[House Hearing, 117 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
NATO 2030: A CELEBRATION OF ORIGINS AND AN EYE TOWARD THE FUTURE
(E3C SUBCOMMITTEE__NATO PARLIAMENTARY ASSEMBLY JOINT HEARING)
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HEARING
BEFORE THE
SUBCOMMITTEE ON EUROPE, ENERGY, THE ENVIRONMENT AND CYBER
OF THE
COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED SEVENTEENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
June 24, 2021
__________
Serial No. 117-53
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Foreign Affairs
[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Available: http://www.foreignaffairs.house.gov/, http://
docs.house.gov,
or http://www.govinfo.gov
__________
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
44-883 PDF WASHINGTON : 2021
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COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS
GREGORY W. MEEKS, New York, Chairman
BRAD SHERMAN, California MICHAEL T. McCAUL, Texas, Ranking
ALBIO SIRES, New Jersey Member
GERALD E. CONNOLLY, Virginia CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, New Jersey
THEODORE E. DEUTCH, Florida STEVE CHABOT, Ohio
KAREN BASS, California SCOTT PERRY, Pennsylvania
WILLIAM KEATING, Massachusetts DARRELL ISSA, California
DAVID CICILLINE, Rhode Island ADAM KINZINGER, Illinois
AMI BERA, California LEE ZELDIN, New York
JOAQUIN CASTRO, Texas ANN WAGNER, Missouri
DINA TITUS, Nevada BRIAN MAST, Florida
TED LIEU, California BRIAN FITZPATRICK, Pennsylvania
SUSAN WILD, Pennsylvania KEN BUCK, Colorado
DEAN PHILLIPS, Minnesota TIM BURCHETT, Tennessee
ILHAN OMAR, Minnesota MARK GREEN, Tennessee
COLIN ALLRED, Texas ANDY BARR, Kentucky
ANDY LEVIN, Michigan GREG STEUBE, Florida
ABIGAIL SPANBERGER, Virginia DAN MEUSER, Pennsylvania
CHRISSY HOULAHAN, Pennsylvania AUGUST PFLUGER, Texas
TOM MALINOWSKI, New Jersey PETER MEIJER, Michigan
ANDY KIM, New Jersey NICOLE MALLIOTAKIS, New York
SARA JACOBS, California RONNY JACKSON, Texas
KATHY MANNING, North Carolina YOUNG KIM, California
JIM COSTA, California MARIA ELVIRA SALAZAR, Florida
JUAN VARGAS, California JOE WILSON, South Carolina
VICENTE GONZALEZ, Texas
BRAD SCHNEIDER, Illinois
Jason Steinbaum, Staff Director
Brendan Shields, Republican Staff Director
------
Subcommittee on Europe, Energy,the Environment and Cyber
WILLIAM R. KEATING, Massachusetts, Chairman
SUSAN WILD, Pennsylvania BRIAN FITZPATRICK,
ABIGAIL SPANBERGER, Virginia Pennsylvania,Ranking Member
ALBIO SIRES, New Jersey ANN WAGNER, Missouri
THEODORE DEUTCH, Florida ADAM KINZINGER, Illinois,
DAVID CICILLINE, Rhode Island BRIAN MAST, Florida
DINA TITUS, Nevada DAN MEUSER, Pennsylvania
DEAN PHILLIPS, Minnesota AUGUST PFLUGER, Texas
JIM COSTA, California NICOLE MALLIOTAKIS, New York
VICENTE GONZALEZ, Texas PETER MEIJER, Michigan
BRAD SCHNEIDER, Illinois
Leah Nodvin, Staff Director
C O N T E N T S
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Page
WITNESSES
Rasmussen, His Excellency Anders Fogh, Founder & Chairman,
Rasmussen Global, Former Secretary General, NATO, Former Prime
Minister of Denmark............................................ 11
Gottemoeller, The Honorable Rose, Frank E. and Arthur W. Payne
Distinguished Lecturer, Center for International Security and
Cooperation, Freeman Spogli Institute for International
Studies, Stanford University, Former Deputy Secretary General,
NATO, Former Undersecretary of State for Arms Control and
International Security Affairs, U.S. Department of State....... 18
Daalder, The Honorable Dr. Ivo H., President, Chicago Council on
Global Affairs, Former U.S. Ambassador to NATO................. 25
Mitchell, The Honorable Dr. A. Wess, Co-Chair, NATO 2030
Reflection Group, Former Assistant Secretary of State for
European and Eurasian Affairs, U.S. Department of State........ 33
APPENDIX
Hearing Notice................................................... 64
Hearing Minutes.................................................. 66
Hearing Attendance............................................... 67
CORRECTION TO THE STATEMENT OF ROSE GOTTEMOELLER
Correction to the statement of Rose Gottemoeller................. 68
RESPONSES TO QUESTIONS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD
Responses to questions submitted for the record from
Representative Wagner.......................................... 69
STATEMENT SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD
Statement submitted for the record from Representative Sanchez... 70
NATO 2030: A CELEBRATION OF ORIGINS AND AN EYE TOWARD THE FUTURE
(E3C SUBCOMMITTEE----NATO PARLIAMENTARY ASSEMBLY JOINT HEARING)
Thursday, June 24, 2021
House of Representatives,
Subcommittee on Europe, Energy, the
Environment and Cyber,
Committee on Foreign Affairs,
Washington, DC.
The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:02 a.m.,
via Webex, Hon. William R. Keating (chairman of the
subcommittee) presiding.
Mr. Keating. The House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee will
come to order.
Without objection, the chair is authorized to declare a
recess of the committee at any point and all members will have
5 days to submit statements, extraneous materials, and
questions for the record, subject to the length limitation in
the rules.
To insert something into the record, please have your staff
email the previously mentioned address and contact full
committee staff.
Please keep your video function on at all times, even when
you're not recognized by the chair. Members are responsible for
muting and unmuting themselves, and please remember to mute
yourself after you finish speaking.
Consistent with House Res. 965 and the accompanying
regulations, staff will only mute members and witnesses as
appropriate when they are not under recognition to eliminate
the background noise.
I will note that we have a hard stop today at 12 p.m. So I
ask the witnesses and my colleagues to keep their remarks to 5
minutes. We'll monitor this.
We'll be working--restricting members' questions time to 5
minutes so that we can afford as many people the opportunity to
question as possible since this is a joint effort.
I see that we have a quorum. I now recognize myself for
opening remarks.
Pursuant to notice, we're holding a hearing today entitled
``NATO 2030: A Celebration of Origins and an Eye Toward the
Future.''
Ten years ago on June 14th, in true testament to the power
of the Trans-Atlantic Alliance, 10 days ago rather, all 30
allied nations met at the NATO Summit in Brussels and agreed to
launch an ambitious set of initiatives meant to ensure the
collective security of NATO members well into the 21st century.
Moreover, President Biden reaffirmed the United States'
commitment to NATO principles and responsibilities, most
notably, America's steadfast commitment to Article 5, that an
attack on any member of our Trans-Atlantic Alliance is an
attack on all and will be met with a collective response.
In anticipation of last week's summit, my colleague and
current president of the NATO Parliamentary Assembly,
Representative Connolly, and I decided to organize this hearing
to echo support for trans-Atlantic security ideals, reflect on
and reaffirm the NATO alliance, and examine the critical
takeaways from this year's summit.
Before I continue with my opening statement, I'd like to
offer my thanks to you and your staff, Representative, for
jointly helping us to organize this hearing today, and I
commend your tireless efforts to preserve and strengthen the
alliance and I look forward to continuing our work together
during Congress.
I also welcome all NATO Parliamentary Assembly members who
joined us today, which will undoubtedly elevate our discussion.
One of the first hearings I held as chairman of the
subcommittee, roughly, 2 years ago was on the importance of the
NATO alliance as well as the opportunities and challenges that
our alliances face.
Much has changed in that relatively short period of time.
We have had a Presidential election, undergone a global
pandemic, tackled important social issues globally, and much
more.
But what has remained constant through all of this is the
vital role of NATO in our collective security and prosperity.
Looking toward the future and to quote Secretary General
Stoltenberg, NATO must ensure the alliance can face the
challenges and threats of today and, importantly, tomorrow.
These new and emerging security concerns include increased
acts of aggression from China, Russia, and other malign actors,
as well as an increase in asymmetrical threats, including
cyber-attacks, hybrid warfare, terrorism, and climate change.
With new and emerging threats from traditional and
nontraditional sources, the Biden administration's renewed
commitment to our trans-Atlantic alliances and the role of
American leadership at NATO has never been more important than
it is now.
America has a responsibility to assure our NATO allies that
this institution has been and will continue to be a cornerstone
of our security and defense policies. Our unbreakable and
values-based coalition is the strategic advantage that we have
over our adversaries.
But these new and emerging threats, in the words of former
Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, also mean that NATO,
like all things that reach a certain age, needs a little
refurbishment.
This means contemplating possible changes of NATO structure
and strategic thinking, not only about how NATO should adapt to
this landscape but also how the U.S. and other member States
must work together to strengthen the alliance and increase
their own contributions.
For these reasons, I strongly support Secretary General
Stoltenberg's efforts to gather diverse and inclusive voices in
developing his priorities for NATO 2030, and was heartened to
see leaders of the Western alliance make clear at the most
recent summit that NATO is ready and equipped to tackle the
security challenges facing the world today.
Now, to better understand the outcomes and decisions made
during the summit and the role of Congress in it, my colleagues
and I and the NATO Parliamentary Assembly have invited an
incredibly experienced and knowledgeable high-level set of
witnesses intimately familiar with NATO and the many
challenges: former Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen,
former Deputy Secretary General Rose Gottemoeller, former U.S.
Ambassador to NATO, Ivo Daalder, and co-chair of the NATO 2030
Reflection Group, Wess Mitchell.
As a former NATO--as former NATO leaders and trans-Atlantic
security professionals, you've been intimately involved in the
inner workings of the alliance. You champion its ideals and
have sought to modernize its impact on global security.
Your testimony will help us better understand the long-
standing impacts of decisions made by NATO member States to
ensure long-lasting security for generations to come.
NATO, now in its 73d year, is most powerful and successful
alliance in history and one that continues to provide security
for approximately 1 billion people in Europe and North America
today.
As Members of Congress, we continue to support the work
you've contributed to preserving and strengthening in this
critically important political military alliance, and I look
forward to hearing your testimony today.
I now turn to Ranking Member Brian Fitzpatrick for his
opening statement.
Mr. Fitzpatrick. Thank you, Chairman Keating. Thank you to
our witnesses, to Chairman Connolly, to all those joining us
from the NATO Parliamentarian Assembly.
And today, we have the opportunity to hear from individuals
who have set the agenda for NATO to learn from their past
decisions and discuss how to ensure NATO is stronger and better
prepared for the future.
Earlier this month, NATO Secretary General Stoltenberg
revealed the NATO 2030 agenda to address some of the most
pressing issues facing our trans-Atlantic partnership.
The summit in Brussels marked a critical juncture of future
cooperation amongst our allies, recognizing ways to work
together and how to address the looming threat of our two
strategic competitors, China and Russia.
And as a founding member, the United States is fully
committed to the NATO alliance and to the Article 5 collective
defense guarantee.
First invoked after the 9/11 terror attacks, our NATO
allies stood shoulder to shoulder with the United States,
sacrificing greatly in solidarity, and as we look to the
future, a similar solidarity must be held when realizing the
commitment of the 2014 Wales Summit.
NATO members must resist calls to downgrade the burden
sharing formulas of 2 percent of GDP on defense and 20 percent
of annual defense spending going toward new equipment,
research, and development.
Greater cooperation amongst our NATO allies is also
critical to Euro-Atlantic security and shared prosperity, and,
as recognized at the Brussels Summit, China and Russia have
leveraged their economic interests and hybrid tactics to
subvert Western institutions.
The summit's final item identified China for the first time
as posing systemic challenges to our alliance. The NATO allies
agree that ``China's coercive policies stand in contrast to the
fundamental values enshrined in NATO's founding treaty,'' and
that was a direct quote.
China's predatory investments in the critical
infrastructure of our NATO allies should be thoroughly examined
where there might--where they might impair military mobility,
resilience, and readiness.
However, naming China as a threat is not enough. We need to
assure the alliance, in coordination with EU, takes concrete
actions to address the threat of the Communist Chinese Party
and the threat they pose to Euro-Atlantic security.
This will require the Biden administration to rally our
NATO allies, including those who might not see the CCP as a
pressing concern, to convince them that we cannot protect our
collective interests without confronting the CCP directly as a
united front.
Russia has intensified its cyber and disinformation
campaigns targeting NATO member States and partner States. They
have interfered with the democratic processes, harbored cyber
criminals, violated NATO airspace, and engaged in provocative
military activities.
Most notably, Russia has a sustained campaign of hostile
and illegal occupation of NATO partner nations. Today, it's our
hope that our witnesses can discuss what actions must take
place for NATO partner countries to advance in their pursuit of
membership.
