[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 29 (Monday, March 10, 1997)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E415-E416]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

[[Page E415]]
        AMERICA AND EUROPE--A TIME FOR UNITY, A TIME FOR VISION

                                 ______
                                 

                            HON. TOM LANTOS

                             of california

                    in the house of representatives

                         Monday, March 10, 1997

  Mr. LANTOS. Mr. Speaker, just a few days ago, the Center for 
Strategic and International Studies organized an outstanding conference 
in Brussels of leading European and American government, parliamentary, 
business, and intellectual leaders. A number of our colleagues were 
invited to attend and participate, and the Speaker of the House and the 
Democratic leader both strongly encouraged Members to participate in 
this outstanding conference.
  Mr. Speaker, we are at a critical period in the relationship between 
the United States and the countries of Europe. We have--gratefully--
come to the end of the half-century long cold war, but as yet we have 
not resolved the nature of the post-cold war world. We have not yet 
completed this important period of change and reordering of 
international relationships. We are on the eve of momentous decisions 
regarding the expansion of the North Atlantic Treaty, and there is a 
solid consensus on the importance and wisdom of inviting a number of 
the countries of Central and Eastern Europe to become members of NATO, 
with the prospect of further enlargement later. The European Union is 
moving toward inviting several of these same countries to become full 
members of the European Union.
  At the same time that we are facing these changes in the 
international arena, however, we in the United States have entered into 
a period of more inward focus, and our domestic preoccupation 
unfortunately runs directly counter to what our role ought to be at 
this time of great fluidity in the international system. This is a time 
when leadership and farsighted international statesmanship is needed by 
the United States and from the United States. We must actively and 
constructively participate in the shaping and forming of the post-cold 
war international system. It is essential that we actively participate 
because of our extensive economic, political, cultural, and other 
interests throughout the world.
  This CSIS conference was particularly important in reaffirming and 
helping key participants define and redefine the Trans-Atlantic 
community of interests that we in the United States share with our 
friends in Europe--interests that are expressed through our commitment 
to NATO, our relationship with the European Union and its member 
states, and growing multiplicity of ties with the newly emerging 
democracies of Central and Eastern Europe and the newly-independent 
republics of the former Soviet Union.
  Mr. Speaker, this excellent CSIS conference was most ably chaired by 
Dr. Zbigniew Brzezinski, the former National Security Advisor to 
President Carter and a distinguished scholar, and M. Jacques Delors, 
the distinguished French diplomat and former President of the European 
Commission of the European Union. Both of these outstanding men guided 
the conference through a series of extremely productive discussions 
that more than fulfilled our hopes for this conference.
  Mr. Speaker, I ask that Dr. Brzezinski's concluding remarks at the 
CSIS conference be placed in the Congressional Record, and I urge my 
colleagues to read them carefully and thoughtfully. His observations 
are particularly significant in putting into context the importance of 
the decisions we and our allies and friends in Europe face. These are 
choices that will affect the future of our Nation and of the world--and 
our choice is either actively to participate by taking positive steps 
to influence the future or passively to watch as conditions develop 
that will profoundly affect our Nation but with or without our active 
participation in shaping them.

 America and Europe: A Time for Unity, a Time for Vision February 22, 
                                  1997

                      (By Dr. Zbigniew Brzezinski)

