RT HON DES BROWNE MP, MR ANDREW MATHEWSON AND MR HUGH POWELL

8 JANUARY 2008

  Q260  Mr Hancock: What did you say then, Secretary of State?

  Des Browne: I said—and I will read it to you because I have got it written down—

  Q261  Mr Hancock: That is very good of you.

  Des Browne: The countries who meet NATO's performance-based standards and are willing to contribute to Euro-Atlantic security, assuming they have gone through the process of Intensive Dialogue and then into the Membership Action Plan, should be allowed to join NATO.

  Q262  Mr Hancock: That is what I thought I said. So the geographical—

  Des Browne: If you repeat the exact words that I have used then that is what I said. If you use other words then it is not what I said.

  Q263  Mr Hancock: I was as near as damn it without having it written down.

  Des Browne: That is your view.

  Mr Hancock: Okay.

  Chairman: Before we move off that, Kevan Jones?

  Q264  Mr Jones: I hear what you say, Secretary of State, but is it not the case that certainly some of the former parts of the Soviet Union and parts of Eastern Europe see joining both NATO and also the EU as a badge that they have got to get in order to be seen to be progressing in the world community? Is there not therefore a political dynamic to this, which is really what I think Mike is driving at, where the political consequences of joining NATO or the reasons for encouraging people to do so outweigh what some of these countries can bring to the table in terms of military contribution towards NATO?

  Des Browne: They may at the beginning—and I am not thinking of any particular country at the moment—be in that situation, but the question is whether the process of holding out membership of NATO, or indeed the European Union, encourages these countries along the path of development of good governance and the rest of the conditionality that we would apply to it—the resolution of internal conflict, stability, security, the treatment of their own citizens, the rule of law—and whether all of these are in the best interests of Europe and indeed of the United Kingdom, and in my view it has been. As a matter of fact, many of these smaller countries who have come into membership of NATO from the disaggregated Soviet Union or Eastern European countries are becoming valued allies and are making a great contribution. Proportionately to their ability they are making an increasingly greater contribution and they are using that process for the transformation of their own military capabilities, and I think that is a very good thing.

  Q265  Mr Jones: I do not disagree with anything you have said but is that not a major change in terms of NATO going away from talking about the military aspects of it to now a political method and a leader, as you say, to try and get development in those countries? That is a big change from where we were, say, 60 years ago when it was about collective security.

  Des Browne: I suppose the answer to that, Mr Jones, is that the world has changed quite significantly from 60 years ago. We have just spent about 15 minutes talking about the change in the strategic context that we all live in. That is part of that change in the strategic context and the value of NATO as an alliance is that as a political alliance that delivers military capability or a political and military alliance it has been outstandingly successful and it has been able to adapt and adjust within the basic framework to this changing context and environment.

  Q266  Mr Hancock: The newly elected Georgian President has said that he will go to Bucharest and he would expect from Bucharest that NATO would give them a MAP for their entry into NATO. Is the UK Government going to support that view and have you given that serious consideration? If that is the case, what do you foresee as the timescale for Georgia's entry into NATO if the MAP would be given to them?

  Des Browne: Since there has been no assessment as to whether or not they have fulfilled the criteria and no decision-making process for us to consequently be engaged in, then I am not in a position to go into the detail that you expect of me in relation to that. Once that process has been gone through then I will give you an answer.

  Mr Hancock: As Secretary of State for Defence and the nation's spokesman for NATO, have you looked at the consequences of Georgia not being given a MAP and the obvious political consequences and fall-out of that? My second question really relates to Russia's new-found impetus—

  Chairman: Before we get on to that, let us have an answer.

  Q267  Mr Hancock: But I think they are linked, Chairman.

  Des Browne: I am being told by those who know the details of previous applications that it can take a decade for us to go through, so timescales are—

  Mr Hancock: That is not what our American allies are saying about Georgia. They are saying they want speedy accession for Georgia into NATO.

  Q268  Chairman: Secretary of State, you will be at this summit?

  Des Browne: I will be, yes.

  Q269  Chairman: Georgia will come to you and say, "We want a MAP," and what will you say?

  Des Browne: If we have been through the process of assessment as to whether or not they are entitled to that status then I will given them an answer, but we have not been through that process.

  Q270  Chairman: And when will you go through that process?

  Des Browne: I will need to defer to somebody else as to when it is proposed that that assessment process will take place.

  Q271  Chairman: Mr Mathewson, Mr Powell, when will the process be gone through?

  Mr Powell: Some time during February or March. I have not got the exact date to hand.

  Mr Hancock: It has to be, does it not?