Earlier this month, NATO leaders reiterated a 2008 pledge
that Georgia and Ukraine will receive a Membership Action Plan.
Ukraine has endured 7 years of Russian-instigated hot war and
illegal annexation of Crimea, relentless cyber, and provocative
military buildups on their border and in the Black Sea.
The illegal occupation of territory in Ukraine by Russia
cannot be a disqualifying factor in creating a membership
action plan from NATO.
It is my hope today that we can learn from our witnesses on
how NATO can confront future threats and find a more equitable
share of responsibility in reaching these objectives.
While modernization will not be easy, it is a necessary
step in the face of the challenges we face in the next decade.
I look forward to the testimony.
Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
Mr. Keating. I thank the ranking member.
I'll now turn to the chairman of the NATO Parliamentary
Assembly, Representative Gerry Connolly, for his opening
remarks.
Mr. Connolly. Thank you so much, Bill--Mr. Chairman, and
thank you to Mr. Fitzpatrick, the ranking member.
This is the first time, I think, ever we have had a joint
hearing jointly sponsored by the House Foreign Affairs
Committee, the European Subcommittee, and the NATO
Parliamentary Assembly delegation.
I think it's important to remember that the NATO
delegation--the U.S. delegation to the NATO Parliamentary
Assembly is actually codified in law.
There are not a lot of inter-parliamentary groups that are
codified in law, but ours is. It's authorized in law and the
membership is specified in law.
I think it's also important to note that we have got a
great panel and we have been working with that panel getting
ready for the 2030 update of the strategic plan for NATO.
We have got a very vibrant U.S. delegation that is
participating in NATO Parliamentary Assembly. We just received
the secretary general a few weeks ago and hosted, with your
participation.
Mr. Chairman, you know, a session with the secretary
general, who, of course, is also the first and only secretary
general to have been invited on a bipartisan basis to address a
joint session of the U.S. Congress.
We're also pleased that Nancy Pelosi, the Speaker of the
House, is a former member of the NATO Parliamentary Assembly
and is the only speaker in the history of NATO PA to have
addressed the annual meeting of the NATO Parliamentary Assembly
not once but twice, and she's very committed to our endeavors.
Last week, NATO heads of State in government met in
Brussels to develop a consensus on critical challenges facing
the alliance.
Together, allies reaffirmed NATO's core mission and values,
set key priorities for the alliance, going forward, and
detailed several new initiatives on resilience, emerging
technologies, climate change, and other pressing issues.
The alliance is at a critical juncture. The world continues
to emerge from this devastating pandemic. The international
power distribution is shifting fundamentally and the shared
values upon which the alliance was founded are under threat,
both from external forces of autocracy and authoritarianism
and, sadly, internal extremist elements that would undermine
liberal Western democratic principles.
It is in this context that the alliance needs a renewed
U.S. commitment to NATO, multilateral action against the myriad
threats posed by China, and to take concrete steps to
strengthen democratic institutions throughout the alliance and
within the alliance.
I believe the alliance achieved two of the three goals at
the summit but fell short on the critical issue of shared
values.
After 4 years of an American administration engaged in
self-defeating attacks on NATO, contemplations of withdrawal
from the Washington treaty itself and a less than full embrace
of Article 5, President Biden has used the Brussels Summit to
signal to our allies and the world that America is back. Our
allies and partners are already breathing a collective sigh of
relief.
By all accounts, the United States helped marshal key
summit deliverables on China, as Mr. Fitzpatrick just talked
about. The summit communique went beyond the 2019 London
declaration identifying China as presenting both challenges and
opportunities and, instead, articulated a more sober assessment
of the multifaceted and persistent challenges and threats posed
by China.
Getting China on the political and military agenda is
something I've recommended in NATO reports I've written,
including a report in 2019, ``The Rise of China: Implications
to Global and Euro-Atlantic Security.''
China has the world's largest military, including the
largest navy and what is soon to become the world's largest
economy. It is increasing its investments in military
modernization, critical infrastructure abroad, and emerging
technologies.
China is exporting its authoritarian model of governance
while it's doing all of that, which runs counter and directly
challenges the core values of our alliance while crushing
democratic movements in places like Hong Kong.
It is engaged in cyber espionage against NATO countries and
domestic industries, and as NATO Secretary General has
observed, China demands our attention not because the alliance
seeks to move into the South China Sea, but because China is
increasing its influence and expanding its activities in the
Euro-Atlantic region.
It is far past time that NATO undergo a comprehensive
evaluation of the threats posed by China to the Alliance. The
decision at the summit to revise NATO's Strategic Concept is an
opportunity to do just that. The current concept adopted in
2010 does not even mention China.
Furthermore, it identifies Russia still as a potential
strategic partner. Russia continues, forcibly and illegally, to
occupy Crimea and portions of Eastern Ukraine, Georgia, and
Moldova, and Putin's military political apparatus actively
seeks to undermine or disrupt democratic elections and
institutions throughout our alliance and would-be partners and
members of the alliance.
Where I believe the summit fell short and what the rewrite
of the Strategic Concept in my view must address is the clear
imperative to bolster democracy within the alliance and across
the alliance.
And given the events of January 6th in our country, this is
an issue the United States can approach with a healthy dose of
humility. If it can happen here, it can happen elsewhere.
NATO success over the past 70 years is not only due to its
military might and capabilities, but also the fact that it is
an alliance underpinned by common democratic values.
Article 2 of the North Atlantic Treaty States they, member
States, are determined to safeguard the freedom common heritage
and civilization of their peoples founded on the principles of
democracy, individual liberty, and the rule of law.
As the global march of autocracy quickens, NATO must
rededicate itself to shared democratic values in concrete ways.
We must continue to insist the allies uphold the founding
democratic principles of our treaty and charter, and consider
support for democratic institutions as a condition for
membership in the alliance.
To that end, one of the top priorities that we are
promoting at the NATO Parliamentary Assembly is to reinforce
those values, and the strongest weapon we possess effectively
to counter Putin regime's authoritarianism is a vibrant,
robust, and immutable expression of the liberal democratic
values that bind us: freedom of press, freedom of assembly,
freedom to dissent, freedom of religion, and an unshakable
commitment to the rule of law.
So we have argued that NATO should establish a center for
democratic resilience within NATO itself with the purpose of
helping member States strengthen democratic institutions to
serve as a resource, to establish best practices and
benchmarking and to, frankly, provide consulting opportunities
for existing NATO members and would-be NATO members.
And I'm very pleased that the NATO 2030 Reflection Group,
headed by one of our witnesses today, Dr. Wess Mitchell,
actually adopted a version of that recommendation in its report
to the Secretary General.
I look forward, Mr. Chairman, to our deliberations today,
and I'm so grateful for your partnership and that of Mr.
Fitzpatrick, in collaborating with the NATO Parliamentary
Assembly in this first ever hybrid hearing, and I look forward
to hearing our discussion.
Thank you so much.
Mr. Keating. Thank you. Working with Vice Chairman Turner
is Representative Austin Scott. I now recognize Representative
Scott for your opening statement.
Mr. Scott. Well, thank you, Mr. Chair.
And America is stronger than ever, our military is stronger
than ever, and our NATO alliance is stronger than ever, and so
I look forward to being able to meet with--in person again soon
and, again, I look forward to the conversation here today.
I think that all of you have a lot of valuable information
to share with us and I look forward to learning from your
experiences.
As a member of the NATO Parliamentary Assembly, I think
this is a very important group, and when we talk about
countering our adversaries, supporting our allies, reaching our
mutual goals laid out in the NATO 2030 plan.
Today, we'll discuss and examine the future of NATO and
ongoing efforts to further strengthen the partnership between
North America and Europe and others who share our interests and
our values.
This conversation couldn't come at a more appropriate time
as our adversaries continue to develop new technologies and
show aggressive behaviors that pose new challenges for NATO
member States.
To address these challenges, proposals of NATO 2030 focuses
keenly or making NATO stronger and helping to adapt to growing
global competitions. From tackling terrorism and cyber threats
to upholding rules-based international order, this plan looks
at how we can continue to maintain stability in our respective
regions while also countering our common adversaries.
Russia's multi-domain military buildup, more assertive
posture, and provocative activities near NATO borders are just
a few of Russia's aggressive actions making it the top threat
to Euro-Atlantic security.
China is making investments in critical infrastructure
across Europe from telecommunication networks, support
facilities, and its military reach is also getting closer to
the Euro-Atlantic region.
China's malign activities throughout the world have
implications for NATO, our member nations, our allies, and
those who share our values and our interest.
One example is their continued over fishing and illegal
fishing off the coast of Africa. AFRICOM Commander General
Townsend testified that illegal, unreported, and unregulated
fishing by the Chinese Communist Party is the primary
contributor to a growing food crisis that will further drive
instability in West Africa.
If not curbed, I believe this will be an issue that will
require more international assistance in the coming years.
There's also great concern with China's growing role in
international money laundering throughout the world. This
spring, SOUTHCOM Commander Adam Fowler told the House Armed
Services Committee that our interagency partners in the United
States pointed out that communist China's money laundering is
the number-one underlying source for transnational criminal
organizations.
Let that sink in for a minute. The Chinese Communist Party
is aiding the activities of transnational criminal
organizations, including the trafficking of humans, drugs, and
weapons through money laundering.
This is an issue I hope we can raise more attention on and
work together to combat in regions around the world. As we
focus on countering China and Russia aggression and the
expansion in the Arctic, there's also an urgent need to address
cybersecurity and cyber defense threats posed by China and
Russia.
As we saw just a few weeks ago, a cyber-attack can cripple
the movement of vital goods while impacting the economy and
disrupting daily lives. We saw that right here in America.
I know addressing cyber concerns is one of several key
components of NATO 2030. I look forward to working with this
group as well as in my role as member of the House Armed
Services Committee to address the cyber threats that NATO
member nations face.
I also want to, briefly, touch on the future investments
for NATO. As we look at bolstering current programs and
implementing new ones, there must also be a focus on continuing
the financial support from all NATO allies.
I applaud those who have reached the 2 percent funding
commitment to defense spending. I hope we can get more member
States on track to meet this goal.
As I said in my initial statement, NATO is stronger than
ever, the American military is stronger than ever, and America
is stronger than ever. This commitment to the funding is key to
our alliance.
A focus on joint funding by all NATO member nations is key
to continuing investments in trainings and exercises, cyber
defense and cutting-edge technologies, and capacity building
for our partners.
I want to, again, thank the House Committee on Foreign
Affairs and Subcommittee on Europe, Energy and the Environment
and Cyber for hosting this joint hearing today.
I also want to, again, thank our witnesses for joining us.
I look forward to being able to meet in person.
And, Mr. Chairman, I yield the remainder of my time.
Mr. Keating. Thank you, Representative Scott.
I now move to our witnesses for their opening statements.
Mr. Anders Fogh Rasmussen is the founder and chairman of
Rasmussen Global. He's formerly served as secretary general of
NATO after being elected the Prime Minister of Denmark.
I'll now recognize Mr. Rasmussen for your opening
statement.
STATEMENT OF ANDERS FOGH RASMUSSEN, FOUNDER & CHAIRMAN,
RASMUSSEN GLOBAL, FORMER SECRETARY GENERAL, NATO, FORMER PRIME
MINISTER OF DENMARK
Mr. Rasmussen. Thank you very much, Chair Keating, Ranking
Member Fitzpatrick, Representatives Connolly and Scott. Thank
you for your opening statements.
And I'm so sorry that I cannot be with you in person today.
There is no substitute for people-to-people contacts to keep
friendships alive, and in my personal case, to spend time with
my American grandchildren, and for the these reasons I look
forward to the United States lifting travel restrictions from
Europe.
Now, NATO has been a successful peace movement for nearly
75 years. This is because of true strength and capacity to
adapt and determined American global leadership. Both are
interconnected, and my view is that we are at a moment where
both strengths must converge.
Why? Because in 2021, the free world's greatest strengths
are being weaponized by autocrats and dictators. Open trade is
leveraged to coerce and co-opt.
Free speech is abused to spread polarizing disinformation.
Technological innovation intended for benign causes is turned
to malign ends.
Today, threats to our freedom are complex, from the distant
front lines of a battlefield to a foreign investment with a
political aim to the phones we hold in our hand.
For NATO, this means adopting a more global and a more
political role, and I will draw the committee to three areas
that I would like to focus on.
First, the Indo-Pacific. NATO should broaden and deepen its
network of democratic allies around the world with a focus on
the Indo-Pacific. NATO may be an Atlantic alliance, but it
includes Pacific allies. Where America strong, freedom is
strong.
The same applies to the Pacific. NATO should support the
development of the Indo-Pacific court, starting with a NATO
court summit, and we should look to expand NATO's network of
so-called enhanced opportunities partnerships with more Indo-
Pacific nations.