       Ladies and gentlemen, let me say that I personally feel 
     very grateful for having had the opportunity to participate 
     in these sessions, and also to serve as co-chairman with 
     Jacques Delors who has added so much gravitas and distinction 
     to our proceedings.
       As we come to an end of what has been a very rich, very 
     diversified discussion, I would like to share with you my own 
     sense of what I have extracted from our dialogue. Obviously, 
     it would be futile to recapitulate its various fine points or 
     to replicate the specific foci of our debates.
       I come away, however, with an intensified awareness of the 
     fact that we stand before two grand challenges to which we 
     jointly have to respond. In effect, we have to fashion two 
     grand bargains for the next decade. The first involves a 
     trans-Atlantic relationship, and particularly insofar as the 
     United States is concerned, we have to come to terms with the 
     fact that if Europe is to be our partner, it has to be an 
     equal partner. There is a fundamental truth in this assertion 
     and an enormous operational difficulty. Partnership has been 
     the American rhetoric for years. It is the official rhetoric 
     of our bureaucracy, but it is not necessarily practiced. And 
     I think that we will have to adjust, step by step, to the 
     idea that if Europe is to be a partner, there will have to be 
     operational and institutional adjustments in how we make 
     decisions and how we share responsibilities. And that will 
     mean some American concessions.
       But it also means something else. It means that Europe has 
     to be there. We cannot create Europe for the Europeans. A 
     European Europe has to be built by the Europeans. If America 
     is to be Europe's partner, and if Europe is to be America's 
     equal partner, Europe has to be prepared to shoulder larger 
     responsibilities, and more equal burdens. And that is a very 
     major undertaking which sometimes is overlooked by those who 
     insist on greater equality across the Atlantic, on equality 
     in decision making but not necessarily on equality in the 
     burdens of decisions. So this is a task for the two of us.
       The second task is that NATO and Russia have to agree on an 
     accommodation which acknowledges the reality of a larger 
     Europe, and of a Europe that by virtue of being larger, 
     involves also a larger Euro-Atlantic alliance. Russia and 
     NATO have to agree, therefore, in that context, not only on 
     the relationship, but on a role for Russia in the larger 
     context of European security and in relationship to the Euro-
     Atlantic alliance. And that requires us to formulate serious 
     proposals--which we are in the process of doing--for joint 
     consultations, for some co-participation in the 
     discussions pertinent to regional security policies and 
     actions. But it also means that Russia has to accept 
     reciprocal obligations. It is not only a matter of Russia 
     having a voice which pertains--and I am being careful in 
     my wording--not determines, but which pertains to NATO 
     decisions. It does not only mean concessions which are 
     reassuring to Russia regarding NATO troop deployments or 
     weapons deployments. It also means symmetrical Russian 
     concessions regarding NATO's voice on pertinent Russian 
     decisions regarding troop deployments or weapons 
     deployments. For example, NATO already has made a 
     peremptory and preemptive concession (without even asking 
     would-be members) on the question of NATO nuclear 
     deployments on the soil of new members. I actually happen 
     to feel confident that the new members would not want to 
     have nuclear weapons on their soil, but they probably 
     would have preferred to make that decision themselves once 
     members of the NATO alliance. Nonetheless, NATO in its 
     wisdom has already told the Russians that it will refrain 
     from the deployment of nuclear weapons on the soil of new 
     members.
       I think it behooves us also to ask the Russians about the 
     prospects for nuclear demilitarization, at the very least, of 
     the Kaliningrad segment, which happens to be located in 
     Central Europe and is very pertinent to the security of the 
     Scandinavian-Baltic region. It is very pertinent to the 
     security of Germany; it is very pertinent to the security of 
     Poland. Similar questions could be raised regarding troop 
     deployments on the western frontiers of Russia, particularly 
     next to the very vulnerable Baltic Republics. In brief, the 
     grand bargain with Russia has to involve, also, reciprocal 
     understandings, reciprocal obligations. It is essential that 
     these grand bargains be both completed because failure in 
     either case would entail negative consequences.
       If we do not accept, in a real sense, Europe as an equal 
     partner, I rater fear that the United States will be torn in 
     the years to come by the opposite poles of unilateralism and 
     isolationism. If we and Europe do not share burdens in 
     common, do not make decisions in common, do not have a 
     genuine reality of partnership, the American public on the 
     one hand will occasionally veer towards isolationism; on 
     other occasions, it will favor unilateralism and even wallow 
     in it. And that real risk could, over time, adversely affect 
     the quality of the very unique relationship that we have with 
     each other.
       If Europe fails to unify and thus to become a genuine 
     partner, I think it is a fair question to ask whether the 
     forces of historical pessimism now at work in Europe will not 
     begin to prevail over the forces of historical optimism in 
     Europe.
       Looking at Europe from the vantage point of America, but 
     exploiting somewhat my own European antecedents, I sense that 
     there are conflicting forces at work in contemporary European 
     societies. That the era

