retype. Things were quiet. What could possibly go wrong . That persisted for six months. And then beginning and sort of late february, early much of 2014, we saw four months of complete crisis. The crimean seized peninsula, sovereign part of the ukraine. For the First Time Since world war ii. We saw just a couple months after that, he occupied two provinces by way of overt and covert provinces in ukraine. And they are still there. This got natos attention even though ukraine is not an ally. Then in june of 2014, they had a guy by the name of albaghdadi and declare aue caliphate. Northern syria and Northern Iraq is northern turkey. And turkey is an nato ally. 2, three things happen in quick succession and what i took from this dense period was that nato is actually, even though it is a 70yearold bureaucracy of at that time 27 or 28 nations, it could adapt. If you look through the Rearview Mirror at that period natos taken some very substantial adaptations that really account for this Inflection Point in 2014. Mayant to circle back if i a beg your indulgence to 9 11. While that was a very interesting policy period, for me, the most poignant experience was after i left nato. Ofeft on january, 2017, 20th january, high noon. No coincidence there. And President Trump is now president and it is traditional that one of the first thoughts the new president takes after being inaugurated is nato. First of all it is a very efficient use of the president s time because he can go there and heads of state and government and he sort of goes and recommit the American Firm alliance commitment, article v at nato headquarters. So, we imagined before president ial became President Trump, wouldnt it be great if we commemorated in a solemn way 9 11. And what they experienced on september 12. Going to the 9 11 museum in new york and arranging on permanent loan to nato an artifact from the north tower. This is some artifacts. About as big as this stage. It is now mounted outside the new nato headquarters. A piece of twisted metal which is the point of impact in the north tower. Thats now outside nato headquarters, in the main public entrance. Every day when nato employs works work they walk past this memorial. And the idea was, what better way to memorialize and remind us t the potency of article v, attacks,america was our allies were there for us. We imagined that the new president would go to nato headquarters. The first meeting in the new headquarters. So, therefore this display was to be unveiled. Its called the article v memorial, ok . We imagine that what better way for the next president when she came to brussels [laughter] to unveil this and remind everybody. And she wanted have. The poignant memory is that none of that happened. The memorial was there. The podium was there and the new president castigated and showed disrespect to our allies in public with the cameras rolling and never said the words article v. I say that not as applicable statement but because it reminded me, it reminded me of something that nato has taken for granted for 70 years, and that is the commitment out of the oval office, out of the white house. It was so poignant because it is such a sharp contrast. That brings us to a shameless plug for doug and nicks excellent report from the center, nato at 70, an alliance in crisis. I want to quote from the report about the challenges, its about ten big challenges nato is fac ing. I encourage you to check out the report. Represent the more severe crisis in the security environment in europe since the end of the cold war and perhaps ever. The question is whether the alliance can adapt to these changes, and retool for the decades ahead. Is notalk about how this a political statement, one of the big challenges and probably the biggest challenge and what the report says the single greatest threat is the absence of strong principled American Leadership for the first time in its history. It talks about the first President Trump is the first president to, you know, talk about the e. U. And europe as a competitor, not a partner of the u. S. Antinato sentiment and that the alliance is, you know, in crisis because of this. Confidence in American Leadership at very low depths. And the last quote is trump may well cause even greater damage to the alliance while he remains in office. This is not a political statement. Two ambassadors from various political persuasions talking about a threat to the alliance. And nick, why dont we talk, tell us a bit about how President Trumps, obviously his desire to have burden sharing and collective defense spending, that is an issue many president s have talked about. Enemy, seeingo as nato as worse than china. And russia. How has that damaged the alliance, and sometimes people say that the biggest challenge that nato has is just getting through the rest of this administration. Thanks for allowing us to plug our harvard study. Doug and i spent six months on both sides of the atlantic talking to nato leaders in north america and in europe. 60 people, we talked a member of congress. We testified before congress. A tried to approach it on nonpartisan basin. Basis. And our tradition is nonpartisanship. We all served republicans and democrats. Lets just reiterate that. Youre looking at people who have served over a republican and democratic administration, very important to remember. Right. Study which this tries the analyze the health of nato. I want to start by saying we think nato is in great shape. It needs reform but it is strong and is definitely part of americas future. As we looked at the problems and crises surrounding nato our first recommendation is that absence of strong president ial leadership. Truman and eisenhower, jfk and bushes, bill clinton, barack obama, all of our president s had thought this was a Central Institution for American Security and President Trump clearly does not. Just a couple of examples. He has never stood up in an unequivocal way supported article v, our commitment to our allies and theirs to us. Hes had several swings at the bat. Most notably on the evening of helsinkis summit last july with Vladimir Putin he was asked by Tucker Carlson of fox news, a hypothetical question. Mr. President if montenegrin is under attack from russia, talk across them, do you think our sons and daughters and United States should go to war to defend montenegrin . Trump said, im not sure they should. Paraphrasing. That is not backing up article v. Hes never done it. Hes never taken on the issue of russian interference. Russias attack on our 2016 election on the dutch, fencrenc h and german elections. Has never convened a meeting to talk about the fact that putin is using cyber warfare. Notably, the single greatest existential problem is the rise of the antidemocratic populace like Marine Le Pen in france and in the netherlands, alternative for deutsche land in germany. And President Trump is not leading the charge against the antidemocratic congress as yo umight picture that Ronald Reagan wouldve done. Picture or bond, the president of hungary, and the polish government. Hes has made the small d democrats, angela merkel, justin trudeau, theresa may. He has turned american policy towards nato upside down and first taking his president ial leadership. That is our first recommendation that there is a lot more in this report than just our view of donald as the weakest american president by far on the Nato Alliance. If i could just add. It is number one among ten challenges, and the reason for that is in order to give it the other night it requires u. S. President ial leadership era there is no other head of state of government among the 29 lac will take that that place is reserve the United States president. And it is absent. Or handicapped in terms of the think one of interesting things was meeting the challenges of a rising china, for instance. And on the economic front and the trade front, that is somewhere that President Trump has been willing to confront china, but i mean, it does seem as if china is emerging as a threat to and a competitor certainly seeking dominance and military technology and such that is a threat to nato. We cite two of the ten challenges as not heare yet but imminent. We call them on the horizon, meaning they are in front of us. One is emerging technologies. We call for nato to update the way it applies commercial technologies to military purposes and in particular getting a things like artificial intelligence, Cloud Computing and so forth. Natos behind the game on it. And the second is the competitionwith china. That competition from the perspective of our european allies is mostly commercial competition. China is b