hearing will will come to order it's my art has been my customary practice when i would share the committee on oversight and gentleman from california another gentleman from california mr rohrabacher described it as the committee without rules and it be my intention to continue to have that in formality and flexibility in terms of the five minute rule the ten minute rule but we would ask all of our witnesses to  circumspect in terms of the amount of time that they use but i prefer that people feel comfortable take their time and it also applies to to members  we generally have a conversation members are allowed to pursue a line of questioning without without being an excellent working relationship we agree on some things on the judiciary committee like what what is it else but i presume on this so it's with a deep sense of responsibility that i'm conducting my first hearing as chair of the subcommittee on europe as i agree with the observation of secretary clinton who noted that europe is our essential partner and that the subject of today's hearing the treaty of lisbon would appear to signal a substantial change in the infrastructure of the european union that's said p who's us to be especially aware of the potential implications for that partnership as there is no other relationship close more significant for the united states and for that matter your trade investment amount to far in excess of one billion dollars a day and together our global trade accounts represent forty percent of world trade and fifty percent of global g d p furthermore it's my own belief that this patna ship is a predicate for political and economic stability and the expansion of democratic values globally now the evolution of a european entity  steel resources in a new organization that other european nation states could join now i won't take the time to review that history that led to the treaty of lisbon but i believe that as the evolution and growth of the e u proceeded over time our partnership with the  became ever more critical and will clearly continue to do so as president obama recently stated in response to the final approval of the treaty strengthened and renewed you will be an even better transcendently antic partner with the united states some experts suggest that the passage of the will have positive implications for the united states and europe e u relations in part due to the creation of new posts such as the european council president and high representative  foreign affairs along with increased role for the european parliament dear to the heart of many members of the united states congress i might note that combined with more authority in specific policy areas these changes would provide to you e u with a more coherent voice and given our shared vision for democracy human rights and global security these new allocations of power within the e u system could offer of the us a more active and assertive overseas partner in addressing our shared challenges and in promoting our common causes while  the promise that deep integration in an lodgment of the e u as a threat to america's leverage over individual member states it's my own conviction that the interest of having a stable and dependable multilateral partner in europe outweighs the shock term interests of any particular bilateral relationship why hold a hearing on the implications of the lisbon treaty at this admittedly prima to thank you much ambiguity exists as to the treaties implementation within the e u even among its own member states much less and working relations with other nations it is indeed accurate to say as with all we form that only trial and practice will reveal a measure is true character and consequence but as we have seen all too often in the cases of was on terror and was on drugs financial regulation and global warming it's our lack of foresight and thoughtful consideration to anticipate and prepare for a new challenges and opportunities that diminishes our ability to promote and preserve the interests and well being of our own citizens it's our six president of the united states john quincy adams once i don't this is sweet and its consequences are cruel for those of you who attend  these subcommittee hearings in the future be prepared for constant references to john quincy adams he was not only the first ambassador to russia but he is only native sons of quincy massachusetts to serve in the united states congress he obviously as they have flaw a very quotable source for me i only hope that i don't end up like john quincy adams whom some of you might know was president and then came to the house of representatives and happened to die in the chamber of the house of representatives but he was a obviously a very large figure in american history so proactive in korean and thoughtful consideration facing the e u american relationship will not only inform us of what may occur but better prepare us for what ever options may be available as we move forward so it's with this purpose that we hold today's hearings understanding the meaningful reforms encompassed in the lisbon treaty will assist our government in making the most of the essential relationship president obama has aptly stated that in america there is a failure to appreciate europe's leading role in the world i concur with that and by holding this hearing here today we are taking europe and the you and the individual member states seriously so with that i will conclude and rules i know of the no rules or the diminished structured rules but i'm sure we're going to work well together it's it's been an honor to serve with you on the judiciary for all these many years and and while as you mentioned we have had some disagreements as it relates to issues philosophically and and maybe even politically from occasion on occasion but i don't think we've ever been disagreeable on any on any issue did have the honor to work with rob as a the chairman and as his ranking member and i enjoyed every minute of it as i look forward to working with you mr chairman as we all know on december the first following ratification by all twenty seven member states in the european union the lisbon treaty went into force in the end the goal of the lisbon treaty is to streamline decision making in the e u and make it more active and united actor in international affairs i don't have a strong view on whether the lisbon treaty will be beneficial to the people of europe this is a decision for the nations of the e u and their citizens to ultimately make they are the best judge on the best way to organize their own political and economic affairs however i will be monitoring the implementation of the treaty to determine its effect on the u s relationship with the sovereign countries in europe for example well the ratification of the lisbon treaty in any way impede our close bilateral military and intelligence relationships that we maintain with certain european countries or will the new treaty make it more difficult for the countries of europe to up to cooperate with us particularly in places like afghanistan sure that such actions are consistent with the policy i find this provision to be potentially troublesome judging by its recent history one can only imagine what the reaction would to the actions taken by some of our close allies such as britain on a variation of national security issues again mr chairman thank you for calling this hearing today i welcome and look forward to hearing the down at the end missed the wexler i'm sure he's here to want to my performance shortly after the conclusion of this particular hearing i will be receiving a report card from professor wexler but let me yield to him to see whether he has any comments that he wishes to make with that the gentleman from florida my friend bob wexler thank you just one understanding that secretary gordon is quite a draw i had the privilege of chairing this committee for three years and then you guys ever showed up and now it's a it's a full boat so what does that have to say i think it says a lot bob actually thank you very much please proceed thank you do any other members wish to make an opening  hopes progress in the union's work in europe and around the globe i applaud the e u members for their achievement in passing this substantial reform after years of negotiations how about the spider land sea deliberation it remains to be seen how the lisbon treaty will affect the work of the european union in practice and how this reform may impact u s relations with the e u and its members also with this long process completed i am eager to see where the new european union will focus is energies next i look forward to hearing from today's expert witness and welcome you to the hearing and i would like to end by saying i'd enjoyed very much working all know that up to it and we look forward to your leadership as we all know you are a passionate leader on the issues that exist between our country and europe and also that how important partnership and friendship is in that you're a strong advocate for strengthening that bond and as a new member of course i wish you the best and the influential subcommittee in the photo working with you and again thank you for calling this timely hearing on the lisbon treaty secretary gordon thank you for being here today the lisbon treaty ratification and its subsequent employment has left the united states with its many exciting prospects of increased cooperation as with questions on the future e u relations personally i would encourage and invite our counterparts in the european parliament to be more active on the hill and to address these concerns as we will seek to interact with them as well mr chairman and secretary gordon i'm actually particularly concerned over noted trend towards protectionism in the european union aside from hampering u s industry in the e u when hurting the e u economy many feel that new rules particularly the alternate managers directive could lead to u s retaliation in the start of a damaging trade dispute in the area of financial services furthermore i have questions about the new internal market chief mark michel barnier and his views on this legislation we are encouraged by the work of the transatlantic economic council to promote increased dialogue between legislators on this matter mr gore and we look forward to your testimony and your comments on these very important issues and as always are grateful for your appearance here thank you understand it was a very robust and very productive session berkeley thank you mr chairman and congratulations i'm looking forward to working with you on these issues as well as so many others and of course my dear dear friend bob wexler if i praise him anymore he's going to get a very swelled head but he knows how much i will miss him and wish him well in his new endeavors i as the chairman said i share the transatlantic legislator dialogue for those that don't know what that is it's an ongoing discussion between members of the united states congress and our european union parliament counterparts we just tended our sixty seventh meeting it's been going on for well over thirty years with and without me i've been chair for the last few years and i can honestly say it's been an extraordinary experience for me we meet twice a year once in the united states and we just concluded our sixty seventh meeting in new york city and one in europe depending on who had the presidency of the e u our dialogue