Second, on political and economic resilience, the Atlantic
Alliance must counter the inbuilt self-doubt of free societies.
We should stand tall for freedom and this means countering
economic coercion.
In my written evidence, I set out an idea for an economic
Article 5.
And then third, the emerging tech challenge. The free world
must win the race to develop emerging technology and to set
global norms and standards. I fear our disunity could lead to
China winning the race and setting these rules.
The U.S. Congress recently received commendations from the
National Security Commission on artificial intelligence.
I highly recommend them and I propose that a similar
exercise be conducted within the trans-Atlantic space. Without
a collective understanding, NATO will lose the race for
technological advantage.
So with those three ideas, I look forward to answering your
questions. Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Rasmussen follows:]
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Mr. Keating. Thank you.
Ms. Rose Gottemoeller is the Frank E. and Arthur W. Payne
distinguished lecturer at the Center for International Security
and Cooperation at Stanford University's Freeman Spogli
Institute for International Studies.
Formerly, she served as deputy secretary general of NATO. I
now recognize you for your opening statement.
Thank you for being here.
STATEMENT OF ROSE GOTTEMOELLER, FRANK E. AND ARTHUR W. PAYNE
DISTINGUISHED LECTURER, CENTER FOR INTERNATIONAL SECURITY AND
COOPERATION, FREEMAN SPOGLI INSTITUTE FOR INTERNATIONAL
STUDIES, STANFORD UNIVERSITY, FORMER DEPUTY SECRETARY GENERAL,
NATO, FORMER UNDERSECRETARY OF STATE FOR ARMS CONTROL AND
INTERNATIONAL SECURITY AFFAIRS, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE
Ms. Gottemoeller. Thank you, Chairman Keating, Ranking
Member Fitzpatrick, Chairman Connolly, Representative Scott,
members of the subcommittee, and the NATO Parliamentary
Assembly.
It's a true honor to have the opportunity to testify to you
today about the importance of the North Atlantic Treaty
Organization, NATO.
If I may, Mr. Chairman, I would like to summarize some key
points in my oral testimony and have the rest of my written
testimony placed in the record.
Is that acceptable?
Mr. Keating. Without objection, yes.
Ms. Gottemoeller. Thank you.
NATO has finally recognized that the politics of the world
have changed, a view, clearly, evident during the Brussels
Summit meeting on June 14th. This moment has taken some time to
arrive.
NATO's political stance did not mirror the decisive action
that it took to respond in a defensive military way to Russia's
aggression in Ukraine in 2014.
The Alliance was saddled with a Strategic Concept that
dated to 2010. It described the strategic environment in a way
that was far from the reality. I quote, ``Today, the Euro-
Atlantic area is at peace and the threat of a conventional
attack against NATO territory is low,'' unquote.
This characterization was hugely at odds with the quick and
efficient military steps that NATO was taking. But some allies
shied away from reexamining the Strategic Concept. Too many
NATO members had a different view of what the top security
priority should be, and they feared that debating a new concept
would be too divisive.
Emmanuel Macron, the president of France, called NATO out
on this failing in November 2019 with his searing criticism
that the Alliance was brain dead. Operationally capable, yes,
but failing to see how the world was changing around it.
Allied leaders picked up on this challenge at their London
meeting in December 2019 and launched the year-long study NATO
2030 to see if NATO could do better. Eminent experts from
across the Alliance did the work, and you'll hear from one of
the two co-chairs today, Dr. Wess Mitchell.
I will not rehearse at length the recommendations of the
2030 study. However, I would like to highlight my enthusiasm
for the fact that NATO is launching a process to develop a new
Strategic Concept. It is high time.
The new concept, in my view, should enable NATO to be a
more autonomous and effective Alliance, less dependent on
American military power at a time when the United States is
pivoting to the Indo-Pacific.
I must make a brief but heartfelt comment about the issue
of burden sharing. It will not go away. I know that many NATO
member States are going to be searching for savings in their
defense budgets as they address the economic crisis growing out
of the COVID-19 pandemic.
This process is natural at such a time, but I would
strongly urge allies to stay the course with the 2014 Wales
Defense Investment Pledge.
The reason is simple. Allies need to modernize. Some are
deploying Warsaw Pact equipment that is 50 years old. If NATO
is to maintain readiness and reliability, never mind buildup
its capacity, judicious modernization of military equipment
across the Alliance needs to occur.
This investment in the Allies' own defense is vital because
the United States will continue its pivot to Asia. Strategic
necessity continues to drive in that direction. Therefore, the
NATO allies will need to do more on behalf of their own
defense.
Finally, I would like to reflect on the concept of
democratic resilience at NATO, a vital and continuing goal for
the Alliance. Here, I would like to make three points.
First, from my own experience as deputy secretary general,
I can attest that NATO leadership is determined to advance this
goal and does so through deft private diplomacy.
All of the top leaders at the NATO headquarters, civilian
and military, take advantage of their good working
relationships to ensure that member States receive a constant
and compelling message about the necessity of upholding NATO's
foundational values as laid out in the Washington treaty.
Second, the NATO leadership also undertakes consistently
and persistently what I call an inside out approach to working
the issues of NATO. The Alliance consistently embraces
democratic values and the rule of law in conducting its daily
business.
An example of this is how NATO insists on the application
of international humanitarian law targeting policy and so
trains its personnel.
Third, NATO actively displays these values wherever it
shows its public face. I recollect, for example, the Crisis
Management Exercise 2018, CMX 1918, which was built on the
principle of transparency.
Of course, the Russians received an open invitation to
observe the exercise and they did attend.
These three examples lead me to a recommendation. I
recommend that NATO should reaffirm its foundational values in
the context of the 2030 review and the process of redoing the
Strategic Concept.
It is important that these values are front and center at
this time and that NATO send a clear message about them.
Thank you for this opportunity to testify, Mr. Chairman. I
look forward to your questions and to our discussions.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Gottemoeller follows:]
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Mr. Keating. Thank you very much.
Ambassador Ivo Daalder is president of the Chicago Council
on Global Affairs. He formerly served as U.S. Ambassador to
NATO.
Ambassador, you're now recognized for your opening
statement.
STATEMENT OF DR. IVO DAALDER, PRESIDENT, CHICAGO COUNCIL ON
GLOBAL AFFAIRS, FORMER U.S. AMBASSADOR TO NATO
Dr. Daalder. Thank you, Chairman Keating and Ranking Member
Fitzpatrick, NATO PA President Connolly, and Representative
Scott for the opportunity to testify before you and the members
of the subcommittee and the NATO Parliamentary Assembly.
I have a written statement that, if you don't mind, I would
like to put in the record, but I will briefly summarize some of
its key points.
Mr. Keating. Without objection, yes. Proceed.
Dr. Daalder. This is an opportune time to hold a hearing on
NATO. The Alliance faces pressing security challenges as well
as the need to reaffirm the long-standing commitment to
collective defense, both of which were challenged in recent
years.
The Brussels Summit earlier this week--this month did much
to address these challenges, and it enabled the president of
the United States to come to its allies to renew the U.S.
commitment to what he called the sacred obligation of
collective defense.
In my written statement, I detail how NATO has become the
most successful alliance in history, and doing so primarily by
proving adaptable to changing circumstances, successfully
moving from a cold war alliance for its first 40 years to an
enlarged alliance in the 1990's to an operational alliance by
2010, and to a renewed collective defense alliance in the
aftermath of Russia's invasion of Ukraine in 2014.
Now NATO needs to adapt once more to meet the new
challenges of the current age. The Brussels Summit recognized
this need when it adopted NATO 2030, a Trans-Atlantic Alliance
for the Future.
It's a remarkable document, setting out a very ambitious
agenda not only for reinforcing deterrence and defense to
counter what Alliance leaders rightly described as the serious
threat to Euro-Atlantic security from Russia, but also to meet
the many new challenges that now confront NATO members.
And I want to focus on those and mention just three.
First, China. For the first time, NATO did recognize the
security challenge posed by a rising China. Though it is
geographically removed far from the North Atlantic area, NATO
countries now understand that China's growing regional and
global ambitions can no longer be ignored.
At the same time, while NATO has now recognized the rise of
China, mentioning the challenge that poses is very different
than agreeing on how to respond to that challenge. And here,
I'm concerned that even on the particulars Alliance members do
not seem yet to agree on the character and the extent of the
security challenge that China poses to NATO.
The Brussels communique states, and I quote, ``China's
growing influence in international policies can present
challenges we need to address together as an alliance.'' Can,
not does.
NATO will have to agree on the extent to which China poses
a direct security challenge and how that challenge should be
met collectively. That includes the possibility of dialog and
deeper cooperation with our partners in--our democratic
partners in Asia that Secretary General Rasmussen talked to,
but it will also need to include greater intelligence and
information sharing, closer coordination of maritime and other
military activities as China encroaches on the North Atlantic
area, and contingency planning and exercises geared to the
possibility of direct military confrontation.
Second, on cyber, NATO has taken important steps to address
the growing cyber threat to its security, including recognizing
as early as 2014 that a cyber-attack could trigger Article 5's
collective defense commitment. It now extended that commitment
in the--at its Brussels Summit.
And yet, the cyber domain continues to evolve in complex
and dangerous ways, and in this domain, as is so often the
case--in this domain the best defense may well be a good
offense.
That has not yet been NATO's focus, but it needs to start
doing so. While NATO has agreed that it could respond to a
cyber-attack with other means, it will also need to develop the
doctrine and capabilities to employ cyber offensively to
enhance deterrence of such attacks.
Third, on Europe, and burden sharing, I just want to echo
the comments that Rose Gottemoeller had before--made before.
The Alliance is unbalanced. Seventy-five years after World War
2, the United States still carries a disproportionate share of
the burden of the common defense.
Yes, Europeans have increased defense spending quite a bit
over the past 7 years, but these increases do not come close to
compensate for the precipitous decline in defense spending over
the preceding 15 years and is still greater under investment in
much-needed advanced capabilities.
NATO's success requires a greater balance between its
members with Europe taking on an ever-increasing share of the
overall burden and responsibility for ensuring security on the
continent.
Most people who reach the ripe age of 72 are ready for
retirement, but NATO is not. It still fulfills a fundamental
purpose of uniting allies across the Atlantic in common defense
and of common values.
NATO has faced challenges before. It has adapted and
emerged stronger as a result, and I have no doubt it will do so
once again.
Thank you for this opportunity to testify before you and I
would be happy to answer your questions.
[The prepared statement of Dr. Daalder follows:]
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Mr. Keating. Thank you, Ambassador.
Dr. Wess Mitchell is the co-chair of the NATO 2030
Reflection Group and formerly served as assistant secretary of
State for European and Eurasian affairs at the U.S. Department
of State after co-founding the Center for European Policy
Analysis.
I will now recognize Dr. Mitchell for your opening
statements.
STATEMENT OF DR. A. WESS MITCHELL, CO-CHAIR, NATO 2030
REFLECTION GROUP, FORMER ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF STATE FOR
EUROPEAN AND EURASIAN AFFAIRS, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE
Dr. Mitchell. Well, thank you, Chair Keating, Ranking
Member Fitzpatrick, Chair Connolly, and Representative Scott
for the opportunity to testify today.
I will submit a written testimony, like my colleagues, for
the record and summarize that testimony and my comments today,
if that is acceptable to the chair.
Mr. Keating. Yes, proceed.
Dr. Mitchell. NATO must adapt for a new era of great power
competition. That is the message that a high-level group of
experts, which I had the honor to co-chair, recently delivered
to Secretary General Stoltenberg.
The changes needed at NATO are serious yet feasible. But
the hour is late and the opponents of the West are gaining in
strength. The costs of failure would be high.
What makes NATO's adaptation so urgent is the scale of
change that is underway in the international balance of power.
By 2030, China's GDP is projected to be greater than that
of the United States and European Union combined. Russia
remains a vengeful actor with a modernized conventional
military and one of the world's largest nuclear arsenals.
Both China and Russia are led by despotic regimes that seek
to undermine the democratic political order of the American
republic and our allies. The main task facing NATO is to
consolidate the Atlantic Alliance for an era of strategic
simultaneity, in the words of our report, an era in which the
West will face concurrent pressure from two large State actors
in opposite directions from the Euro-Atlantic area.
This new environment presents two chief dangers, one
political and one military. The political danger is that China
and Russia will use their size and power to divide, isolate,
and manipulate American allies.
China enjoys an enormous power disparity vis-a-vis
individual Western States. Russia has a well-practiced
repertoire of tools with which to cow smaller States. The
danger is that our rivals will suddenly deliquesce the bond
between the United States and its allies, rendering NATO less
cohesive even as it continues to exist in name.
The military danger is that China and Russia will generate
simultaneous crises that strain or exceed our capacity to
handle. Under the 2018 National Defense Strategy, the United
States replaced the two-war standard with an emphasis on
fighting one war with China in conditions in which it is
unlikely to possess escalation dominance.
