Word: strasbourg
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Barack Obama arrived in Strasbourg on Friday for this weekend's NATO summit enthusing about the military organization, which he described at a joint press conference with French President Nicolas Sarkozy as "the most successful alliance in modern history." That it may have been. But Obama's praise contrasts starkly with the scathing assessment of the state of NATO, now 60 years old, by European military analysts, who say that the gap in military capability between the United States and Europe has grown so big that in some places battlefield communication between NATO forces and their US allies has become...
...Friday's Financial Times that Europe's militaries were "pathetically ill-equipped for the world we foresee," and that the Continent's "usable deployable troops amount to just 2% of the 2.5 million who are in uniform" a figure which Abuthnot says is "generous." In an interview in Strasbourg, NATO's military committee chairman Giamcampo Di Paolo, an Italian Admiral, told TIME that he is pushing European leaders to allow their troops to engage in combat. Di Paolo says he nonetheless thinks that some of NATO's critics are exaggerating the problem of Europe's military abilities...
...Obama arrived in Strasbourg there was little discussion about divisions between the U.S. and Europe. After his packed schedule at London's G20 summit, his day in Strasbourg seemed almost relaxed, and included an hour at a youth town-hall meeting, where he answered questions about issues such as climate change and African poverty, before meeting with German Chancellor Angela Merkel; the NATO summit itself is scheduled as a three-hour meeting on Saturday morning. At the press conference with Sarkozy, Obama limited himself to saying that "the more capability we see here in Europe the happier the United States...
...town hall in Strasbourg, France, Obama stood before an audience of mostly French and German youth and admitted that the U.S. should have a greater respect for Europe. "In America, there's a failure to appreciate Europe's leading role in the world," he said before offering other European critical views of his country. "There have been times where America has shown arrogance and been dismissive, even derisive...
...complicated the activists' message, Roel Stynen, 28, a Belgian philosophy graduate from the organization Vredesactie (Peace Action), answered, "Yes, definitely. The Belgian government has said as much, that it was a lot easier to refuse requests from Bush." The demonstrators hurled their bottles at riot police in central Strasbourg on Thursday afternoon before being dispersed by tear gas. Some things have not changed. While activists may take comfort in the arrival of the usual suspects to protest at the NATO summit, it won't help delegates find a sense of common purpose for the next decade...