and compass is a number of issues starting many years ago just on foreign policy and of course we talk about the balkans and iran iraq afghanistan our relationship with russia the middle east but we've started to expand the scope of our discussions and we're now talking about the collective economies especially in light of the financial meltdown that plagues continues to plague all of our trade issues the tech that's become a  large part of what we talk about so i can tell you without fear of contradiction that at this latest meeting which took place last weekend in new mark the euphoria felt by the members of the  european union parliament that were in attendance was palpable and they are most excited to take this new treaty and translated into positive action not only among e u members and have a stronger more transparent and a better e u but these would be their relationship with the united states in the strengthening of the transatlantic coalition  i am curious in your remarks and perhaps during q and a the europeans have made a number of proposals to the american side of the trance atlantic legislator's dialogue everything from  as simple as exchanging internes during the summer which i think would be a very good thing to strengthening our involvement in the text additional meetings throughout the year rather than the two we can certainly be doing video conferencing on specific issues and tailoring our meetings so that they may be we since we have now i good contingent of both europeans twenty seven and we had fourteen  congresspeople at the last t l g meeting so it's a good number of people and many have areas of expertise that we would like to hone in on but one of the most intriguing  suggestions by the e u members is that they are setting up an office transit t l d office here in the united states starting on january right after the new year that will interact with members of congress so that legislation that we're considering they'll get a handle on and its impact on the e u prior to prior to enactment they have asked that the united states congress do the same and i'm curious as to what your opinion is it's easy enough to do we can patterned after helsinki and their arrangement and so we have lots of possibilities and i'd be curious to hear mr gordon what you think about that and where you see the t l d's role in this relationship through the list in treaty and i thank you very much for your kind attention unaware but there was a former member from minnesota by the name of guilt good along with myself chaired the congressional study group on germany and working with the then chair henry hyde of the basic structure of the e u and they needed to be a presence given the significance of congress as an institution in american foreign policy so i look forward to working with you on this  it seemed if i could mr chairman there was discussion that the united states congress is the weak link in our foreign policy discussions and involvement with the european union and i'd rather chairman and let me start off by congratulating you on your new assignment and i like that for those who may not know the chairman is the only member of congress with a distinct full photograph of him  taken and moscow downtown with the statue of john quincy adams many people did not know that john quincy adams has a statue of him in downtown moscow and the chairman was there and i was very my enjoy that and to you mr wexler we really appreciate as george serving on this subcommittee with you and i wish you great success in your future endeavors this is indeed a very timely hearing at the e u some very perplexing questions and issues certainly present themselves it's going to be very interesting to see how these reforms from the lisbon treaty impact on multiple layers one there are so many er amendment five within the nato agreements as well so i think that that's an area that certainly raises some questions the other is the reform to lisbon treaty in terms of the common defense that this reform has put forward strengthen a more aggressive foreign policy a more protective one and particularly as it relates to terrorism support as as nato and then the overlapping of nato and the e u and when this twenty three countries i believe the other twenty seven but there are many of the same countries so that's a very area and will there be  more aggressive approach to russia particularly the area of energy security and the monarch believe that russia has in that region and supplying nearly forty percent of its natural gas and russia's tendency to use that knobbly as a political tool will they be more aggressive in how they respond to that and and and i think that  terms of their efforts to move forward in a more responsive way with iran on the sanctions we've not had that so i'm really looking forward to this i think that the lisbon treaty is very positive and i think that we really need to examine a very thorough here hopefully we can accomplish through our examination  and sense of urgency to move the european union to be more forceful and it's good to see the underlying agreements with then this treaty appear to be moving the european continues to participate under the lisbon treaty we will continue to see exchanges i think most of us are aware that the largest trading partner that the united states has is with europe and the portugal the lisbon treaty was finally concluded and although it took several years to ratify it we're honored to have the ambassador from portugal is here in the audience today investors along developer l who has taken  great interest as all the members twenty seven nation states of europe successfully seen the treaty enacted what this portends as to the lisbon treaty a stronger more coherent voice with the european union is one of the goals more streamlined decision making in their process and increased transparency and democratic accountability as the  european network has expanded we can only think twenty years ago the ural really had not developed and today of course the euro is a very robust strong currency that has created tremendous economic vitality not just within europe but around the world one can only imagine what twenty years from now the new european union with the enactment of the lisbon treaty arrows we would say in portugal por when our country was formed and we achieved our independence we had the articles of confederation that were fairly ineffective and which ultimately led to the development of our federal form of government in our constitution this is a very exciting time period and the lisbon treaty as we would say is a work in progress we look forward to the testimony that the secretary will provide us during this transition that is currently  portugal and for serving as a as a venue as well as a force in terms of the conclusion of that treaty that we're discussing here today  now let me as i look to my right one more time less i'm going to have to go to one of the best ranking members in anywhere in the congress a lot of people were i think surprised by billet to work some extremely difficult issues when i chaired the oversight committee but i think we accomplished  much more than was ever anticipated and it was terrific working with the gentleman my friend from california dana rohrabacher mr chairman i'm here to wish you good  luck in your new endeavor but i do want to remind you that even today if you'll notice i am not on your right i am on your left and i know that's very difficult to  when in the one nine hundred ninety s when we used our currency stabilization fund to save the euro the euro was going down i was very upset that president clinton you know sought and his power which was not given granted him by congress to stabilize the euro with our funds when this fund that he was using was for the united states dollar but we did that and we save the euro and i think that it was a certainly an act of goodwill on the part of the people states because they wouldn't even be here euro now i'm very anxious to find out whether or not our european friends are being reciprocal in that whether or not now that the dollar is under attack what are they doing to help us strengthen the dollar or are they instead taking advantage of the situation and kicking a friend while he's down chairman again congratulations for assuming this new chairmanship today we've heard congratulations and best wishes to representative wexler for the job that he's done a great job that he's done for the many accomplishments that he's had we've also heard some very hopeful words about the lisbon treaty and the sense of optimism that that might be something that will play a positive role in the future let me fully identify myself with the former words of congratulations and not the latter words of hopeful perhaps irrational optimism thank you mr chairman  one way or another bemoaning the fact that coordination between nato and the e u with respect to afghanistan right at the moment is lacking and i would  and significant service to issues such as nato and our national security and our relationship with particularly with europe nothing further ado thank you for your patien old on may fifteenth from two thousand to two thousand and nine he was a senior fellow at the brookings institute in washington where he focused on a wide range of europe and us foreign policy issues he was director for european a fee is at the national security council during the clinton administration when he played a key role in developing and coordinating nato policy in the run up to the alliances fiftieth anniversary summit in washington he has an extensive background academically as well as service to his country so thank you mr secretary and please proceed thank you mr chairman  to all of you i'd also like to begin by congratulating you mr chairman on your taking over this committee is as you all know i've had extensive engagement with this committee over the years and i look forward to continuing that under your leadership  and i too would like to acknowledge and thank your predecessor mr wexler we all benefited from his leadership of this committee over the years and know he'll stay engaged on on all of these issues i also want to thank you for  inviting me to testify on this subject at this time because as many of you have pointed out this really is a potentially important development that the united states should be playing close attention to as we think about our own interests  have submitted more detailed testimony for the record so if it's all right with you and abiding by your encouragement to be brief i'll just make a short opening statement please the united states and the r p n union form a community of shared values in a partnership of shared interests our eight hundred million democratically governed citizens are bound together by an during links of culture and commerce by our shared history and our common hopes for the future the european union is one of our most crucial partners in addressing regional and global challenges around the world our shared priorities cover all the major u s foreign policy concerns including stabilizing afghanistan and pakistan contending with the iranian nuclear program addressing global climate change pursuing comprehensive peace in the middle east managing our responses the global financial crisis and hansing energy security and promoting the spread of democratic and market reforms to every corner of europe the us europe