This means that more and more U.S. military resources will
go to the Indo-Pacific and that the United States will
prioritize developing capabilities for Asian maritime rather
than European land combat environments.
These two dangers provide a baseline for how the United
States should think about NATO's role.
First, NATO needs a strategy that matches the world of the
next decade. Last week, NATO leaders agreed to our report's
recommendation to update the Strategic Concept.
The United States should use this process to bring NATO
into alignment with U.S. global strategic requirements by
enhancing European allies' conventional deterrence vis-a-vis
Russia, and affirming NATO's role in dealing with those aspects
of Chinese behavior that affect Euro-Atlantic security.
Second, NATO needs better tools to deal with a challenge
from China. While it is inadvisable to push NATO to play a
military role in Asia, it is in our interest and squarely
within the remit of NATO's mandate for it to address Chinese
activities that impact military readiness, interoperability,
and secure communication in SACEUR's area of responsibility.
Third, the United States must redouble efforts to improve
burden sharing. It is reasonable to expect Europeans to field
at least 50 percent of the conventional capabilities and
enablers for securing the European theater to free up U.S.
forces to focus on the Indo-Pacific region in the event of a
major crisis.
Fourth, NATO will need greater political cohesion to meet
the growing threats from China and Russia. Efforts at European
strategic autonomy should be welcomed insofar as they aid in
meeting established NATO capability targets but firmly resisted
insofar as they deepen the bifurcation of the West into
competing blocks.
But the threats to Western cohesion are not only or
primarily institutional. As articulated in the North Atlantic
Treaty, NATO exists to safeguard the freedom, common heritage,
and civilization of its peoples founded on the principles of
democracy, individual liberty, and rule of law.
NATO should develop a center for democratic resilience to
resist foreign influence in allied public institutions, and it
should address head on the tendency of some allies to
politicize NATO decisionmaking in ways that benefit its rivals.
It is in the American interest to preserve and strengthen
NATO. Even as the United States shifts focus to the Pacific,
the Trans-Atlantic Alliance remains the seat of the free West
and the foundation of American strength in the world.
We have a window of opportunity to make the needed changes.
If NATO seizes this opportunity, I'm confident the Trans-
Atlantic Alliance can deal with the profound challenges it
faces in the coming decade.
Thank you, and I look forward to your questions.
[The prepared statement of Dr. Mitchell follows:]
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Mr. Keating. Thank you, Doctor, and I'd like to thank all
the witnesses for your testimony. And without objection, the
prepared statements of all the witnesses will be made part of
the record.
I'll now recognize members for 5 minutes each, and pursuant
to House rules, all time yielded is for the purposes of
questioning our witnesses.
Because of the virtual format of the hearing, I'll
recognize members by committee seniority alternating between
Democrats and Republicans and between members of the European
Subcommittee and of the NATO Parliamentary Assembly.
If you miss your turn, please let our staff know and we'll
circle back to you. If you seek recognition, you must unmute
your microphone and address the chair verbally. I'll now
recognize myself for 5 minutes.
NATO continues to work with emerging and developing
democracies in line with NATO values. To expand NATO membership
through NATO Member Action Plans is essential and currently
only Bosnia is the only aspirant that has a NATO Member Action
Plan.
To any of our witnesses, during the recent visit to
Washington, Secretary General Stoltenberg stated that there's
no concrete plans to expand NATO in the short term. But he also
indicated in his statements that there ways that NATO can
assist countries aspiring to join the alliance in this interim
period. There are things that can be done.
Can you--can any of our witnesses speak to what specific
actions NATO can take in this regard, what they would suggest?
It's an important issue. I throw the question to any of our
witnesses.
Mr. Rasmussen.
Mr. Rasmussen. Thank you very much.
First of all, let me draw your attention also to my written
testimony that has been submitted to the committee. It seems
that my co-witnesses are more experienced in meeting before
your committees and they asked explicitly for permission to
include their written statements in your records of the hearing
and the committee. And if you don't object to that, I would
know be pleased----
Mr. Keating. No, I'd already done that. Just go ahead and
proceed.
Mr. Rasmussen. Thank you.
To your concrete questions, I think time has come to grant
a so-called membership action plan to Georgia and Ukraine. Both
countries fulfill the criteria for receiving such a membership
action plan. It is not a guarantee for future membership, but
it is a step in the right direction.
It would be to followup positively on the decision we took
at the NATO Summit in Bucharest in 2008. But at that time, we
could not agree on a membership action plan. But we decided
that next steps should be a membership action plan.
I think it will send an important signal to Russia. It will
also send an important signal to the domestic audience in
Georgia and Ukraine and encourage them to continue reforms.
So, in conclusion, I think time has come to grant the two
countries a membership action plan.
Mr. Keating. Yes, Dr. Mitchell?
Dr. Mitchell. Let me just add to that, that in the
reflection process, it became very apparent to me that NATO
urgently needs to reform the way that its partnerships
function, and I'll just give you two examples of things that
could be addressed in those reforms.
One, and this surprises even a lot of longtime observers of
NATO is the way partnerships are funded. They are funded on a
voluntary basis. They're not--there's not a regular,
predictable funding flow for partnership activities and I think
that limits our ability to make strategic use of these tools.
And second, the frequency with which a handful of allies,
and I'm thinking of two in particular, politicize partnership
activities and introduce single-country blockages to prevent
them from functioning.
This has happened repeatedly to Ukraine. It happens to
Israel. It happens to Austria. And I think there are real-world
and attainable reforms that NATO could take on that would make
the partnership activities that it has now a lot more
serviceable.
Mr. Keating. Great. Yes. Ms. Gottemoeller, I also want to
see what interim steps perhaps the countries could pursue
themselves as well. Yes, Ms. Gottemoeller?
Ms. Gottemoeller. Yes, thank you very much, Mr. Chairman,
and I certainly endorse what Mr. Mitchell just had to say.
I really found that maddening while I was deputy secretary
general that it was impossible in some cases to move forward on
partnerships because of blockages put in place by individual
member States.
But I did want to focus attention on the fact that not only
does a NATO engage in military training and development of
capacity building in these States, but also works on tackling
the problem of corruption in these States.
And I wanted to endorse the role of our NATO offices in
these States in being able to establish good working
relationships throughout the governments there and to really in
that way, again, work from the inside out to try to ensure that
the corruption that dogs these countries and really stands in
the way of their NATO membership is dealt with over time.
I know this is a goal for individual countries like the
U.S. as well, but in this case very important. Thank you, sir.
Mr. Keating. Thank you so much. My time has expired.
I'll now recognize Ranking Member Fitzpatrick for 5
minutes.
Mr. Fitzpatrick. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. My question is
for Mr. Mitchell.
Recently, heightened tensions between some allies and NATO
member Turkey have prompted questions of standards for NATO
membership.
Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg criticized Turkey's
acquisition of the S-400 air defense system from Russia,
stating that it can pose a risk to our aircraft and then that
the system cannot be integrated into NATO's air and missile
defense system.
Briefly, sir, can you describe how does Turkey's
acquisition of the Russian S-400 negatively impact the NATO
alliance?
Dr. Mitchell. Well, thank you, Representative Fitzpatrick,
for that very important question.
I think there is a problem, and I'm speaking for myself
here and not in my capacity as the co-chair of the Reflection
Group. There's no question that Turkey's acquisition of a
sophisticated Russian air defense system has implications for
NATO politically.
I think technologically some of the risks to our own
military technologies are well known. I think it affects
interoperability.
And I think there's also no question that there have been
significant political tensions between Turkey and other NATO
members. I'm thinking of Greece and the non-NATO State, Cyprus,
that played out as a sort of leitmotif as our--as our group was
conducting its deliberations.
And I would go further and say there's no question in my
mind that many of those problems had more to do with Turkish
behavior, including domestic factors inside Turkey. But from a
NATO perspective, I think how we approach those issues I think
it's a prudential question.
We have to keep in mind that the ultimate goal is the
cohesion of the NATO alliance as a tool to deter and defend
against Russia and eventually also China.
That's priority No. 1. And if in our tactics, even the best
intentioned approach, if we undermine that goal I think we're
counterproductive.
So I would say the U.S. and other allies can and should
pressure Turkey, for example, on S-400 or its other military
technological dealings with Russia, its approach to Greece,
another NATO member State.
But I put it to you those efforts will be most effective if
the pressure is occurring alongside efforts to meet Turkey's
legitimate security concerns and make sure that it has a viable
Western option in its foreign policy.
So, for example, allies could do a lot better addressing
the threat of Syrian missiles to Turkey. It is no less a
legitimate NATO job than defending the Baltic States.
We could do a better job of all offering Western
technological alternatives to Turkey in a timely fashion, not
just from the United States but other European NATO members,
alternatives to Russian systems.
And I think we could do a better job of incorporating
terrorism, which Turkey has a significant interest in
combating, incorporating that more into NATO's core tasks and
treating the southern and southeastern dimensions of NATO as
priorities.
So the approach should be pressure, yes, criticize, yes.
But do so in proportion to how much of a viable alternative
we're giving for meeting Turkey's legitimate security concerns.
Mr. Fitzpatrick. So if I could just in contrast, Ukraine,
for example, has been a steadfast supporter through their
partnership with NATO enduring at the front lines of Russian
aggression with deepening cooperation over time, with Turkey
working with one of NATO's most looming threats, and Ukraine
actively working with our alliance against it.
The open door policy, I believe, must be examined. So I
guess my question would be why do you believe it's important
for the alliance to not allow Russia's war in eastern Ukraine
and illegal annexation of Crimea to permanently thwart a
membership action plan for Ukraine?
Dr. Mitchell. Well, I think in the case of Ukraine, and
again, I'm speaking for myself, the best thing that the United
States can do for Ukraine is to arm that country and to prevail
upon European allies to arm it.
I think we should keep up the drumbeat on membership action
plan. But we should also consider major non-NATO ally status
for Ukraine to ease its defense cooperation with the United
States. That would be my thinking.
Mr. Fitzpatrick. OK. I yield back, Mr. Chairman. Thank you,
sir.
Mr. Keating. Thank you.
The chair recognizes Chairman Connolly for 5 minutes.
Mr. Connolly. Thank you so much, Mr. Chairman, and again,
thank you and the ranking member for this first ever joint
hearing. I think it's so important and I think it is an
expression of congressional support for the Alliance and for
the renewal of NATO on a bipartisan basis.
And I want to thank our very distinguished panel of
witnesses, who I think are making a really thoughtful
contribution to our dialog about how we move the Alliance
forward.
Ambassador Daalder, if I could start with you. You talked
about the 2 percent. We certainly agree with you and, by the
way, we have been arguing that for years. I mean, it's--it
predates the previous administration.
But could you talk a little bit, though, OK, so even if we
have reached the 2 percent there are people who are very
concerned about the internal State of readiness, military
preparedness, obsolescence, lack of operational readiness of
equipment and troops within the Alliance itself.
Many people, for example, point to Germany as, you know,
really not something that I feel great confidence in. And I
just wonder if you could comment on that, too, because that--
aside from the 2 percent commitment, what about the military
status and capability of NATO today? Should we be confident or
should we be concerned or somewhere in between?
Dr. Daalder. Thank you, Representative Connolly.
I agree with you, one, on the importance of 2 percent as a
guidepost, but also the fact that 2 percent doesn't get you
what you really need, which is real actual military capability,
to be part of the collective defense commitment and the
collective security commitment that NATO has.
And on there, we're falling short. I mentioned earlier that
the 2 percent guideline, which was adopted in 2014, came after
15 years of steady reduction in European investment in military
capabilities, both by cutting defense spending, which in the
year 2000 average spending by non-U.S. allies was 2 percent of
GDP, and that went down to about 1.25 percent by the time NATO
finally agreed to the guidelines.
And then, second, by spending all of the funds that they
had on deploying forces in operations and not investing in real
capabilities.
And so that's--it's that combination of under investment
and underspending that, in some ways, has led to where we are
today. And we need a fundamental recommitment to defense by our
European allies to take defense more seriously than it has.
Yes, dialog is important. But dialog doesn't work without
defense and it's not an alternative to defense.
And I think we need to spend our time talking about
readiness, investments in real capabilities, ability to
reinforce our forces, and making sure that we have the
logistical plans, the contingency plans, all taken seriously,
and as we think about new threats that we continue to focus on
those real capabilities that are necessary to deal with the
threat that already exists today.
Mr. Connolly. Thank you--thank you so much, Mr. Ambassador,
and I couldn't agree more. I think we have got to focus on
both, not just the 2 percent, although I favor, of course, the
2 percent.
Ambassador Mitchell, I want to thank you for your report
and I also--you know, we have a convergence on the whole issue
of we need to elevate the whole issue operationally of our
commitment to democratic shared values and that's incorporated
in your recommendation to the secretary general.
