Last October 7 the Atlantic Council held a forum titled "Missile Defense in Europe: Next Steps" with U.S. Missile Defense Agency director Lieutenant General Patrick O'Reilly and Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security Affairs Ellen Tauscher on the Obama administration's expanding global interceptor missile system.
Tauscher's effusive comments included:
"I want to thank all of my friends at the Atlantic Council, especially people like Sen. Hagel and others that are here that your leadership is fundamental to our being sure that we constantly keep refreshed the very, very strong relationship we have, not only with our NATO partners, but across the Atlantic with our friends that are not only trading partners, but certainly are national security partners. I believe NATO is the premier defense alliance in the world...."
"Let me begin by stating unequivocally that the Obama administration is committed to deploying timely, cost-effective and responsive missile defenses to protect the United States, our forward-deployed troops, as well as our friends and allies from ballistic missile attack. Statements by some that President Obama has decided to forego, cancel or shelf plans for the U.S. and European-based ballistic missile defense deployments are simply not true. The implication that we have abandoned our NATO allies in Europe, that we do not intend to abide by our Article V obligations with NATO, or that we have devalued our treaty obligations to our allies or other security commitments to our friends is also not true....[T]here was no attempt to curry favor with the Russian government, or to secure some kind of tradeoff in negotiations for a START follow-on treaty." [18]
O'Reilly spoke of the U.S. interceptor missile project in Eastern Europe as a broader, NATO-integrated one than that planned by President George W. Bush, insisting that "it has always been adaptable to NATO and it was built with NATO protocols in mind, so that it could readily be interfaced with the NATO system. But now we are at the point where through the active layer theater missile defense project and other discussions with NATO, we are very open to integrate the command and control with a NATO command-and-control system." [19]
On February 2 the Atlantic Council's Vice President and Director of the International Security Program, Damon Wilson, spoke at a video conference in the Ukrainian capital of Kiev entitled "U.S. expectations from the Ukrainian election" five days before the presidential runoff election.
Wilson was Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for European Affairs at the National Security Council from December 2007 to January 2009 when he "played a leading role in developing and coordinating U.S. government efforts to advance a Europe whole, free and at peace and to work with Europe to promote security, prosperity and democracy around the world. He managed interagency policy on NATO, the European Union, Georgia, Ukraine, the Balkans, Eurasian energy security and Turkey, and planned numerous Presidential visits to Europe, including U. S.-European Union and NATO Summits."
Prior to that he served at the National Security Council as the Director for Central, Eastern and Northern European Affairs from January 2004 to November 2006. "During this time, Mr. Wilson strengthened ties with the German Chancellery, coordinated interagency policy in support of reform in Ukraine, including during the Orange Revolution, directed efforts to deepen engagement with America's allies in Central and Eastern Europe...and promoted close consultations with coalition partners in Iraq and Afghanistan." [20]
At the Kiev conference he said that a "neutral status is not an option for Ukraine," and "cautioned Ukraine against seeking an alternative model of strengthening Ukraine's security.
"Such alternatives could prevent Ukraine from further integration into Europe, Wilson believes. In his words, the best way to guarantee Ukraine's security lies through cooperation with NATO and internal reforms." [21]
In addition to the expansion of NATO throughout Europe and even deeper into former Soviet space (with concomitant political, foreign policy, economic and legal transformations) and the deployment of a missile shield along Russia's western border, the Atlantic Council is playing a major role in the ongoing energy war with Russia over supplies of natural gas and oil to Europe.
Last August Alexandros Petersen, senior fellow with the Atlantic Council's Dinu Patriciu Eurasia Center, spoke with Azerbaijan's Trend News Agency and said:
"Azerbaijan not only has significant reserves of its own, but it is also a
gateway to vast reserves on the Caspian's eastern shore and further into Central Asia, including Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. Azerbaijan is also important because it is already supplying Western countries with oil through the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline, its gas goes through the South Caucasus Pipeline and it is the most likely producer country at the moment to supply the Nabucco gas pipeline."
"Turkmenistan hold enormous potential and will be a growing player in the region and globally in terms of natural gas, but the central question about
Turkmenistan is whether its resources will primarily go east or west." [22]
Petersen "came to the Council from the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, where he served as Southeast Europe Policy Scholar, and the Center for Strategic and International Studies, where he was an Adjunct Fellow with the Russia and Eurasia Program. Previously, he served as Program Director of the Caspian Europe Center in Brussels and Senior Researcher at the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London. In 2006, he was a Visiting Scholar at the Georgian Foundation for Strategic and International Studies in Tbilisi. He has also provided research for the U.S. National Petroleum Council's Geopolitics and Policy Task Group and the Council on Foreign Relations Task Force on Russian-American Relations." [23]
The following month Senator Richard Lugar's remarks at the Atlantic Council also included advocating the activation of NATO's mutual military assistance clause in reference to energy policy:
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