economic relationship is one of the central drivers of the world economy our links are not just those of shared values trade and political traditions but also consist of the millions of our citizens who travel each year to our countries to work study or simply business in view of the many ties that bind the united states and europe together the obama administration welcomed very much the entry into force of the lisbon treaty on december first we believe this treaty marks a milestone for europe and its role in the world create several new institutions including the permanent presidency of the european council a new e u high representative for foreign policy foreign affairs and security policy and a new european external actions service there will also be an enhanced role for the european parliament these new and institutions will further promote the evolution of the european union toward a more consistent coherent and effective foreign policy we believe that a strong and cohesive europe is very much in the u s national interest and we look forward to the development of these institutions and to engaging with their new leaders incoming president herman fun run point and the new high representative catherine ashton as well as with president barroso the european commission and the leaders of the european parliament we're hopeful that a permanent presidency of the council will allow for the development of a long term consultative relays unshipped at the head of state and government level the new high representative for foreign affairs and security policy will combine responsibility for foreign policy coordination with a greater capacity to make strategic use of the use substantial foreign assistance budget and will function as the permanent chair of the foreign affairs council the monthly meeting of e u foreign ministers secretary clinton met with her with catherine ashton during her december for a visit to brussels for the nato minister ial and they've talked about an early visit by high represent band of ashton to washington i representative ashton it will be supported by a new external action service that will ultimately function as a sort of diplomatic service for the e u and offer counterparts to u s officials lisbon treaty brings other know where the institutional changes the european parliament parliament has gained increased powers over issues of justice and home affairs the budget agricultural policy and trade agreements we hope that ties and contacts between members of congress and the e u legislators will continue to strengthen as the european parliament's authority broadens i think this reinforces a point made by many of you about the need for that which we certainly support a number of members of this committee as as representative berkley pointed out met on december fourth to six with their european counterparts counterparts in new york of the transatlantic legislators dialogue in what we understand were some of the most robust consultations so far between our legislators and that can only be a good thing and i hope in the question answer period to be able to allow braid on this but certainly given that this is a democratic space on both sides of the atlantic we need to be connecting with what i just slater's and citizens on these foreign policy issues do you also continues to take steps towards fulfilling the european vision of the you that contributes as much t terms of crisis management deployments peacemaking supporting third countries in combat in terrorism in their territories and defense coordination it is the policy of this administration to support a strengthened european defense capacity we believe  make an important contribution to international security and stability we also believe that nato and the e u with twenty one common members can complement each other and should work closely together on their shared priorities in our view there is more than enough work to go around so it also makes sense and again this is addresses a point that several of you have made it also made sense for the two organizations to coordinate their efforts to make the most efficient use of scarce resources by minimizing duplications of capabilities and superstructure and operations let me conclude with what i think is the essential point behind our thinking it is clear to all of us that the united states faces a daunting array of global challenges that no single country can handle on its own for a variety of critical issues from climate change to the doha round of trade talks the balkans iran i could name many others solutions will require working in close concert with our european partners we believe that the lisbon treaty represents an important effort by our you partners to streamline their policy making process we understand that as with all efforts to reform complex institutions in the u s certainly one this is a work in progress and it may take time for the new institutions to demonstrate their impact nevertheless we hope that changes wrought brought by lisbon will make the e u a stronger partner for the united states and increase the role of europe in the world stage we want to you to be that stronger partner and we certainly intend to do our part to engage closely with the new institutions ultimately their effectiveness will be determined by the will of the member states to invest in them let me thank you again mr chairman and all the members of the committee for the opportunity to appear before you on this important subject and i look forward to your questions and our discussion thank you thank you mr secretary and as i'm listening to your testimony thoughts stop provoking in the sense of future future hearings i've always contemplated the concept of trance a clinic free trade zone as you reference commercial trade relationship and i've always europe that have an interest in participating in that program and i think that ought to be a subject of the hearing and i but i have always been surprised not just by the european ignorance of the role in the function of congress  our in our federal system and our american democracy but clearly the the the opposite is also true as i mentioned in my opening remarks  to the american the concept of the e u you know represents something at first blush is very simple but it  and what's it doing in brussels with all due respect to to brussels the point is that this lack of understanding i think carries with a great risk i think there are a perceptions on the part of members of congress that sometimes there is in a mosque city when in fact there is not and are minimal disagreement as opposed to animosity and i think it's very very important to maintain a consistent constant dialogue and i respect the work that my colleagues under the leadership of the congressman from nevada have done but i don't think we can afford at this point with a a new entity post was been that will be more efficient in terms hopefully in terms of his decision making not to have a significant presence in brussels where there is a consistent constant open lines of communication as opposed to an ad hoc series  of meetings and i intend to discuss this with ms berkeley but i just put out on the table  why not a congressional office obviously would be bipartisan in nature but having a presence and with a well qualified staff given the seriousness of the issues that we all know face both europe and the united states i can certainly say i share your perception that there is in from insufficient familiarity on both sides with the institutions of the other including on the parliamentary side that partly stems from very different practices we certainly encourage when visitors come here to talk foreign policy we do encourage them to come up to the hill a number of these european countries their parliaments don't play the sort of role in foreign policy that ours do and it's important for them to understand ours in terms of the other direction i would say this one theoretical at least advantage of lisbon is to be easier to understand you know we can forgive some americans for not having mastered the intricacies of the council the commission the european parliament and how that into relates to the countries and again in theory this has to be proved in practice but one of the ideas  was is to to have a more identifiable interlocutor and so now with a standing president of the council and the standing high representative if you will foreign minister it is a little bit clearer who is speaking for them on foreign policy that said and this comes to your point mr chairman you know let's not pretend that that will answer this question one for all and there be just on phone number individual it will remain quite complicated and we're going to have to take advantage of your suggestion to understand it better including the european parliament which will play a greater role in foreign policy than it has i don't really have a specific you on your idea of a congressional office in brussels maybe that is something that could be explored and similarly in the other direction but i certainly agree with the notion that that is worth thinking about how we can get our parliaments to understand the other side better mr secretary it's my understanding that the european parliament is  rs about to open an office here in washington and without having a counterpart in brussels i think we stand at a disadvantage and like i said i would i look forward to having this discussion with congresswoman berkley to see where the legislation a is necessary whether congress is an independent institution can just simply appropriate the money and say that we're going to do it but trade relationship i think the treaty will have a limited impact on the economic trade relationship it has potentially significant impact on the foreign policy in the general foreign policy relationship economics and trade is one area that was already significantly integrated in e u structures even prior to lisbon the commissioner for trade has for a long time been a powerful figure you member states a long time ago agreed to grant significant authority for example when there's a trade negotiation it's the commission the trade commissioner who is really empowered to act on behalf of all of the member states in a way that has not been true and remains untrue for foreign policy so i don't think that we should expect lisbon to have a major impact on that e u common institutions of already been quite empowered and that will not change with the lisbon treaty how do you see the impact that the enhanced role of the european parliament might have on the the u s c relationship that's more of an open question because the lisbon treaty does give the parliament a greater rol including to some degree on foreign policy and including something that is a tradition in this country is holding hearings for and approving some of the appointments that would be part of the of the foreign policy apparatus  and the parliament also play a greater role in justice and home affairs issues that at least indirectly affect our our our interests but precisely how so we can we can confidently say the european parliament will play a greater role what we can say it will depend in part on who gets elected to the european parliament and how they assert assertive they want to be and how resistant the people who feel the new post want to be is precisely what impact that will will have we don't know what direction that they will  