  Q272  Linda Gilroy: Is there not a real Catch-22 situation as far as Georgia is concerned and something that makes it a bit different from other previous applicants, and that is that it still has frozen conflicts on the border of Russia, and Russia will try and get in the way of its applicant status? How do you actually see that being broken because it will always be in the interests of Russia to try and maintain those so-called frozen conflicts, although they are actually far from frozen?

  Mr Mathewson: I think these are the very considerations that will be taken into account first in the consideration as to whether Georgia is allowed the MAP in the first place and then in the consideration of how it proceeds through the Membership Action Plan process. Firstly, there is certainly no guarantee that Georgia will be given the MAP at Bucharest and, secondly, the MAP process itself is open-ended; it will take as long as it takes. The fact of the frozen conflicts is a factor. It is a factor that NATO has to take into account openly without going as far as handing Russia the veto on Georgian membership.

  Q273  Linda Gilroy: Is it not just a veto to Russia, is it actually not doing Georgia any favours by creating a situation in which it is going to be almost impossible for Georgia ever to get out of? Therefore in terms of the fundamental principle you were outlining of NATO being about not just shared values but sharing Euro/Atlantic security, is there not a way in which extending NATO in that direction is going to be really difficult for all of us as well as for Georgia?

  Mr Mathewson: I think there are risks which NATO has to think through and I think this is a decision which NATO has to consider carefully and get right. These are all factors which have to be taken into account in that consideration. There is no presumption that Georgia will get into MAP this time round.

  Chairman: I think that is as far as we are going to be able to take Georgia. Mike Hancock?

  Q274  Mr Hancock: I was just going to ask a final question about whether Russia's new-found assertiveness mean that NATO should look again and refocus on the traditional role of providing collective security? This slightly goes against the position that David Borrow was suggesting that they needed a new strategic view. Maybe they need to have two. What is your view?

  Des Browne: I do not think NATO has moved away from the role of providing collective security, but our current assessment is—and this is an assessment shared by NATO—that Russia does not pose a strategic threat to NATO or to any of its members, so it does not therefore in my view require any changed response to changed strategic circumstances.

  Chairman: Moving on to the European Union in relation to NATO, Robert Key?

  Q275  Robert Key: Almost every EU or NATO summit is of course an "outstanding success", better than the previous one, and sometimes they are—and perhaps Berlin Plus was a good idea, but some of us think that St Malo did more to weaken NATO's relationship with America than anything else. You said that Riga was a triumph but I do not believe it was. Twenty-one countries share membership of the EU and NATO and yet that relationship is plagued by mistrust. Riga paid lip service to that and said it would "strive for improvements in the NATO-EU strategic partnership as agreed by our two organisations." Nothing at all has happened to improve that relationship between NATO and the ESDP, has it? They continue to duplicate their roles and capabilities. Are you not a bit frustrated about that?

  Des Browne: I do not know what the evidence is that they continue to duplicate their roles and capabilities. What there is evidence of is encouragement by both organisations for the development of capabilities, which we encourage in fact because we are conscious that those capabilities, if they are generated by members who are members of both organisations, will be available to NATO, but there is no duplication of that. There are tensions between the two organisations. The stand-off between Cyprus, Greece and Turkey continues despite political efforts at the highest level to try and resolve that, but the bottom line in this is that co-operation on the ground is good.

  Q276  Robert Key: There are always differences between the political relationship and the military relationship. Are there ways in which the military capabilities of NATO and the ESDP can be better co-ordinated?

  Des Browne: I think there are ways. The advances that we have made with strategic airlift are an example of us doing just that. However, I think there are lessons to be learned at the strategic level by the way in which forces and those on the ground in Kosovo and Afghanistan (and in the past the Balkans) are able to work together, and at the end of the day I think that is what matters. The issues that cause the tensions at the strategic and political level are political issues and will be resolved only by politics, so we have to redouble our efforts to try to resolve those issues, but they are not easy to resolve for very good historic reasons.

  Q277  Robert Key: When we visited NATO headquarters in Brussels earlier in the year, it was pretty clear that France wanted to establish a separate EU military headquarters. Is France right?

  Des Browne: I think we are on record as saying that a permanent EU operational headquarters would duplicate what is already available to the EU at the Berlin Plus level from SHAPE or otherwise from the five national operational headquarters which are offered to the Headline Goal, and I agree with the development on that.

  Q278  Robert Key: So how can we reconcile this divergence of opinion between France and the rest?

  Des Browne: Presently we have no operational headquarters and that is how it has been reconciled thus far!

  Q279  Robert Key: I cannot argue with that.

  Des Browne: There is no operational headquarters and so long as we continue to sustain the argument then that is how it will be resolved.

  Chairman: Secretary of State, if such a headquarters were the price for increased French commitment to NATO or for increased French commitment to Afghanistan, would it be a price worth paying?