And I want to give you an opportunity to expand on why you
thought that was so important and where you think we're likely
to go on that, given the fact there's some internal resistance
because some people feel that that's threatening or potentially
embarrassing.
Dr. Mitchell. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I also
want to thank you and your staff for your engagement and
attention to our reflection process as it unfolded, and the
ideas that you fed our way were very helpful.
On this issue specifically, as you know, our report devoted
a lot of attention to the question of the health of democratic
institutions inside NATO. NATO is an alliance founded on
democratic principles, and departures from that foundation do
weaken the Alliance, I think, in general, but particularly in
an era of great power competition, the terms of which are not
just material but ideological and political.
And the question, to my mind, is what is the appropriate
role for NATO as a security alliance when it comes to those
kinds of issues. We debated that at length and we heard a lot
of proposals in the Reflection Group.
NATO is a security alliance built on a treaty that requires
consensus of all of its members, and I found that in the
Reflection Group process of the 30 NATO allies, the capitals
that we engaged, I can count on one hand the number of allies
who were willing to see NATO play more of a role in
strengthening or engaging with domestic democratic
institutions.
I think, historically, NATO's approach has been more akin
to what Ambassador Gottemoeller described eloquently a moment
ago. It has steered away from deeper attempts at influencing,
for example, domestic policy.
I think the ultimate goal has to be to strengthen the
cohesion of the Alliance, and you wouldn't want to weaken
cohesion with finger pointing.
But I think the right role for NATO is to focus on the
intersection of democracy with security--with external security
threats, which is its core function, and, of course, the
Russians and Chinese are very well versed in working internally
through corruption and a variety of means to weaken
institutions. That's the sweet spot, in my mind.
I think the idea of a democratic resilience center
addresses that, and I am disappointed that the communique last
week did not endorse recommendation of a resilience center.
My understanding is that a lot of the recommendations from
the report are still under examination by the NATO
international staff and we'll see if that could gain traction
in the future.
Mr. Connolly. Thank you so much. And thank you again, Mr.
Chairman.
Mr. Keating. Thank you, Chairman Connolly.
The chair recognizes Representative Scott for 5 minutes.
Mr. Scott. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I'm going to
ask Ms. Gottemoeller to go first and then the others could
answer this as well. But we have all spoken to the--to the
issue of 2 percent.
As we all know, the domains that we're having to engage in
are expanding, not contracting, and so we're talking about
space. We're talking about the Arctic. Both of those are
extremely expensive to operate in, and we're talking about
cyber.
And one of my concerns is where's the 2 percent actually
being spent and are there better places to spend it.
Ms. Gottemoeller, you spoke about modernization, that when
we talk about modernization we typically think about, you know,
ISR and those types of platforms or new planes that are faster,
stealthier, or carry more powerful weapons that can be fired
from further away.
And that's a key aspect of the modernization that's
happening in the United States military. But my question gets
to cyber. Offensive actions in cyber, which are still
considered in the gray zone, they're very cheap to carry out
and they're--and the consequences for those that are the
recipient of these aggressive actions are extremely damaging.
We have seen that with the U.S. economy with regard to our
food supply chain. It has been occurring in other areas of
Europe repeatedly over the last several years. We're just now
starting to feel the effects of it inside the United States.
So, Ms. Gottemoeller, cyber--the modernization with regard
to how we handle cyber, do you feel like NATO is focused enough
on that in developing the offensive capabilities and the
defensive capabilities and the sharing of information with
regard to real-time information with the attacks and our
abilities to both defend against them and to hack back, if you
will, against the aggressors?
Ms. Gottemoeller. Thank you, Mr. Scott, for that extremely
timely and complex question.
I would just State briefly that, in fact, NATO sets the
requirements for member States to spend their 2 percent and I
constantly was aware when I was DSG of the tension often
between the requirements that NATO was setting for equipment
that would allow for interoperability, that would allow for
military effectiveness, especially in the acquisition of more
mobility and more heavy armor at the time, again, when I was
DSG for defense against Russia.
But sometimes member States had their own ideas that they
wanted to buy fighter aircraft rather than, you know, buy
another heavy armor brigade.
So it's a tension that is there. But I do want to stress
that NATO sets the requirements and then works with the allies
[inaudible].
Mr. Keating. I can't hear her.
Ms. Gottemoeller, I think we're having some technical
difficulties at the moment. Let's just pause for a second.
Could you continue? Could you continue?
Ms. Gottemoeller. Yes.
Mr. Keating. We lost you for a moment. Go ahead.
Ms. Gottemoeller. OK. Can you hear me now?
Mr. Keating. Yes.
Ms. Gottemoeller. All right. Very good.
About your very important cyber question, the point is that
NATO has taken steps in recent years, especially with the
adoption of policies that allow for individual member cyber--
member States to provide cyber effects to NATO should there be
attacks during the course of a crisis or conflict.
And this is, I would say, normal practice in that NATO
often does not own the assets but turns to its member States to
provide them. So providing offensive cyber effects to NATO is
to say now that a number of member States, and it's more than
just a handful, have offered to provide to NATO the capability
to respond effectively should there be an attack during a NATO
mission or operation.
So I actually feel like NATO has been moving in the right
direction on this. You bring up the question of information
sharing.
Here, there is a continuing tension over the role of
attribution with some member States taking a strict view that
they themselves must provide an attribution based on shared
information, others saying that attribution can be done by the
State under attack and then others should follow along in
supporting them.
So it is a matter of some stress and tension within the
Alliance. But I think the move is in the right direction.
Mr. Scott. Ma'am, thank you very much. My time has almost
expired. My concern is what the cyber-attacks are doing to our
economy and, as we all know, the economic ties are strong. They
could be stronger and should be stronger.
But when Russia takes aggressive actions against U.S.
economic interest or the economic interests of our allies, that
creates disruptions that have a tremendous impact on our
citizens and the well-being of the world and our NATO
partnership. And so I appreciate your comments.
Mr. Chair, I'm over by just a few seconds, but I'll
certainly yield to the chair. Thank you again for being here.
Mr. Keating. Thank you, Representative Scott.
The chair recognizes Vice Chair Spanberger for 5 minutes.
Ms. Spanberger. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
To our witnesses, thank you so much for being here. I'd
like to follow with--in the line of d
So, Ms. Gottemoeller, you said that NATO is moving in the
right direction, and I hope that we see NATO moving in the
right direction aggressively because, certainly, we have seen
the impact here at home of not having the cyber defenses in
place that are necessary.
But, Ambassador Daalder, I'd like to go to you quickly in
this context. I'm wondering how you view that the United States
can best support NATO's efforts to build cyber resilience in
defense, and how the United States can be part of really
encouraging NATO as an entity to aggressively move in the
direction of ensuring our cyber defenses are what they need to
be, not just now but recognizing increasing and ever-changing
threats that exist in the cyber realm.
Dr. Daalder. Well, thank you so much for the question. I
think this is one of the key issues that the Alliance faces,
and we should recognize the Alliance has done a lot over the
last 10 years. This is an issue that has beset allies for a
long time.
The critical point it has focused on is defense of its own
systems to make sure that the systems that we have operate
effectively and that allies are able to help each other if they
are attacked with cyber defensive measures of all kinds.
I think the next step was to recognize that cyber could be
deeply destructive, so destructive that it was akin to an armed
attack--that's what it says, again, in the Brussels
communique--and therefore could lead to Article 5.
The issue that I think NATO needs to focus on more is cyber
offense. That is, what are the cyber offensive capabilities,
both in order to enhance defense that the best way to get to
the defensive stance I to be in the systems of those who are
attacking us, and as a means to deter attack in the first
place.
And I think a major step was made when President Biden in
his press conference in Geneva made very clear that we were
prepared to use cyber-attacks in response to further attacks on
the United States, particularly, the 16 critical infrastructure
targets that are part of our own domestic guidelines.
We ought to make that part of the NATO thinking both in
terms of the infrastructure that we're talking about, the
target systems, and the way in which we can have defensive as
well as offensive capabilities and I very much hope that as
part of the Strategic Concept we will dive deeply into this and
be more forward leaning than we have had--been in the past on
the issue of using offensive capabilities as a means to deter
attack in the first place.
Ms. Spanberger. Thank you so much, Mr. Ambassador, and I do
hope that we can be really leading the charge, echoing the
president's comments in Geneva related to the need to be on the
offensive in the space.
Ms. Gottemoeller, if I could pivot back to you. In December
of last year, you wrote a very interesting piece in Politico
where you examined how NATO was really rethinking its Strategic
Concept, part of the NATO 2030 report, and you mentioned where
China is concerned NATO should develop a political approach
focused on the Euro-Atlantic space that recognizes China's new
role in the world.
I think this is an important frame and I was hoping that
you might be able to walk us through this approach, what it
would look like, and what steps the Alliance should be taking
in the context of contending with China.
Ms. Gottemoeller. Thank you very much, Ms. Spanberger.
Again, a very important question. I will refer back to Anders
Fogh Rasmussen's remarks about how China is inserting itself
into the Euro-Atlantic space, in particular, buying up
infrastructure, which could hamper NATO mobility in time of
crisis or conflict.
So I think that NATO should be ready to engage with China
and to, for one thing, just have a situational awareness at the
top level so it understands what exactly is going on and what
it may need to counter in terms of China operating in its
space.
Whether in the--in the commercial space, so to say, or else
in the military space, it is exercising together with the
Russian Federation, for example, in the Baltic Sea.
So situational awareness is all important, but also being
able to talk straight and talk tough to China about NATO's
interests, and here I endorse fully the political military
dialog that has been going on between NATO and China, the
Chinese foreign ministry, because it gives an opportunity to
talk about NATO's concerns but also talk about where there may
be some joint interests.
For example, the upcoming discussions are on the arms
control topic, and getting China to come to the negotiating
table, I think, has been an important goal for the United
States, certainly, on certain critical topics.
So I think there is definitely a way in which NATO must be
able to engage with China. But my own view is it's not in the
Indo-Pacific. It's actually in the European space.
Ms. Spanberger. Well, thank you so much, Ms. Gottemoeller.
And, Mr. Chairman, I yield back. Thank you, again, to our
witnesses.
Mr. Keating. Thank you.
I've been informed that we're having some technical issues
on the broadcast out. So I'm just going to ask us to just pause
maybe just for a few minutes and see if they can square those
away. We're going to recognize Representative Wagner next and
then proceed with the hearing.
But let's just see if we can rectify these things in a very
few minutes. So take a chance. By a few minutes, I'm hoping
three or 4 minutes. So let's see how we're doing then and let's
recess for that short period, if there's no objection. Thank
you.
[Recess.]
Mr. Keating. I'd like to call the committee back in order.
There seems to be a technical issue throughout the whole
Capitol area with other committees.
However, we can hear each other. We're able to communicate.
Our witnesses can hear the questions. Our members can hear the
witnesses' dialog and answering those questions.
So it's my feeling that although some of the broadcasts out
they're working on the technical difficulties, I don't want to
hold up this hearing, given the limited time and the importance
of the hearing.
So I will reconvene and now recognize Representative Wagner
for 5 minutes.
Mrs. Wagner. I thank you, Mr. Chairman, and for hosting the
hearing and our witnesses. I want to thank you for your time in
support of this critical Alliance.
NATO has served as a pillar of international peace and
stability and security for decades. Yet, Russia and the
People's Republic of China have repeatedly shown that they view
the cooperation of free and democratic States as a threat.
It is clear that a strong and united NATO will be
absolutely crucial as we confront authoritarian challenges to
the rules-based order.
Dr. Mitchell, Russia sent over 100,000 additional troops to
the Ukraine's border this spring just a few months after it
unilaterally imposed restrictions on naval movement near
Crimea.
Ukraine is an important NATO partner and Russia's
threatening behavior is a worrying signal that it is willing to
escalate its illegal offensive in Ukraine.
In light of these developments, the Biden administration's
decision to freeze a military aid package intended for Ukraine
following the Biden-Putin summit, I think, sends mixed signals.
Can you please tell us, Mr. Mitchell--Dr. Mitchell, pardon
me--what is the current status of Russia's military buildup
near Ukraine and how should NATO manage this crisis?
Dr. Mitchell. Well, Representative Wagner, thank you for
that question. I think you've touched on a very important issue
and that's one that I'm sure is dear to the hearts of everyone
on the call, and that is the status of Ukraine and its struggle
to be an independent and democratic country on the borders of
Russia.
To answer your question directly, I also know what I've
seen from public reporting, but it appears that there is still
a significant concentration of Russian troops near the border
of Ukraine.
It appears that some of those assets were removed in the
lead-up to the summit. I only know what I've seen in public
reporting again, so I don't know the exact status.
But I would say with regard to the meeting with Putin,
diplomacy does have an important role to play at times,
including in interactions with our most serious and determined
opponents.