want to go in but it comes back to the chairman's point about being better aware of developments taking place within the parliament so we know where they might be trying to push things in another area how do you see such things as a commitment of troops to wars and around the world or in areas of trade policy or a more coherent  could pose some difficulties to the us foreign policy objectives it could in theory pose difficulties for us foreign policy objectives but as i suggested in my testimony we actually believe it is more likely to provide benefits in that least two ways  address for us to consult with on foreign policy challenges and again through the new president the council in the high representative we will be able to have this dialogue in a more direct manner with more direct representatives of the european union that is not going to be a cosmic jump from one situation to another member states of the you particular the bigger more active ones will still play a predominant role and ultimately and let us be clear about this member states will still decide and on issues such as whether to send forces abroad when it comes to afghanistan not just because we're doing in a nato context but anything like that these questions will still be decided by countries and we shouldn't expect the institutions don't provide for it and we shouldn't expect the new person in the council or the high representative to take decisions like that nonetheless they can play a coordinated role and a role in engaging with us we also believe that by having a more coherent foreign policy and spokespeople for that foreign policy will help europeans think strategically and raise their sights by empowering people to think about these things and lead the e u we believe these institutions will give europe a more prominent role in the world stage and therefore better balance the transatlantic relationship when it comes to thinking about these big foreign policy challenges ultimately the reason we see more positives than negatives in this is that ultimately our foreign policy interests are very much in line with those of the european union whether it's stabilizing afghanistan or responding to a crisis in africa or keeping the peace in the balkans we really don't see major differences with our democratic like minded european allies and therefore the more they get engaged in these things as i noted there's a theoretical prospect for a difference or tension but in most cases we're actually likely to see the european union pursuing very much the same interest as us chairman just one last question because i see we have several members that want to jump in here but maybe in short term you could give me what your assessment is and the effect that the treaty might have on the bilateral relationships that we currently have with individual national capitals those important bilateral relationships will continue to exist again i don't think anybody believes that we are seeing a dramatic shift away from particular b relationships towards an exclusive or even dominant relationship with the new e u institutions i think this is a gradual process and the relationship with brussels or the new new president the council representatives will in no way replace these historic relations that we have with a number of key european partners i would like to believe that they will compliment those bilateral relationships and reinforce them with another place to organizations and in the past the united states including in the clinton administration in which i served was very concerned about potential for competition and  concerns continue to exist and i mention that my testimony the last thing we need to do is duplicate institutions or structures or resources that are all too scarce but we are confident that our interests are harmonized enough in the relations between the two organizations as which as pointed out significantly overlap you know twenty one of the countries are in both that we can avoid such on necessary  actually see benefits to ourselves in having that you play a more prominent role it is inevitable that the united states when it comes to security challenges around the world will think first about nato nato  is is the one of these two organizations that we're in and obviously we'd like a seat at the table and we play a major role it is also unlikely that if nato is ready to act in a certain situation that our european allies well go along with that when the united states is ready to play a leadership or a major role it is likely that europeans who are in both organizations will want that to be the case there may be however be other situations where we choose not to play a leadership or any role at all where we should welcome the fact that the us ready to do so and there have been a number of conflict interventions of situations in over the past decade or so where that has been the case and where the e u has in fact gotten involved and that is something that we should welcome rather than worrying that somehow the you is going to go off and use military force in a place that we wouldn't want it to much much more likely that they would go in and help stabilize the situation that we might have not have the available resources or political commitment to doing i mean currently in bosnia where we are nato and we initially deployed significant military forces nato is out and the european union is running the peace mission there they've been interventions in africa and likely to be others where we should welcome the fact that the european union is getting more involved in stabilization exercises finally let me just note the two differences that the organizations have different mandates and capabilities they you is more comprehensive than nato and can bring  along a political element civilian element foreign assistance element that nato historically at least has not played a major role in so on balance while we are always going to be cautious and focused on issues sure as noted by you and others nato has an article five it's our bedrock guarantee we are absolutely committed to it and any member of nato operates on the premise that attack on one is an attack on all the european union has moved towards further commitments to its mutual security and it has long been understood among e u states that that they are committed to each other's security but its mutual assistance clause is not as strong or binding as nato is and obviously doesn't apply to us we would naturally take very seriously any  assault on the territorial integrity of a european member state and all of the european member states will be committed to each other security but that's different from an article five commitment which we would only undertake if a country join nato and and the senate agreed to  on the amount and this eight thousand new jobs that comes with this sounds like a jobs bill to me  these things are going to evolve over time for example the jobs you're referring to i think is referring to this the new european external actions service which will gradually be put together over the coming years and the europeans have a lot of work to do in figuring out exactly how that's going to work i think many of those jobs will not be new jobs by they will be a gradual process of diminishing some national representations and bolstering the zone representation and transforming it as well at present the european commission already has representations in in just about every country in the world and what will happen over time is that these commission representations which in the past were only dealing with issues that the commission dealt with like trade or finance will take on a broader role and actually representing the european union but this is a process that is just getting underway and i suspect it will be years before there are e u embassies in in the united states question like sending force me to the current practice is only a member state is going to decide whether its soldiers get sent abroad and that's not going to change with this what what we hope will change is that the european union has a more coherent and consistent foreign affairs representation the rotating presidency which was the way the representing themselves in the past to us and the rest of the world had a deficiency of being rotating every six months there was a different leadership chairing a  meetings and speaking for the you abroad so just again to put it in our terms the us that you some might at each want would be a different set of leaders and it's hard to build continuity and talk about the same issues now for at least two and a half years we'll have the same int r that we can talk to and they'll be institutional memory and there be an opportunity to shape their views and work together on on common challenges so again it is a process but we believe that over time this process will actually lead not to more layers but but a more coherent partner in the question of turkey and cyprus how does this play with with a new treaty it won't change the reality i mean there are several turkey cyprus aspects to address it won't change the reality that to take in a new member state such as turkey wants to be all current member states will have to agree so you know the new person on the council representative will not have the power to take in a new member that would have to be done by consensus and so in that sense it doesn't really change turkey's accession process it doesn't mean that any new applicant would have to agree to be part of this new foreign policy and that's something that applicants w have to to consider for themselves the other relevant turkey cyprus aspect is an unfortunate one which is the two countries ongoing dispute about nato e u relations and in response to some of the other questions i noted how important it is for nato and the e u to work together that cooperation is imperfect because of turkey turkey cyprus dispute and cyprus is a member of the e u but not nato and turkey is a member of nato but not the you consistently block each other participation in the organization that they are a member of and that that is unfortunate and we all believe that a stronger more coherent more effective e u can be borne out of the lisbon treaty and is an important thing with our ongoing partnership and friendship but however as i said i'm concerned about some protectionism that you seem to be hearing coming out of the e u commission especially in the area of financial services which concern me i represent new york city staten island and brooklyn in particular and the alternate fund managers directive which you know is legislation which places unjust regulations on e u manages raising funds outside the e u or marketing and nine fund with you as well as on the u s with the non manager that is marketing a fun within u and more importantly what is widely seen as a protectionist measure nine managers such as those in new york must be established in a country with e u equivalent prudential regulations and ongoing supervision can start marking the only after three years of time so that's something that would hamper the competitiveness of american financial industries and so i'm wondering if you can respond to questions about that particular policy and then in a broader sense so we worried about a growing protectionism coming from the e u first as it has to do with that fund with that initiative but also in the broadest sense thank you for raising