[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 145 (1999), Part 18]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages 26002-26003]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



   TRIBUTE TO DIETER SCHMIDT--A TIRELESS ADVOCATE FOR CLOSER GERMAN-
                           AMERICAN RELATIONS

                                 ______
                                 

                            HON. TOM LANTOS

                             of california

                    in the house of representatives

                       Tuesday, October 19, 1999

  Mr. LANTOS. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to pay tribute to Dieter A. 
Schmidt, Director of the Institute for Foreign Relations of the Hanns 
Seidel Foundation of Munich, Germany. Mr. Schmidt is a true friend of 
the United States and a longtime force for stability and cooperation in 
Europe.
  One of Mr. Schmidt's most lasting accomplishments has been his 
leadership of the Franz Josef Strauss Symposium, a highly regarded 
international conference on foreign and security policy. The 
Symposium--which will be held for the twentieth time later this year in 
Munich--has provided a platform for senior American officials and 
Members of Congress to meet and discuss with their German counterparts 
perspectives on critical issues relating to Germany and European 
affairs.
  For the past two decades, this outstanding forum has provided an 
excellent opportunity to consider and evaluate the dramatic changes 
that have taken place in Central Europe--the fall of the Berlin Wall, 
the end of the Cold War, the enlargement of NATO, and the changing 
nature of international institutions in the post-Cold War era. Dieter 
Schmidt's guidance--from helping to establish the Symposium in 1979 to 
chairing its meetings and working tirelessly to bring together policy 
makers on both sides of the Atlantic--has provided a critical forum for 
leaders of both of our countries to meet, to build strong personal 
relationships and to create greater mutual understanding and 
cooperation.
  Throughout his career, Schmidt has time and time again worked to 
strengthen German-American relations. In 1957, as a young officer, he 
attended an exchange program at the United States Military Academy at 
West Point. In 1968, Schmidt returned to the United States for CBW 
warfare training at Fort McClellan, Alabama. After his military career, 
he became the international secretary of the Christian Social Union 
Party. In that capacity, Schmidt played a key role in the founding of 
the International Democratic Union (IDU), a worldwide association of 
Christian Democratic and conservative political parties. For many years 
now he has served as a member of the Committee for International 
Affairs of the IDU, where he was instrumental in expanding the 
organization to include American participation.
  In 1981, in his capacity as Director of the Institute for Foreign 
Relations at the Hanns Seidel Foundation, Dieter Schmidt initiated a 
series of annual conferences to educate congressional staff about the 
German and European political processes. In the past eighteen years, 
these extremely valuable conferences have involved the participation of 
almost two hundred Congressional staff members, and they have provided 
the participants with a much broader and more meaningful understanding 
of Germany and of America's other key allies and partners in Europe.
  Mr. Speaker, as we mark the twentieth gathering of the Franz Josef 
Strauss Symposium, I invite my colleagues to join me in paying tribute 
to the remarkable contributions of Dieter

[[Page 26003]]

Schmidt to the close ties between Germany and the United States. His 
efforts merit our great appreciation and our respect.

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