I think in this particular case, the fact that the
president's meeting with Mr. Putin came on the heels of a major
Russian military buildup in Ukraine, I think that has--that
looks from the perspective of a lot of U.S. allies in the
region like a major concession. I think the fact that the
meeting itself was a kind of win for Putin or it can certainly
be----
Mrs. Wagner. That is--Dr. Mitchell--Dr. Mitchell, what is
NATO doing? What's NATO doing? This is a crisis.
Dr. Mitchell. Well, NATO, of course, has partnership
activities with Ukraine, but because Ukraine is not an Article
5 ally in NATO, there are limits to what NATO can do to provide
direct military assistance. NATO is very active in Ukraine in
training and----
Mrs. Wagner. Dr. Mitchell--I'm going to cut you off and
reclaim my time here. I've got very limited time, many more
questions.
Dr. Mitchell, you've written that the old policy of hoping
growth and enmeshment with--will turn China into a country that
plays by established rules should be abandoned. What allies and
areas should the U.S. Government prioritize to confront the
People's Republic of China?
Dr. Mitchell. Well, I think the most urgent in a NATO
context is to have China be squarely on the agenda for the
North Atlantic Council. I think it needs to permeate the
existing structures and committees of NATO.
And as our report recommended, and I was sorry to not see
this in the communique last week, I think there needs to be a
platform at NATO where the North Atlantic Council and the
European Council can coordinate on security concerns vis-a-vis
China much the way that the COCOM structure did during the cold
war.
I think, beyond that, there's a lot that NATO could do to,
as Ambassador Gottemoeller said, improve our defenses against
Chinese subversive activities inside Europe. I'm thinking of
European infrastructure, military technological relationships
between NATO allies----
Mrs. Wagner. Dr. Mitchell--Dr. Mitchell, I want to get one
more question in and just so they can be answered maybe in
writing. In Bosnia and Herzegovina, the only NATO aspirant with
a membership action plan, Russia is exploiting ethnic divisions
among Serbs, Croats, and Bosniaks to stall Bosnia's accession.
And just a few months ago, the Russian embassy in Bosnia
issued a statement--a statement threatening that, and I quote,
``In the event of practical rapprochement between Bosnia and
Herzegovina and NATO, our country--meaning Russia--will have to
react to this hostile step.'' It was pretty stunning, I think,
that they--that they did this.
I don't know, Ms. Gottemoeller, I don't know--in writing if
you could respond to what we think NATO allies and the United
States can do to combat these dangerous tactics to deter
Russians malign activity in Bosnia.
I'm out of time, so I will yield back. But if you could,
Ms. Gottemoeller, respond in writing to me and anyone else. I'm
very concerned about what's happening in Bosnia and
Herzegovina. Thank you.
Mr. Keating. Well, thank you, Representative. I've been
informed and advised by the full committee that there's still
some technical issues we have that could be in violation of
roles if we continued before that's rectified.
So I'm going to have to--I'm going to----
Good news is I've just been informed--breaking news--the
technical issue has been resolved. So I'm glad we have
continued forward and the chair will now recognize
Representative Larsen for 5 minutes.
Mr. Larsen. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Just have a couple of
questions and perhaps we'll start with Secretary General
Rasmussen and then go to former Deputy Secretary General
Gottemoeller regarding NATO and Indo-Pacific.
How should the--how should the U.S. approach the choice
about whether or not to do--to act within NATO decisionmaking,
NATO confines when, say, doing a freedom of navigation
operation or any other activity to show a NATO face versus
doing operations, say, with folks who are NATO allies but not
doing it under a NATO banner?
Does one or the other make any difference? Is it better for
us to try to elevate NATO or is it better for us to move ahead
with allies even though it won't be due--it won't be under a
NATO rubric?
We'll start with--we'll start with--yes, Mr. Rasmussen.
Mr. Rasmussen. Yes. Thank you very much for that question.
As a point of departure, I think we should elevate as many
activities as possible to the NATO level. If I understand you
correctly, you are speaking about exercises and other
activities.
But I think in general--in general we should demonstrate
solidarity and a collective will to strengthen our defense
through NATO exercises and also through joint and common
funding and joint acquisition of the capabilities.
And I fully agree with those who said the 2 percent target
is important as a guideline, but it's not enough, and I will
draw your attention to another target--another guideline,
namely, 20 percent should be used in new abilities and research
and development.
And it is a fact that we could get much more value for
money if we acquire critical capabilities and extensive
military capabilities jointly instead of on a national basis.
So also in that respect, I prefer NATO to national efforts.
Mr. Larsen. That's fine. Former Deputy Secretary General
Gottemoeller, can I give you about a minute and 20 seconds to
answer that question specifically with regards to NATO and the
Indo-Pacific?
Ms. Gottemoeller. Yes, thank you, sir. My view, strongly
held, is that, in fact, NATO member States are very active with
their freedom of navigation exercises, the U.K., the U.S.,
France, and partner States such as Australia. This is very
important.
My own view is that NATO is the North Atlantic Treaty
Organization, as I mentioned in my testimony. Their center of
gravity is in the trans-Atlantic space and, furthermore, NATO
per se is responsible for the defense of the Alliance in the
Euro-Atlantic space.
So I, in some ways, see the continuing focus of NATO to
defend NATO in the Euro-Atlantic space, rather than moving its
operation, so to say, to the Indo-Pacific. That would be my
strongly held views, sir.
On a personal level, I do think it's important that NATO
pay attention to its core--its core mission and that includes,
of course, its core tasks, the defense of NATO Europe.
Mr. Larsen. Yes, thank you. I just would note in the NATO
Parliamentary Assembly we get this push and pull about the
eastern flank and the southern flank, depending on which member
State is talking to us as NATO Parliamentary Assembly members
from--or the United States. And so, you know, at the Indo-
Pacific then we have got a third push and pull.
I've got 38 seconds left, and for Dr. Mitchell, President
Connolly appointed me to be one of three members on a contact
group with the Ukraine parliamentarians. It's a group chaired
by Ojars Kalnins from Latvia.
And just about the Crimean platform, and could you--could
you address that quickly with regards to the importance of not
recognizing the illegal occupation of Crimea and what we can do
within NATO and how NATO should approach that, in 9 seconds?
Dr. Mitchell. It's incredibly important. NATO has said the
right things. I think the most important thing for your
important mission is that we not let up or slack in our efforts
to showcase the illegality of that annexation.
I think what the Russians want most is by degrees to see
certain Western European States, first de facto and then
eventually de jure, start to recognize that.
So I think just keep keeping closed ranks on it is the most
important thing we can do.
Mr. Larsen. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Keating. Thank you, Representative.
The chair recognizes Representative Meijer.
Mr. Meijer. Thank you, Mr. Chair. And then thank you to our
witnesses who are here today and on this for--and to the
committee for--the subcommittee for hosting this important
hearing on our NATO Alliance, specifically NATO 2030 and both,
you know, celebrating the origins and reevaluating, you know,
how we go toward the future as we are continuing to focus on
our shared values across the Atlantic, as we adapt from a cold
war mentality to one that is really pitting democracies versus
autocratic regimes, especially in Europe, but also toward some
of our shared commitments that we have made abroad, as we mark
the withdrawal of United States forces from Afghanistan, the
only invocation of Article 5.
Now, NATO Secretary Jens Stoltenberg had identified the
need for more societal and economic resilience from the allies,
you know, the importance of safer and more diverse supply lines
as well in the fuel, food, and medical spaces in particular.
During this pandemic, we have also seen some of the
challenges with both our supply chain resiliency domestically
but also some of the risks that a more globalized world holds,
and then specifically on the military front and on the national
security front, what can happen when we are overly reliant on
international supply chains over which we do not have full
control.
One of the areas that deeply concerns me when it comes to
our NATO alliance is the construction of Nord Stream 2, an
additional Russian economic leverage over many of our northern
European allies.
I guess this question first. I strongly wish to target to
Mr. Rasmussen do you believe the construction of Nord Stream 2
and that increase of natural gas dependence, especially for
heating, is that a step toward or away from that broader
concern that Secretary Stoltenberg mentioned about resilience?
Mr. Rasmussen. Thank you very much for that key question.
To speak directly, I'm against Nord Stream 2. Nord Stream 2 is
not an economic project. Nord Stream 2 is geopolitical project
aiming at maintaining a European dependence on imported Russian
gas.
So it is as simple as that, and I strongly regret that it
seems as if the Russians are now able to finish the project. It
remains to be seen whether the pipeline will actually be used.
That will very much depend on the U.S., European Union, and
Germany.
And in conclusion, I hope if it's finished that it will not
be used, because it also serves the purpose to circumvent the
Eastern European allies that will lose a lot of fees and
duties.
So it's clear it is part of President Putin's overall
ambition to dominate Western Europe.
Mr. Meijer. Thank you. Thank you, sir.
I mean, you mentioned kind of those Eastern European
leverage points and as well, you know, we can have discussions
on whether or not we have--we look toward, you know, the future
membership of certain States within NATO and if that is
advantageous to the Alliance to join.
I firmly believe those are discussions that should be made
within the Alliance and not discussions that are influenced by
the malign activities of outside powers, specifically Russia,
and the additional leverage that they may hold.
It does not portend for those decisions to be made, you
know, on their merits but, rather, giving our Russian
adversaries a greater ability to exercise that leverage.
And I guess, Mr. Rasmussen, if I could also just followup
with a quick final question before my time expires. You know, a
recent Brussels Summit communique had identified combating
corruption, promoting an inclusive political process, and
decentralization reform based on democratic values, respect for
human rights, minorities and the rule of law, noted these areas
as priority reforms, specifically around Ukraine's membership.
And I guess, just real quickly, how does Ukraine's record
in these areas compare with current NATO member countries like
Turkey, Poland, and Hungary?
Mr. Rasmussen. Unfortunately, I didn't hear the whole
question because of technical issues. But, in short, I think
Ukraine as well as Georgia qualifies for membership of NATO, to
go directly to the bottom line. But Putin tries to prevent them
from seeking membership by fueling conflicts in Abkhazia, South
Ossetia, and the Odessa region in Ukraine.
And we shouldn't let him have a veto. It's a decision for
NATO and the applicant countries.
Mr. Meijer. I could not agree more.
And, Mr. Chairman, my time has expired. So I yield back.
Thank you.
Mr. Keating. Thank you, Representative.
The chair will recognize Representative Titus for 5
minutes. I'd like to inform the other members that our hard
stop has been extended because of the technical difficulties an
additional 10 minutes. So if you're keeping track, we'll be
able to go at least till 12:10.
The chair recognizes Representative Titus for 5 minutes.
Ms. Titus. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
All of the questions this morning and the discussion have
really kind of revolved around several things, and one of them
has certainly been Russian interference or how we push back
against the tension of Russian interference.
Secretary General, I'd like to ask you just kind of a
specific question along the lines about North Macedonia. One of
the conditions of North Macedonia for getting into NATO, which
was a great accomplishment--they've been trying to do it for a
long time--was the name change which they had a referendum and
so did Greece to allow that to happen.
We heard that there was considerable Russian interference
in that election process. I wonder if you are seeing that--if
that is accurate, or if you are seeing that in other places as
one of the ways they're trying to exert influence and challenge
the widening or broadening of NATO membership.
Mr. Rasmussen. Thank you very much. I can, clearly confirm
that the Russians tried to derail the referendum campaign in
North Macedonia.
Actually, I was engaged or I am engaged and I'm co-chairing
something called the Trans-Atlantic Commission on Election
Integrity, and we have deployed tools to detect such
activities, among other places, in North Macedonia.
And we could confirm Russian interference and interference
had the aim to get people to abstain from voting because a low
turnout would make the referendum outcome nonbinding.
But the bottom line is they didn't succeed. Fortunately, an
agreement was reached and North Macedonia became a member of
NATO. So they didn't succeed. But it's not the only place.
Now we're watching Germany. We'll have German elections in
September this year, and I would expect heavy, heavy Russian
efforts to meddle into those elections.
And I wouldn't exclude Chinese attempts to do exactly the
same. China has a key interest in an adoption of an investment
agreement between European Union and China, and Germany has so
far been in favor of that. So they want to influence the
outcome of the German elections.
Ms. Titus. Well, we have certainly seen it here and I
suspected that it was abroad, too. So thank you for being on
that commission to keep an eye on these things.
You know, when you interfere with elections, it doesn't get
more basic than that. Just one other quick question. I wanted
to ask about climate change and how it's related to what's
happening in the Arctic. Anybody can answer this. But, you
know, there are new shipping lanes now and the resource-rich
regions are now more accessible.
But recent Russian military expansion in the region could
threaten our equitable access to these areas and I wonder if
NATO is involved in any way and assure that it's done and any
kind of exploration is done in an equitable manner.
Mr. Rasmussen. It should develop a clear Arctic strategy.
You're quite right. We have seen Russia reopen abandoned Soviet
air bases and military facilities in the Arctic.