that i'm not familiar enough with the details of that protect directive to give you an answer on that i'm happy to look into it as a general comment i would say obviously we're always on the lookout for protectionist measures because the u s e u trade relationship is is so important to us i don't think that that we have detected a protectionist move from the e u and i certainly don't think lisbon will push it in that direction and given the economic crisis that we've gone through on both sides of the atlantic in the past year one might have feared  worse it is conceivable that that both sides could have turned to protectionist measures as unemployment rose and economic difficulties also rose but that hasn't really happened and i think that leaders on both sides i think if you look at the new team in place in brussels and certainly is the case for the obama administration understand the importance of free trade and open markets and globalization and certainly in the u s european context we believe that  both sides benefit tremendously from keeping that open and i appreciate that but just to belabor the point a little bit it's a we were talking about you know agricultural products manufacturing products  quickly you know the alliance would go off much more clearly because we worry about getting into a traditional type of trade war but the same could be true in the financial services industry as well it's america takes retaliate tory action so would you look at that secretary we were talking a earlier in comments that were made about extending formal structure to the current relations now that the european union is thinking of setting up an office here in washington and whether or it the intention of the state department or this administration to make any structural changes as it relates to the in response to the to the lisbon treaty in terms of how we go forward with this  partnership it's an interesting question they're changing their structures do we need to change ours in response they were obviously be changes in certain certain mechanisms such as the u s the e u summit that i mentioned there's going to be a different team on the other side we need to think about the best way to carry on that tradition and work with those new institutions we will have to work with the new european external action service but again we have to wait and see what it looks like  and and how it's represented and so i do think that will entail some changes in the way we engage but it's going to be something that we're going to have to figure out over time as they figure out exactly what role  that so that will be a work in progress that well be a work in progress as well otherwise there you know i will have i mentioned you know as they set this up assistant secretaries in the state department should have a new counterpart in their structure and we'll have to figure out how that works or that they aren't yet and always a real forward ladies are so i and my opening comments i talked about you know looking back twenty years looking forward twenty years and none of us have a crystal ball obviously but but what is the administration's expectations and sometimes we overplay that that it's going through a transition but but but on the positive side what are your expectations and on the negative side on the downside what do you think we should be concerned about in the next five in two years  a good question i think you're right to talk in that sort of a timetable when you look at the history of european integration it tends to move very slowly and in fits and starts sometimes two steps forward one had you know some people come up and say oh now that's done well actually it's not done it's just beginning what's done is the ratification but but as i think my testimony has demonstrated there are an awful lot of questions and it's not just questions the europeans themselves they have big questions about how this will work and it will take time and just as our own institutions or anybody's institutions they can be implemented in different ways will the president council on the high representative will be strong leaders who bring you along in a coherent manner or will they not have much of an impact on the member states pen's in part on how successful they are in managing this is very much still to be determined so by putting in a longer term time horizon just as practical positive expectations could be what in the next five to ten years could be european union which again is our partner on all of the global challenges we face in the place in the world with the most resources economic and military and democracies in the the entity with which we really need to cooperate on afghanistan iran pakistan middle east climate change the positive scenario could be you know within five years or whatever timetable you want to put on it representation of that partner that is more global  thinking that thinks globally and that is able to act more coherently with fewer internal contradictions in other words really a partner for the united states so that when we face these challenges it is easier for us to talk to that interlocutor and reach agreement on how to move forward together and they put more behind the common effort and it's a more balanced transatlantic partnership that is the positive outcome and the downsides the down so i mean there are other scenarios one would be not much change at all where the new structures come into place but in the end it's still divided difficult to find consensus still a useful partner but the new institutions don't bring about the more coherent a force for human line decision making process not greater efficiency and right and the transparency we're looking for and you know there's a theoretical negative scenario but it really is unlikely i mean worry about a rival that somehow if europe is more united than we have a more difficult partner that we won't be able to influence over but as i've stressed you know given that their interests on all of these questions lined up very significantly with ours many things that are on the table right now and again i just like your opinion on that note thank you for the opportunity to do that as you mentioned of others have mentioned you have the transatlantic legislators dialogue you have the nato parliamentary assembly these are opportunities for the representatives of the people the democratic electorate represented the people on both sides the atlantic to talk about the challenges we face and i think that's increasingly important it's increasingly important as the european parliament plays a greater role in europe and as we look to our european friends and allies to join us in dealing with these tremendous challenges again because we are both democracies on both sides here you can't do this without the involvement of legislators and and and citizens and you know we've seen that before when our government might have appealed to european governments to join us in some enterprise and then those governments go to their people or their parliaments the parliament says you know we don't want to do that well that's because we didn't manage to convince those legislators and people that we have common interests we should be doing it together and i think that that is extremely useful and healthy for and you know frankly you face the same challenges you know you have skeptical populations who wonder why they should be dealing with stand iran or whatever it might be and you can compare notes on the best way to to approach what we think are really common interests thank you best i know it will on doubtingly be a very successful tenure i especially want to thank mr gallagher lee for the five years i believe that i had the privilege of serving with him as the ranking member and as the chairman for the always dignified and respectful way in which he dealt with me and everyone else it was it was a professional privilege to have the opportunity to work with him  i also want to thank the secretary for his friendship and cooperation over this relatively short period and undoubtedly president obama and secretary clinton i believe made a very effective choice is assistant secretary for your position and i deeply want to thank all of the colleagues who were were very kind to say things today and at other times i would be remiss if i didn't take turkey is somehow minimizing its relationship with the west i understand the basis of those articles the basis of concerns but to listen to the prime minister himself to listen to foreign minister dava tolo it seems quite to me what turkey is exercising is a regional policy and a regional policy more often than not coincides with the interests of the united states with some notable exceptions and if anyone had suggested five years ago that turkey would be in a major process of engagement with armenia few of us would have believed it possible someone had suggested five years ago that turkey would entertain a democratization effort that provides needed freedoms to its kurdish and other minorities few of us would have thought it possible understanding that all of these efforts will have bumps and grinds and obstacles and even in the context of syria and iran where i myself at times differ it would seem to me that the benefit to america the benefit to the west of having turkey deeply engaged with its neighbors will almost by definition always impressions given the extensive time the prime minister had a one was here and spent with the president and with others in terms of the status of our relationship with turkey and as to the issue of is turkey turning one way or the other if you would care to comment thank you and thank you congressman both for your kind words and for asking that important question or giving me the opportunity to address it i of course have seen the same articles in the same analysis of turkey turning eastward then and and you're right that they are playing more active role in the region and see for themselves a very important role in the region and frankly it's also true that on some of those issues we have express different views in the president and prime minister obama had a chance to talk about some of those including on the approach to iran and israel and syria that said i believe it is  impression to somehow think that turkey is turning its back on decades of cooperation with nato in the united states and europe in the west in pursuit of some eastern agenda indeed the very fact of having the prime minister come here and spend several hours and gauging with the president on how to deal with these common challenges hardly is the sign of a country turning away from the united states just as their continued interest in joining the european union which is not always welcomed in some parts of europe is hardly a sign of moving away from europe so yes it's true that the turkish government is very active and seeking to play a major role in in the middle east and elsewhere but it's also true that they remain a close partner of ours with whom we cooperate on such a range of hugely important issues regional ones but also more global ones turkey has been a strong partner in afghanistan where we have a special relationship and they have a special historical relationship and and we're doing good work together and they're contributing but also on energy issues and and other regional issues including with armenia so we have a big agenda with turkey and it remains hugely