[[Page E416]]

     of optimism, of Europeanism, may be challenged by forces 
     which are much more inward oriented, which in some cases can 
     be more domestically narrow minded, occasionally, even 
     ethnically or religiously xenophobic. This would not be good 
     for Europe. It certainly would complicate Europe's 
     relationship with us, irrespective of what would happen in 
     the American orientation.
       If we do not reach the grand bargain with Russian, there is 
     the risk that Russia will be more antagonistic, and that is 
     something that we want to avoid. Though in seeking to avoid 
     it, we should not be shy in saying publicly that the 
     expansion of NATO will in fact help a democratic Russia. We 
     should not be shy in saying it, and we should not be shy in 
     coupling this with saying that the expansion of NATO will 
     hurt an imperial Russia. And we should not be shy in saying 
     that either, because that pertains to the fundamental 
     question regarding Russia itself, namely what will Russia be 
     in the future. This is a large, creative dynamic nation 
     undergoing a profound crisis of self-definition. The collapse 
     of the Soviet Union has brought home the reality to many 
     Russians that the four hundred year long imperial history of 
     Russia has come to an end. But many find it very difficult to 
     accept that and this is particularly true of the former 
     Soviet foreign policy establishment, which is now the Russian 
     foreign policy establishment. The idea of the multinational 
     Russian imperial power still is deeply rooted, providing the 
     basis, therefore, for Russia's claim to global status. What 
     the Russians should realize--they have to realize--is that if 
     Russia is again to be a great country, it can only be a great 
     country if it democratizes itself and modernizes itself, and 
     indeed, the two probably go hand-in-hand. But the quest for 
     an imperial restoration is futile, counterproductive, and we 
     will not support it. And we will not pay a price to avoid 
     Russian antagonism that the for the sake of avoiding the 
     antagonism makes that restoration, perhaps, more feasible.
       So failure to have the grand bargain would be regrettable. 
     But even worse than that would be if NATO just expands a 
     little bit or cuts a deal with Russia which dilutes NATO's 
     identity by de facto making Russia a member of NATO while 
     promising that there will be no further expansion. For that I 
     think would be profoundly demoralizing to those who would be 
     left out, and profoundly destabilizing, in terms of the 
     future, for it would create a zone of disappointment, 
     psychological vulnerability, as Congressman Lantos said 
     yesterday, and geopolitical anxiety which would be fully 
     justified. And it would create temptations in Russia to 
     define itself in a historically adverse fashion. So the 
     failure to have a grand bargain would be regrettable, but a 
     grant bargain which dilutes NATO, and which limits the 
     progressive expansion of the Euro-Atlantic scale would be 
     even worse.
       And the worst of all would be failure to deliver on that 
     which we have undertaken, which is to expand, because we made 
     a decision. We have made it, all sixteen of us have made it. 
     We are committed. And if we now fail to go through with it, 
     either in July, or more likely in the ratification process, 
     we will be signaling that we have neither the will nor the 
     capacity nor the determination to shape the kind of world we 
     want to have which is democratic, pluralistic and secure. 
     This is a fundamental historical challenge.
       Thus at issue are three great realities: what is the global 
     role of America, and how we share our global responsibilities 
     with Europe as a partner who partakes of the same philosophy 
     and values; at stake is the question whether Europe will be 
     Europe, a real Europe, and not a truncated Europe, or worse, 
     a Europe that is divided; and, ultimately at stake is also 
     the question of how Russia divines itself, and whether it 
     will someday be a party of that larger community of which 
     America and Europe are currently engaged in constructing.
       Those are the great challenges that we face. And, 
     therefore, the kind of judgments that we were making 
     yesterday and today are not only strategic, they are 
     historical. And the choice, I think is clear. If we have the 
     vision, I trust we will also have the will.

                          ____________________