So Russia is about to militarize the Arctic, and NATO has a
responsibility to--according to Article 5, we are all
responsible for helping each other. So the Arctic members of
NATO could expect that NATO develop an Arctic strategy in order
to counter that Russian militarization of the Arctic.
Ms. Titus. Is that in--is that in process? Is there a
committee working on that or----
Mr. Rasmussen. Yes, it is in process. Yes, it is in
process.
Ms. Titus. All right.
Mr. Rasmussen. But I can tell you when I was secretary
general at NATO it was impossible to move forward because of
Canadian resistance. But Canada has gradually changed its
position to now it's a work in progress in NATO.
Ms. Titus. Well, thank you very much. I yield back.
Mr. Keating. Thank you, Representative.
The chair recognizes Representative Tenney for 5 minutes.
Ms. Tenney. Thank you, Chairman Keating and Chairman
Connolly, for convening this important hearing today to look at
NATO's future. And I want to thank all the witnesses for their
very insightful testimony. Also, thank you to our Ranking
Members Fitzpatrick and Scott.
Preserving the Western Alliance is one of the key foreign
policy challenges that we face. Our strong community of nations
must adapt to adversaries like Russia and China, as we know so
well.
The United States cannot do this alone, and it is vital
that Europe continues to be a central pillar of our
international Alliance system.
Which brings me my first question for Dr. Mitchell. The
United States has accepted and honored our share of the
responsibilities for European security by being clear on our
commitment to NATO and Article 5, and pouring billions of
dollars into the defense of Europe.
But our efforts can be counterproductive if they're not met
by a willingness on the part of European allies to defend their
own continent.
Europeans cannot expect Americans to care more about their
security than they do with Nord Stream 2 being a perfect
example and referenced earlier.
What can we do realistically to make European countries
share more of the--be more equitable partners and enjoin
efforts to preserve the security that we need from these NATO
allies?
Dr. Mitchell. Well, thank you, Representative, for that
question. I think in some ways that is the most important
question facing the United States when we look at our alliance
structures not only in Europe but in Asia in an era of great
power competition.
And we have seen successive administrations try different
tactics. The Obama Administration tried charm. The Trump
administration tried pressure. It's not always clear that
either of those work.
Under the Trump administration, European countries in NATO
increased defense spending by something like $140 billion. But
I think the reality is, and this is in your--the premise of
your question, European NATO is not doing nearly enough.
By my count right now, I see 10 allies spending 2 percent
and I think, increasingly, given the two-front challenge that
United States has with China and Russia, the 2 percent goal in
Europe--in NATO is a receding de minimis requirement.
I mean, this is the wealthiest alliance of nations on
earth, and I think American taxpayers have a right to ask at a
moment when we have a $25 trillion U.S. debt, why, in a way,
we're indirectly subsidizing European social benefits. I don't
think those questions are going to go away.
The key point to grasp, I think, is that it's no longer
just a matter of fairness or tax dollar stewardship. I think
it's a strategic imperative.
If Europe doesn't take on more of the defense burden vis-a-
vis Russia, the United States physically will struggle to be
able to handle a major crisis in the Western Pacific if there
were crises in, say, the Baltic and South China Sea at the same
time.
I'm of the personal opinion that we have to be willing to
be creative, and so speaking for myself and not the Reflection
Group, to answer your question I would say we should allow the
Europeans to pool more of their capabilities as long as that
effort is harnessed to NATO capability targets.
So I would favor, for example, the creation of a European
level of ambition under the NATO awning that results in Europe
being able to field fully 50 percent of the capabilities and
enablers in the European area.
That would be preferable, to my mind, both to the current
slow improvement in defense spending and to the European
strategic autonomy idea, which I think could be pernicious to
NATO cohesion and capabilities.
Frankly, I don't know how we will hit the goal otherwise. I
think we can keep pressuring allies. But I would favor getting
creative on a European level of ambition inside NATO.
Ms. Tenney. Thank you for the answer. Well, let me just
followup with that. How would you--what steps would you
actually suggest that the Biden administration take to move
them in that direction?
I mean, as you said, there was charm and then there was
pressure, but President Trump did have some success with
pressure moving some of the Allies up, especially Germany.
Germany has, you know, the wealthiest of all the other NATO
nations. How did we get Germany, for example, to be--to comply
and, you know, especially in light of what I mentioned earlier,
the Nord Stream 2 issue where the Biden administration lifted
the sanctions and now we have, you know, this pipeline that is
actually hurting some of our allies in Europe?
Dr. Mitchell. Well, I think that's an important question
and I'm--frankly, I think the administration has to keep up the
pressure on Germany. I hope it will. It's not clear to me from
some of the statements of senior Biden administration officials
if we are still pressuring the Germans.
I think the Trump administration, one of its greatest
accomplishments in Europe was a significant increase in defense
spending from a number of European allies.
And I disagree slightly with my friend, Ivo. I think the 2
percent metric in Germany's case would be a game changer. If
Germany were spending 2 percent of its GDP on defense tomorrow,
it would have a defense establishment, roughly, the size of
Russia's.
So I would say keep up the pressure, No. 1. No. 2, be
willing to be creative. As I've said on European level of
ambition inside NATO, that would go--it would be heterodoxical
from the traditional U.S. approach to NATO. But as long as
those are harnessed to European capability targets, and I think
the administration would have the political--possess the
political support throughout much of Europe to broach a reform
like that within NATO, I think it would find a lot of support.
Perhaps not from the French, but I think it would be moving in
the right direction to put creative ideas on the table.
Ms. Tenney. Thank you so much. My time has run out. But I
greatly appreciate your insight, Dr. Mitchell.
I yield back.
Mr. Keating. Thank you. The chair recognizes Representative
Wild for 5 minutes.
Ms. Wild. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I'd like to direct my question to Mr. Rasmussen first.
In your estimation, sir, has the Erdogan government in
Turkey respected its commitments under Article 8 of the NATO
charter?
Specifically, I'm referring to its actions against the
Kurds in northern Syria and its multiple instances of
belligerent behavior in the Mediterranean.
Mr. Rasmussen. Thank you very much. My brief answer is no.
Turkey has not honored its--I would say its obligation to act
cohesively within NATO. That goes for the intervention in
Syria. That goes in Libya. That is true with Cyprus, and also
the purchase of Russian military equipment.
In all those areas, Turkey does not live up to what we
might expect. Having said that, I would add I also think NATO
should have done more previously, for instance, in Syria to
establish a no-fly zone. We discussed it during my mandate as
secretary general. But we couldn't achieve consensus within
NATO and, consequently, the Turks concluded that they had to do
something themselves.
So I do believe that, in particular, the Europeans should
realize that they should be stronger and engaged in their new
neighborhood in the Middle East, for instance.
Ms. Wild. Well, thank you. We have seen a change in
rhetoric from President Erdogan recently, but it's not clear
yet whether that rhetorical shift will be accompanied by a
substantive change in Turkish foreign policy.
In your view, what are the most strategic steps that the
U.S. can take together with our allies, of course, to promote
genuine cooperation, de-escalation, and better communication
with Turkey?
Mr. Rasmussen. I think we have seen a change of Erdogan's
rhetoric. We have also seen rapprochement between Turkey and
the European Union and European allies because he realizes that
if he continues on the current path he will be in conflict with
not least the American president.
I think words matter and it's clear to me that the U.S.
should continue to press Turkey in particular to do what the
U.S. can do to prevent continued Turkish-Russian cooperation on
military equipment. I consider that the most dangerous element
in the relationship between Turkey and the U.S. and within
NATO.
By the way, we have recently seen that the Turks have
increased their military cooperation with Ukraine. I also
consider that a step in the right direction. So I think we
should continue to pressure Turkey on those issues.
Ms. Wild. What about Turkey's human rights abuses? I'm
particularly concerned about their continuing crackdown on
opposition-elected officials and dissidents. Thoughts on that?
Mr. Rasmussen. Yes, but I can't agree more. I think it's a
major--it is really a major problem. But on the other hand, I
don't think external pressure on issues like democracy,
freedom, human rights, et cetera, will result in any change.
On the contrary, it might strengthen the current government
in Turkey, and I think we owe it to--and we shouldn't forget
half of the Turkish population voted against Erdogan and his
party in recent elections, and we owe to that half to continue
our dialog, our critical dialog, with Ankara. We also have a
strategic interest in keeping Turkey within, I would say, a
Western-oriented and reform-oriented course.
Ms. Wild. Thank you. I appreciate those comments.
And with that, Mr. Chair, I yield back.
[No response.]
Ms. Wild. Mr. Chair, I think you're muted.
Mr. Keating. The chair recognizes Representative Pfluger
for 5 minutes. Thank you.
Mr. Pfluger. You all good? Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank
you to all the panelists today.
I actually served 2 years in NATO stationed in Europe and
as a member of the U.S. Air Force was delighted to be able to
serve with 17 different countries at that particular location.
I have a great appreciation for the impact that this
organization brings, you know, not only to our member countries
but, really, to the stability of the world. And so thank you
for everybody's previous service, your testimony today, the
thoughts and ideas.
I want to kind of hone in on something that I think is
really important. You know, when we--when we look at what each
country can do in NATO and what each country should do, I
appreciate the previous comments when it comes to the
participation, not just--not just financially with the 2
percent standard but also in these niche capabilities and
specifically with regards to infrastructure.
And, Mr. Secretary, if I could start with you. You know, I
have several other questions. But, you know, one of the
investments that NATO members are making in the way of
infrastructure so that the rapid agile deployment of forces,
which I think is a competitive advantage that we have as NATO
as a--as a whole, you know, what are those infrastructure
investments that are being made or need to be made, and then
what are the obstacles that can hinder that?
Because when it comes to it, access, overflight, and basing
are so important to this organization. So, Mr. Secretary, if
you can comment on that briefly.
Mr. Rasmussen. Thank you very much. I think the most
important investment we could do in Europe is to invest in
transport capacity.
We have more soldiers, actually, or more troops in Europe
than the U.S., but we can't move them. Whenever Europeans
decide to participate in an international operation we have to
ask the United States for transport capacity.
So it's, clearly, a critical capacity that we need to focus
on. So speaking about infrastructure, I think transport
capacity is the most important area at all.
But in addition to that, we all need more in intelligence,
reconnaissance, drones, all the modern military capabilities.
We are lacking those capabilities in Europe. In the Libya
operation, for instance, we were very much dependent on U.S.
capabilities.
Mr. Pfluger. Well, thank you for that. Let me follow this
up with looking at some of our most vulnerable members in the
Baltic countries, and I spent a lot of time talking to Latvia,
Lithuania, Estonia, and the--specifically those countries but
also the other ones that are on the eastern flank.
You know, are we engaging non-NATO partner nations with
these common security concerns and what are we doing to bolster
specifically those countries and others that fall into that
category of vulnerability?
Mr. Rasmussen. We have already discussed Georgia and
Ukraine, and I think an immediate first step should be to grant
the two countries a Membership Action Plan and that way create
a much more solid framework for our cooperation with those two
partners.
There is no guarantee for future membership and it's for
them and NATO to decide, not for President Putin to intervene
in that. And I think we could prevent his de facto veto against
membership by deploying exactly the same principle as we did
when Western Germany became a member of NATO and we left
Eastern Germany outside the Article 5 guarantee.
We could do exactly the same when it comes to Georgia and
Ukraine and State, OK, you could become members but Article 5
will only cover those areas under control of your government
Tbilisi and Kyiv. That will be a formula that would actually
deactivate President Putin's de facto veto.
And in the Balkans we have exactly the same issue with the
same challenges.
Mr. Pfluger. Well, thank you very much for that.
In my remaining 20 seconds, let me just say that I applaud
Lithuania and their decision to leave the 17+1 cooperation
framework over their concerns over the People's Republic of
China's predatory and debt-trapping diplomacy that includes
growing malign influence.
I applaud it and I think that we as NATO, as a group,
should continue to look for ways to counterbalance Chinese
malign influence in addition to the Russian influence that we
see.
So with that, Mr. Chairman, thank you very much. I
appreciate everyone's service to this--to this organization and
believe in NATO and its ability to stand up to the malign
influence of actors around the world.
I yield back.
Mr. Keating. The chair recognizes Representative Schneider
for 5 minutes.
Mr. Schneider. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I want to thank
you and Mr. Connolly for leading this meeting, as well as
ranking members and our witnesses, in particular a hometown
call out to Ambassador Daalder and the Chicago Council on
Global Affairs. It's good to see you.
I appreciate having this conversation highlighting the
importance of NATO and, in particular, the significance of NATO
2030. I also appreciate the concerns that we have raised over
the course of this meeting, everything from dealing with China
and Russia, concerns about cyber, the burden sharing.
I want to give a special commendation to my colleague from
Pennsylvania, Representative Wild, on asking the questions
about Turkey. This has been a great opportunity for us to
reaffirm Congress' support for NATO and discuss what the coming
decade holds for what is, clearly, our most important strategic
partnership.