important to this administration to continue to engage turkey to make sure that it remains the partner that has that particular issue mr secretary looks like that's it i have one other just observation the relationship between the e u and nato   from some quarters here in the united states which would obviously remove the us from the decision making processes from the equation if you will and yet i'm sure it in some ways is be fuddling for lack of a better term to the europeans  afghanistan it's almost like i think we here in the united states have to seek some clarity in terms of how we view and how we articulate  very specifically are almost in the institutional or treaty language and the reality is that it would be impossible to reach such an agreement and it's probably also not necessary we need to the extent possible to reach some agreements on avoiding on this is hairy duplications but we're just not going to agree in advance on which organization does what in every circumstance but i'm confident of is that our interests are similar enough that this should be something we can work out and that when the united states wants to lead and play a major role the europeans will be quite happy to see that and so i don't think we have to worry that there will be cases where we want to be involved w involved let me just add again going back to my original observation about the need for presence when i see the dichotomy diverse views on the same issue with criticism being allocated in a fairly equal way between own efforts in terms of its security and then the criticism from nato i think that communication and that dialogue because a lot of it comes from congress would be very positive and constructive in terms of  ok let's be clear about what we're talking about here and i think it goes to i agree with your statement i think it is unnecessary to have a treaty but i think at the same time i full an ample discourse on those issues could go a long way to not muting justified criticism but making sure that the criticism is accurate and and is  stated with a full understanding of what the realities are in any event thank you for bearing with us and you're excused and thank you again and now if we can have the next panel come up and let me let me extend my my thanks again for your for your patience it's been several hours and i understand that we're going to have votes around four o'clock which means i'm going to be very brief in my introductions and then would ask you to see if we conclude your opening statements and then come back for  presume not all members will return so probably be a few a number of us to do have to deal with so first let me introduce dr karen don fried  who is the executive vice president of the german marshall fund of the united states again that's i'm going to truncate a very long curriculum to say that i've had author i have had the pleasure of hearing his testimony previously he's extremely knowledgeable and i look forward to his testimony and finally sally mcnamara  a senior policy analyst in european affairs at the heritage foundation's margaret thatcher center for freedom she was formally the director of international relations for the american legislative exchange council before coming to the united states in two thousand and four she served as chief parliamentary aide to roger helmer a member of the european parliament in brussels  previous to that she acted as regional press officer for the british conservative party in the east midlands of the u k thank you for all and she's a native of nottingham england can you get that but but thank you very much mr chairman i'd like to begin by congratulating you on assuming the chairmanship of this important subcommittee and also thanking you for the opportunity to testify today it's a real pleasure to participate with you and the other distinguished members of the subcommittee to talk about the future of transatlantic relations under this new lisbon treaty structure what i'd like to do in my oral report remarks and i'd like to ask my written remarks be submitted to the record objection i'd like to highlight how the united states might constructively engage this post lisbon european union at its core the lisbon treaty seeks to improve how o european union of now twenty seven member states and five hundred million citizens functions the hope in this capital is that the european union will now look beyond europe and capitalize on more effective and more efficient decisionmaking structures to help the united states meet the many global challenges that face us and what i'd like to do is talk first about how congress might engage this new e u and then also focus on a couple of ideas for the executive branch i want to start close to home for you and others by looking at the new legislative powers that the lisbon treaty provides for if you look at the history of european integration the european parliament is the one institution whose power has consistently increased with each treaty revision and that's no different here and what we see is that the parliament is expanding its ability to have an equal footing with the council on most legislation parliament will also now have a decision making role on the entire budget of the european union what's interesting in the li treaty is it not only increases the power of the european parliament it also creates the power of national parliaments who will now have the opportunity to challenge a piece of european legislation national parliaments parliament unnecessary these changes were intended to make the european union more democratic as parliaments are in all systems the most democratic expression of public opinion what does this mean for the u s congress as we know  congresswoman berkley was here earlier the transatlantic pledges legislators dialogue has been the main forum through which members of the european parliament and members of the house have interacted there's of course a separate web of exchanges at the national level between u s members and their european counterparts and the german marshall fund even participates in some of those given those existing structures and knowing that time is a premium for members of congress how  you structure deeper relationships recognizing that you don't have a lot of time for that we can't just add meetings and the suggestion that i wanted to make is that we target a limited number of legislators on both sides focused on discrete substantive topics so that you're engaging members of the european parliament and members of the national parliament together around specific topics really creating an issue specific dialogue it seems to me that if each parliamentarian came away from these dialogues feeling that they had gained something for their own legislative process back home these meetings become the need to do rather than just something that's nice to do and i think we have to admit that it's hard to engage american members for europe we need to engage them on the topics whether security or immigration on which they have a legislative role to play i think the europe subcommittee is well poised to try to generate ideas for how you might keep in the style log and i did notice that colleagues i used to work at the congressional research service are here in the room you might even want to see if c r s wants to prepare a report that's generating some new ideas on how do we deepen this trans atlantic parliamentarian relationship under this new lisbon treaty now if we think about the executive branch and how it engages the u we just heard from assistant secretary gordon that the obama administration looks forward to an e u that will play a larger role on the global stage my question is how do we encourage that development i'm asking that question because we need to acknowledge that the lisbon treaty offers the european union the promise of a political role in the world commensurate with its economic weight but the l treaty only lays the framework that would provide the e u with the capacity to act it does not guarantee a willingness to act in that way we have to remember that the european union remains an  intergovernmental undertaking the powers of the european union can only grow to the extent that the member states surrender more of their national sovereignty to this unprecedented multinational enterprise today foreign policy still remains in the hands of national leaders yes we have president fun run point yes we have high representative ashton it's interesting some of the press around these appointments h complained that they're not political rock stars the economist went so far as to refer to the two of them as two mediocre of my honest think these critics are missing a fundamental point washington and for that matter the world will listen to mr fender employ and baroness ashton if they genuinely speak for a united european union the lisbon treaty may solve the structural problem in providing the infrastructure to make possible a coherent voice for the e u but only the member states can muster the requisite political will to take just one example will france and the united kingdom be willing to give up their national seats on the united nations security council someday in favor of a european union seat and the so called big three the u k france and germany are the key drivers of foreign policy at the e u level if we think about the united states were facing serious challenges on many fronts the obama administration wayman may well not be picky about whether effective partnership with europe comes through bilateral nato or european union channels as long as it is forthcoming that said if the e u can prove itself to be an effective mechanism for catalyzing substantial european contributions to global challenges facing us simply put if the e u can show that it can deliver then it would very quickly become a preferred partner for washington now how does the administration encourage that development if we think it's a positive one for u s interests certainly one way is how president obama will engage and work with president fan room boy another is how secretary clinton will engage high representative ashton beyond that let me make two admittedly modest but concrete suggestions first i think in the opening months of two thousand and ten president obama could make a visit to broad seoul's and engage the european union and embrace publicly its post in architecture such a visit could be a fitting and bipartisan bookend to the trip that then president bush made to brussels in february two thousand and five then president bush met with representatives of the parliament the council and the commission to express u s support for the development of the european union into a more effective strategic actor on what most believed it turned out to be wrongly they believed it was the eve of the european constitution then being approved which as we know then failed given the continued phenomenal popularity of barack obama across europe even a short stop in brussels could be a powerful sign of substantial civilian surge in afghanistan ideally the european union could announce the stepped up commitment at the international conference on afghanistan that will take place in london on january twenty eighth of next year british prime minister brown and german chancellor merkel together with french president sarkozy pushed for this conference as a place to discuss plans for handing control of afghanistan back to local