Although still concentrating on the Euro-Atlantic zone, the Atlantic Council has followed NATO into former Soviet Caucasus and Central Asia territories, Asia as a whole, the Middle East and Africa. It now has a South Asia Center and a Dinu Patriciu Eurasia Center which "serves as the Atlantic Council's focal point for work related to Black Sea, Caspian, and Central Asian energy issues, such as pipeline politics, the East-West energy corridor, and east and southeast European energy policies. Security concerns throughout the wider Eurasia region, gas crises, and the continued debate over proposed pipelines into Europe make the Center's efforts increasingly urgent." [13]
In its own words its contemporary priority objectives are:
- identifying and shaping responses to major issues facing the Atlantic Alliance and transatlantic relations;
- building consensus on U.S. policy towards Russia, China, Japan, Korea, and Taiwan;
- promoting balanced responses to growing energy needs and environmental protection;
- drafting roadmaps for U.S. policy towards the Balkans, Africa, Cuba, Iraq, Iran and Libya;
- engaging students from across the Euro-Atlantic area in the processes of NATO transformation and enlargement
Starting two years ago, the Strategic Advisors Group (SAG) has "focused its efforts on the topic of NATO reform, teaming up with the Center for Strategic and International Studies, the National Defense University, and John's Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies to produce a report entitled "Alliance Reborn: An Atlantic Compact for the 21st Century.' This effort outlined ways in which Allies should reinvigorate NATO, including improving decision making, enhancing capabilities, and tackling major challenges to ensure NATO's relevance for new and emerging threats.
"The "Alliance Reborn' report served as a prelude for the SAG's "STRATCON 2010' project, which seeks to shape the debate concerning NATO's development of a new Strategic Concept. Led by SAG members Yves Boyer and Julian Lindley-French, the project influences the Strategic Concept development process from both inside and outside the formal process." [14]
The SAG is no abstract planning body, as it "produces major public policy briefs and reports, hosts off-the-record Strategy Sessions for senior U.S. and European civilian and military officials, and provides informal, expert advice to senior policymakers." [15] Its 2007 report "Saving Afghanistan: An Appeal and Plan for Urgent Action," authored by James Jones, was released at the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in the presence of Committee Chairman Senator John Kerry, and Jones later testified on its contents before the same committee.
The Strategic Advisors Group then visited NATO Headquarters, Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe and European Union Headquarters in Belgium to brief European military and civilians leaders on the report.
The group was present at all five official NATO conferences on the new Strategic Concept and co-hosted the largest of them in Washington in February at the National Defense University with NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen, Defense Secretary Gates and Secretary of State Clinton. [16] The last-named began the Washington Strategic Concept Seminar by delivering an address at the same the Ritz Carlton in Washington that hosted the recent Atlantic Council awards affair, and at the event Atlantic Council Chairman Chuck Hagel provided the welcoming remarks.
The Atlantic Council of the United States has demonstrated its quasi-governmental nature by hosting NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen's first major speech in the U.S. last September, shortly after succeeding the Netherlands' Jaap de Hoop Scheffer at the post on August 1.
At the same event Atlantic Council member Senator Richard Lugar reiterated the demand for the former Soviet republics of Georgia and Ukraine to be absorbed into NATO. His comments included:
"NATO's contributions are taken for granted. It is important to take stock of just how remarkable it is that NATO is involved in combat three thousand miles from Europe. We should also celebrate the fact that NATO membership has been a tremendous engine of reform among prospective members, helping them to achieve the institutional structures needed for success in the 21st century....We must not repeat the folly of the early days of the Cold War, when the appearance of a rigid U.S.-drawn defense perimeter in the Far East invited the perception that we would abide any geopolitical upheaval behind that line. The West must hold out the prospect of membership to qualified aspirant countries, including Ukraine, Georgia, and the entire Balkan region." [17]
The Atlantic Council hosted and showcased the presidents of Georgia and Ukraine, Mikheil Saakashvili and Viktor Yushchenko, after their ascension to power in so-called color revolutions in 2004 and 2005, respectively.
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