During the Trump administration many in Congress, including
myself, were concerned about President Trump's lack of a clear
outward commitment to our obligation to Article 5, the central
tenet of NATO and our collective self-defense.
To our allies around the world President Trump's wavering
sowed doubt about the United States commitment to NATO and our
other strategic partnerships. Given the overwhelming bipartisan
support for NATO in both the House and the Senate, Congress
pushed back.
In the 115th Congress the only legislative item, either
amendment or bill, to pass the Senate with a vote of 100 to
zero was an amendment during the consideration of the National
Defense Authorization Act that affirmed our commitment to
Article 5.
In the 116th Congress, the last Congress, one of our first
bills voted out of the House was legislation by my colleague,
Representative Panetta, the NATO Support Act, that would
prevent the use of funds to effectuate any withdrawal from
NATO. The bill passed overwhelmingly on suspension.
President Biden's comments and work at the summit in
Brussels went a long way toward mending any doubt about our
fidelity to NATO and Article 5 and I am certain he will
continue to make clear our ironclad commitment to NATO and our
strategic allies.
Ultimately, our experience under President Trump left me
deeply concerned about a future president with similar disdain
for alliances, fundamentally undermining our most important
strategic partnership without Congress being able to
meaningfully push back.
Ambassador Daalder, I'll start with you. But my general
question is what can Congress do to further demonstrate U.S.
support of and commitment to NATO and make sure that that
commitment is iron clad?
Dr. Daalder. Thank you, Congressman, for the question. And
I think what the Congress did in the last 4 years and, as you
mentioned, the two major votes that were taken in both the
House and the Senate with near unanimity in both cases, was a
very important signal to our allies that whatever a particular
occupant in the White House may say, Congress, and indeed, in
our polling at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs the
American people stand squarely behind this alliance.
And reminding folks of that reality constantly is extremely
important. I'm, therefore, very pleased that the NATO
Parliamentary Assembly is being supported so strongly by
Congress because I think that's another way in which to
demonstrate America's commitment and to hold administration
officials when they start to deviate from the treaty
obligations that we have accountable for those facts as much as
possible.
In the end, I think NATO still remains an organization with
very strong support in Congress. It's one of the few bipartisan
issues where in which Republicans and Democrats and Americans
agree on and I think demonstrating that in as best way possible
constantly is a necessary and important reminder to our allies
that this is an alliance that meets our security interest as
much as it does for other members.
Mr. Schneider. Great, thank you. Let me shift to my 1
minute left to the climate. Coordinating our international
response to climate change will be critical to fully living up
to our responsibility to prevent catastrophic changes to the
Earth's climate, as we have seen around the Earth already this
summer and in years past.
But we know that climate change is a threat multiplier,
driving drought and famine, wildfires and flooding,
transnational migration and regional conflict.
How can NATO best adapt? How is it adapting its strategic
outlook to incorporate climate as a threat multiplier and
driver of regional conflict?
And that's to anybody.
Dr. Gottemoeller?
Ms. Gottemoeller. Thank you very much, Congressman. That is
a great question. I am so pleased to see the results of the
latest NATO summit with regard to the emphasis on climate.
It has been really strongly called out now by the NATO
heads of State and government as an overarching strategic
objective to take account of these climate crises that are
emerging.
Talking about the Arctic, we have already mentioned that.
So I do think that the Alliance now has turned its attention to
this in a significant way.
I will just note the contrast a short while ago during the
previous administration. It was not possible to do so. So I'm
very glad that this issue of climate will be front and center
in NATO considerations and in NATO policy development. Thank
you, sir.
Mr. Schneider. Great. Thank you, and I see my time has
expired. I yield back.
Mr. Keating. Thank you, Representative.
The chair recognizes Representative Malliotakis for 5
minutes.
Ms. Malliotakis. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I really enjoyed
today's discussion. It was very enlightening. I want to thank
those who came to testify.
I wanted to followup on some questions one of my colleagues
asked earlier regarding Turkey. In 2020, Turkey engaged in
2,060 violations of Atlantic airspace, including 384 mock
dogfights and 3,025 violations of Greece's territorial waters.
You know, I think it's certainly a violation of Greek
airspace. It violates both international and U.S. laws,
including the Arms Export Control Act.
In addition to that, we saw the U.S. Government impose
sanctions on Turkey in December 2020 for Turkey's purchase of
Russia's S-400 system, and also Turkey now openly supports
Hamas, a widely designated anti-Israel terrorist organization,
and has aided and abetted ISIS and that's well documented.
You know, certainly, not only do these things violate
international U.S. law, but it's also one of--against one of
the endorsed priorities that resulted from the NATO 2030
initiative.
And so, I know Mr. Rasmussen has already commented. I'd
love to hear from the other guests today if they believe that
these actions undermine the integrity of NATO and what can and
should NATO do to address these violations by one of its
members.
Mr. Mitchell is raising his hand.
Dr. Mitchell. Thank you for that incredibly important
question. I think these are extremely concerning actions on
Turkey's part, and let me just say I think the single most
important thing we can do at the U.S. level is to deepen our
defense and security cooperation with Greece, No. 1, No. 2, to
treat Cyprus like a vulnerable Western partner rather than just
a U.N. reunification project in the making.
The Trump administration introduced an eastern
Mediterranean strategy that I think got the emphasis--the
points of emphasis, basically, right. I hope that will
continue.
In the past, the United States has been a little bit
cautious about engagement with Greece and Cyprus. But I think
offsetting--the offsetting role that the United States can play
in the region is significant and it actually helps to bolster
our efforts at working closely with Turkey.
So I wouldn't, for example, go so far as some of the
recommendations that I heard during the Reflection Group
process from experts about using NATO as a tool to--a punitive
tool vis-a-vis Turkey. I think there are real perils to that
approach.
But I think the established practice of the secretary
general offering his or her good services--good offices to
mediate between Greece and Turkey is the most important thing
that NATO can do.
Ms. Malliotakis. Yes, Mr. Rasmussen?
Mr. Rasmussen. Yes, if I may add to this just the following
reflection. I think what we have seen in the Middle East is
what happens when the United States retreats and retrenches,
namely, you will leave behind a vacuum and that vacuum will be
filled by the bad guys.
That's exactly what happened when the U.S. disengaged in
Syria. Who moved in? Turkey, Russia, Iran. So I can only
recommend stay engaged, demonstrate determined American global
leadership. That is a way to keep the autocrats at bay.
Ms. Malliotakis. Yes. I mean, I believe that NATO and the
Western Alliance need to call out Turkey for their ties in
support of terrorist groups but also for their aggression in
the Mediterranean and Aegean.
I have one last question, which I'm going to try to squeeze
in quickly. NATO has identified a need for anti-submarine
warfare capabilities to combat a growing adversarial submarine
threat specifically from an increased Russia presence.
Currently, the U.S. Navy fills a lot of the mission
requirements for NATO with its fleet of P-8 Poseidon aircraft.
I was wondering if you can talk about the existing
submarine threat and the requirement for NATO to address a
capability gap.
Mr. Daalder, if he's available or--Mr. Daalder?
Dr. Daalder. Thank you, Congresswoman. I think the growing
submarine threat from the north, just building on what
Secretary Rasmussen said with regard to the Arctic, more
generally, is a greater concern. For the first time in decades
we're worried about the GIUK, the Greenland-Iceland-UK gap
being penetrated easily by submarines.
So we need a response to that, and the best response is
what NATO was trying to put together, which is like it has done
with AWACS, like it has done with ground surveillance systems,
is a NATO capability which shares the responsibility and the
funding for an anti-submarine capability that will be able to
operate not only in the north but around the seas to defend the
United States--to defend NATO and the countries. The U.S. will
contribute to this.
But I think the NATO countries don't have the resources to
just buy these pieces of PA and other capabilities by
themselves, and doing it collectively as it's done with air
transportation, as is done with AWACS, as is done with ground
surveillance systems is the way for NATO to contribute best to
the security of the North Atlantic area.
Ms. Malliotakis. Thank you. And thank you, Mr. Chairman,
for allowing him to complete the answer. Appreciate it.
Mr. Keating. Thank you. Finally, the chair recognizes
Representative Meuser for 5 minutes.
[No response.]
Mr. Keating. Representative Meuser?
Mr. Meuser. Yes, thank you. I was taking it off mute. Thank
you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you to our ranking members. Certainly,
thank you very much to our witnesses.
Mr. Mitchell, last month, President Biden and the NATO
leaders met in Brussels, as we all know, to discuss security
challenges and adopt initiatives aimed at strengthening the
Alliance and enhancing cohesion among allies.
The leaders for the first time identified China's posing
systematic challenges to aligned security and the rules-based
international order, and underscored the NATO's relationship
with Russia as at its lowest point since the cold war.
NATO's increased focus on China and Russia will be critical
to the success of the Alliance going into NATO 2030. However,
more needs to be done to ensure our efforts are being matched
by other NATO nations.
So Mr. Mitchell, were you satisfied with NATO's response
specifically to China from the summit?
Dr. Mitchell. Well, thank you for that question, sir.
I think it made important contributions. But there's far
more that needs to be done. It was a--it was a productive
summit and I think specifically on the subject of China, the
most important thing that happened was this is the first NATO
document that I'm aware of that went as far as it did in
acknowledging the threat from China.
So that's, clearly, an important step in the right
direction. I think what's missing at this point, and it's been
alluded to already in today's conversation, is an indication of
what NATO is really willing to do to take on the question of
the threat from China.
There are a number of NATO allies who don't want to see
NATO play a more forward-leaning role on China. They want to--
in many cases, they would wish to reserve that as a competency
for the European Union.
I think it's a minority of allies, but it's--their concerns
are, effectively, impeding progress on a more substantive
agenda, and I think you see it in some of the recommendations
from our report on China, which were very specific that didn't
make it into the communique.
I mentioned the idea of a coordinating platform similar to
the cold war era COCOM structure where the North Atlantic
Council could air concerns about Chinese behavior even when
NATO itself is not necessarily the tool that's being used to
address those concerns, maybe even alongside the European
Council.
I think there are steps like that are well within NATO's
reach. On the--in the conversation today, we have talked about
efforts to improve NATO's technological edge, engage more with
Indo-Pacific partners. In short, I think some--the leaders
meeting last week was an important step in the right direction.
But there's far, far more that needs to be done on China.
Mr. Meuser. Sure. No, I certainly agree, and that was my
next question. Is there consensus within the Alliance? I'll ask
this, and quickly. You mentioned a few things there. What would
you recommend the Biden administration to do to try to gain
such consensus?
Dr. Mitchell. Well, I think the lead up to the update of
the Strategic Concept is a tremendous opportunity for the
United States, and I think the Biden administration, in its
outreach to NATO allies in that process of updating the
Strategic Concept, has an opportunity, for example, to add a
fourth core task.
I say add one because we heard from--almost unanimously
from capitals across NATO a desire to preserve the existing
NATO core tasks. But I think adding a new one that helps to
bring in the great power competition frame and helps to bring
in the China question would be a logical step in the right
direction.
I think the administration can do a lot also to continue
the Trump administration's momentum in making China a central
topic in trans-Atlantic conversations at both the NATO and the
EU level.
And I think, for example, keeping up the momentum on the
Clean Network, which effectively jettisons Chinese, Huawei and
ZTE 5G operations from a majority of European countries. That
would keep up that momentum.
But within a NATO context, specifically, I would emphasize
the need for a comprehensive China strategy that outlines the
steps that NATO can take to rebut or guard against Chinese
activities in the areas of sectors' responsibility that impact
readiness, interoperability, and secure communications.
I think there's a lot of low-hanging fruit there, and so I
would--I would invest the political efforts on the handful of
allies that are the most resistant.
Mr. Meuser. Great. The concern of Hong Kong or, shall I
say, the idea of Taiwan perhaps being--moving in the direction
or China imposing itself on Taiwan in the manner it has with
Hong Kong, what would you think NATO's response would be to
that and how much of a hypothetical is that at this point in
time?
Dr. Mitchell. Well, I think it's a very real concern and I
think from NATO's perspective there are two things. First, on
human rights----
Mr. Keating. I'm sorry, but we're up against a hard stop
and we're over the time period.
Mr. Meuser. I didn't have a clock. Excuse me, Mr. Chairman,
I yield.
Mr. Keating. If we could have that, you know, in writing. I
want to thank Representative Meuser, too, for his questioning.
I want to thank all the members of our committee for their
participation. I want to thank my co-chair for the hearing,
Representative Connolly, for working so hard to organize this
hearing, and the members of the NATO Parliamentary Assembly
that participated as well.
It's been an important hearing and a forward-looking
hearing, and a discussion that will be ongoing. So our period
for questioning has now concluded.
The members of the committee will have 5 days to submit
statements, extraneous material, and questions for the record,
subject to the limitation of the rules.
I want to thank, again, everyone for participating.
And with that, this hearing is adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 12:18 p.m., the committee was adjourned.]
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