authorities over time as afghan capabilities are strengthened a key deliverable at this conference will be the concrete measures the international community will pledge to support afghanistan in this decisive phase this conference would be an ideal venue for the to step up to the plate and redouble its efforts again for the e u to show that it can deliver on an issue of great importance to the transatlantic community i think it would be a fitting way to mark with action the enhan foreign policy role the lisbon treaty outlines with words the european union has been by almost any measure a huge success two key elements of a state sovereignty our money and troops u has already succeeded in creating a common currency the euro it may seem light years away from establishing a european army and certainly the lisbon treaty does not do that none of us can know today where this remarkable experiment will end what we do know is that is revolutionaries many of these accomplishments may seem the process of european integration is in fact an evolutionary one the e u will continue to grow and change sometimes gradually and sometimes in spurts over time we americans have played a critical role in fostering that evolution we need to decide how and to what extent we want to continue to do that in the twenty first century it is easy to criticize the weaknesses and even to exploit them the question is whether we want to help strengthen the union and if so how i would argue the post has been architecture gives us new opportunities to engage and encourage a stronger partner on the other side of the atlantic thank you so much for this opportunity to share my thoughts with you thank you dr don frieden i will go to  for europe to shoulder a greater share of the world's security problems however there is nothing in the institutional restructuring of the e u that will mean greater resources and political will to do more in places like afghanistan the middle east or iran essentially last punch taking forward the lowest common denominator positions which often frustrated american leadership on the world stage it is vital that the united states recognizes the value in dealing with it and during our lives on a bilateral level treaty is threat to these relationships on issues of foreign affairs defense security justice and home affairs including counterterrorism bilateral relations work best for the united states replacing individual european allies with a single foreign minister means inevitably america's interests will lose out most in the discussions that really matter or as dr henry kissinger says when the united states feels with the nations europe individually it has the possibility of consulting at many levels and to have its views heard well before a decision is taken in dealing with the european union by contrast the united states is excluded from the decision making process in two thousand and seven officially suspending its own travel ban on him to welcome into lisbon in afghanistan the e u has been nothing more than a bit part player with a police training mission criticized by the nato parliamentary assembly is too small underfunded slow to deploy inflexible and geographically restricted however it is the e u s disastrous handling of the russia georgia war that fully illustrates the e u s limitations as a role as a regional power and it was recently announced that france is looking to sell a half billion dollar mistral class helicopter carrier to russia the lisbon treaty also reigns in its members from taking independent action on the world stage and potentially from standing alongside the united states and when they choose to do so there has been treaty poses the biggest threat to national sovereignty in europe since the second world war it has power to unelected unaccountable bureaucrats far removed from member state policy commitment to free and undistorted competition and instead favors protection nation which will likely see the continued persecution of successful american company as it duplicates made those roles and functions and decouples america from europe killing the concept of individual security which has kept the peace in europe for sixty s the lisbon treaty will do huge damage to american interests in europe contrary to any democratic tradition it is a self amending treaty which can aggrandize power no statement which i would like to submit and i'll just summarize briefly without objection thank you the other witnesses have stressed particularly foreign policy issues and in fairness not to duplicate that same testimony i think it's probably appropriate to identify a few other elements of lisbon that i believe affect american citizens and american interests perhaps of not quite gotten as much as the attention and i think the reason for thinking about these things is a point that you made mr chairman mr gallagher made and others that if you think about the relationship between the united states and europe the societies the deep integration of our economies we really have the most complete relationship we probably have with countries in the world and it's one that reaches so deeply into our domestic societies that one has to look not just at the foreign policy dimensions of what europeans do or what we do but how it affects really people  estimate our latest estimate we do it any survey the trends like khana me about to come out is that this is a five trillion dollar economy employing up to fourteen million people on both sides atlantic europeans employed more americans in the world than they do any other nationality in american companies employ more europeans than any others in the world it has a real makes a real difference in people's lives the way this relationship works so the area i would suggest that lisbon is probably going to have more of an immediate impact is actually not in foreign policy but actually in justice and home affairs was mentioned briefly but if one looks at the provisions of the treaty this is an area that will move faster i believe than building the external action service and it puts  freedom justice and home affairs as the discussed prism justice and security need terms also what we would call homeland security at the center of e u priorities it has the potential for giving us a partner that is more effective to dealing with human trafficking crime issues terrorism building up european societal resilience to challenges that we face potentially with the united states congress passed recently ratified treaties that we've had with the e u now on mutual legal assistance and extradition there is much work to be done in this area discussions about legal agreements and data protection on principles of combat in terrorism these are all close centrally to issues of our domestic security and that of our major partners so there are significant areas to develop here one one result of lisbon in this area is a discussion about forming within the european council a committee on internal security this it would be a new development perhaps take on functions similar to the national security council and it's something i think to watch because it could  directly influence u s efforts another development which is in the treaty is what is called the solidarity pledge solidarity clause and that is in the event of any natural or manmade  disasters of civilian societies in europe each of the european members would come to each other's assistance this says i think considerable revocations for how the europeans will organize their societal security and given the fact  terrorism does no knows no bounds could have implications for the united states mr tanner mentioned the questions about article five of the nato treaty and north atlantic treaty and as you know over this coming year there's a debate going on in the nato strategic concept about how we think about article five today we our obligation across the atlantic is through nato it is defined in article five the north atlantic treaty it is coming to each other's defense in the in the event of quote armed attack and yet today we face a different realm of security challenge and that is the networks that move people goods services ideas across the atlantic the networks upon which free societies develop are increasingly vulnerable and we have yet to really a systematic way address those challenges to our security societal security i believe while nato can play a role there and identified that in the report we issued earlier this year it is at most a supporting player and that if these are challenges to civil society then certainly the main instruments of or civilian interaction that is the us and the you have to come together and think hard about how we protect the networks that frame our society when the airplane flew into the world trade center and september eleventh and the pentagon the economist noted this was not only an attack on freedom it was an attack through freedom using the very instruments of free societies to attack and disrupt those societies we face same challenges today either through intimidation cyber networks energy or through directly through terrorism i would propose that we must consider now a supplementary clause a pledge that we would make to each other through the u s e u channel and that is a transatlantic solidarity pledge that is in the event of a natural or manmade disaster that we would come to each other's assistance at the invitation of political authority and as deemed appropriate it would not compete with the nato clause of armed attack it would actually supplement it and provide us a new bond across  atlantic to deal with what i believe is a much more direct security challenge that we have yet to face a second area in which there is considerable change is in the area of development assistance and humanitarian assistance the lisbon treaty gives the e u a legal basis for control over this the high representative would have huge resources now at her disposal in this area and together the united states and european union provide eighty percent of the world's sapan development in humanitarian read the summit statement you see they moved ahead with some low hanging fruit i would put it but i believe there's much more that could be done to make as was mentioned earlier better use of our scarce resources really devoting attention to build synerg relevant assistance humanitarian assistance and to reach out to other donors it is a fact odd that we together provide eighty four percent of assistance of both of these areas and yet there are many other potential donors that we should be reaching out to both in the islamic world and i think to rising powers that could play more of a role another area that i think is perhaps underestimated but could potentially have considerable repercussions as yet uncertain treaty there was a reference to what is called the charter of fundamental rights this was a charter approved some years ago was tried to be corporate into the what was called the constitutional treaty that failed and yet there is a reference to the charter and it accords that legal status which means that now the charter of fundamental rights has equivalent legal status throughout the european union as well as these treaties and before those were unenforceable principles but today they will become european law and it's important to look at those principles and those rights now because they are considerable that not only include most us rights under the american constitution the rights that we're familiar with but a catalog of social rights and positive social rights that the u s to date does not adhere to rights education health environmental protection social assistance unjustified dismissal for instance and a new right to petition which is actually much more in the american tradition but had not existed in europe before that is a million european citizens can now petition their legislators to address issues which they had not before i think it's uncertain what this catalog rights will mean but it will mean that the european court of justice will start to interpret this type of legal catalog similar in ways that what the u s supreme court does now for the united states and yet it's a whole nother ball the rights that for which we have had not experience will affect american citizens living in europe that will affect those and american companies operating in europe and i think it's worth  examining a bit further than seems to have been the case another element which is already been mentioned i only mentioned briefly then is the role in the growing role of the european parliament this is been stressed but i think it is morton to look at  actually i think lisbon doesn't change the trait piece on the executive side but it does on the legislative side european parliament has co decision has to give approval now on many elements of trade as well as justice and home affairs budgetary matters agriculture agriculture has merit mention before transportation issues it now has to agree to a whole range of international agreements when the e u enters international agreements under these provisions it has to have european parliament on board this makes the european parliament essentially the only parliament in europe with powers approximating those of the us congress and i think distinguishes now the parliament from national parliaments in many different ways even though national parliaments also have a new role so back to the point it's been the theme of this hearing in a way is if we are not appreciating the role of each other's legislatures this will now become even more significant with these changes and so  i have submitted to congresswoman were berkeley and to the european members of the translate legislators dialogue a report we have produced recently suggesting very specifically a range of proposals of how the u s congress parliament national parliaments could have a more effective dialogue not only dialogue but engagement i was pleased to see that those principles those recommendations center were indorse in fact last week by the legislators psylocke i think there are a couple elements that are worth bearing in mind one is that the transatlantic legislators dialogue only involve members of the house there are not members of the senate involved and likewise on the european side it's only members of the european parliament even though national parliaments also under lisbon now have more of a role our proposal is in fact to include members of the u s senate in in this dialogue that in the house that the members of the transit legislators dialogue be made speaker appointments so they have a formal role within the house structure and then on the european side there is another body within the called coast act which is a member of which is a grouping of the european affairs committee chairs in the national parliaments they will now play a more of a role and yet they're not part of the dialogue and as we said individual member states of the you have to have to go along with what's going on here they have to implement much of this legislation and to exclude members national parliament pretty members from the u s e u the law i think misses some of what the dynamic will be we have also suggested that the congress should in fact open an office in brussels and the reason is not just because of lisbon but because my first point which is the deep nature of our interactions across the atlantic actions by the us congress deeply affect european societies and european economies actions now with  european parliament and many european parliamentary authorities deeply affect the way americans live today that reach deep into our societies there's more you know un but us european investment in any of the states that you represent any single one for instance in california or or massachusetts more investment in the state of massachusetts and all of us investment in china and japan put together and those create jobs and those deeply affect our communities and so understanding the impact of our legislation now i think becomes critical and it should start first with this type in a question across the atlantic because that's the wets where globalization is actually happening quicker than other areas in ways that affect our citizens other things that could happen beside such a larger step is a joint consultative committee on the extraterritorial application of our respective legislation simply an early warning system as members consider any legislation that might have this extra reach or the same for european parliamentarians that were at least notified about this because as you know in recent years many of our frictions have come from the impact of these x toro tauriel applications we recommend that the members of the translate legislators dialogue or members of congress in the parliament be full members of the transatlantic economic  council the new transplant energy council which has just been created and along the lines of what i proposed about the solidarity clause and justice and home affairs we proposed the creation of a council resilience a resilience council across atlantic to deal with these issues and clearly members of parliaments in the congress should be fully part of those so a whole range of areas very specific ones that we have submitted i have as an appendix in my testimony which i  urge that congress give some due consideration to in result lisbon i think together with a whole host of other issues that we're facing around the world today we have to make this relationship more strategic this is an important relationship with the european union but it's not strategic and strategic i mean fluid interactive way to interact with each other to confront the challenges we face and to look at the tools we have at our disposal whether they be bilateral relationships that's not the relationship we have yet particular with the e u nato is indispensable but it is insufficient to the broader range of challenges we're facing it does not have the full toolbox and with only by supplementing our nato agenda and expanding it with the european union do i believe we can really adequately address the kinds of challenges we're facing not only very far away in afghanistan in the middle east but actually right here at home when we deal with one of mental issues about people's livelihoods about their jobs their prosperity and their freedom i believe those are the kinds of specific issues we now must look at thank you interesting and i do really think the level of the author of magnitude of the engagement has to be has to be ratcheted up substantially and it does come back to this parliament to parliament particularly as you indicate the enhanced role of palm and almost becoming more of a  counterpart to our own institution here your suggestion about the senate however  assessment of what you believe the e u could do to improve the perception of what has been referred to as the legitimacy the concern among many of its citizens member states and by these other additional referenda so there was a democratic process there it was simply an evolving one elements that didn't work revisit it so we can look at it from here i guess and evaluate how if it meets our standards it seemed to meet the standards of the people of europe in the e u and now i think our question is how do we deal with it as i said i think there  con maybe for american interests here but more specifically the perception what more definitively can be done to improve on that while i'm happy to give advice to my european colleagues of how they can improve their democracies but i said there is one element in the in the treaty about this right to petition which is does give some authority to citizens how it evolves is secretary gordon said will take time but it is an innovation that didn't exist there before as we said the national parliaments are also given a role now in important principle of the european union  sometimes offered in the advance and the breach is that of what's called subsidiarity that is the basic principle that decisions within the e u should be taken at the level of most close to the citizen  that doesn't always work and there was no procedure for trying to assure that in the past what lisbon does is now give national parliaments two measures in which they could flag their objections to propose legislation that is an e u level when they believe it should either be at a national or even local level and so there is a procedure now again will be tested that would allow any national parliament to flag concern about this type of legislation how that will develop i don't know but i think that was an effort to try to address some of this question of legitimacy of the institutions dr hamilton i posed a question to ambassador gordon and i'd like to get your your perception are spent do you see a more coherent e u as being problematic for u s foreign policy as it relates to future commitments of troops to different parts of the world said it's very hard to say that in advance because much of his case by case i think the basic realization that's important is that we're talking about the same set of forces across t still the progress of national authorities the question is how do we as a united set of nations try to aggregate the potential we have together and deploy it to deal with the security challenges we face  have a bloc between nato part of it is related to the turkish cyprus issues that we discussed but there are elements that we could explore that i think get around that or address issues that we have to face right now for instance a more coherent europe in the mention the internal security world is in american interests in fact after september eleventh it was the united states frankly that pushed the europeans to great and the european rust warrants and what's called euro just an area of justice and home affairs that debated going on for years with inclusively until the united states after september eleventh says we need this coherent europe because we are directly threatened in a weaker europe does not allow us to do it that it was the bush administration that pushed that and it was successful and there are some treaties also negotiated the bush administration that i mentioned that advance that so we clearly in that area have interest in coherent europe the other area i think which is worth exploring we have submitted some recommendations is not just in the purely military area but in civil reconstruction and stabilization when we send our troops to places around the world they do their business but usually state stability is not ensured by the military alone we see that in afghanistan today and so the e u is actually the framework in which the civilian deployments dr concrete mentioned are where that resides the united states is trying to build up through the state department the civilian response corps the idea is to build and to be able to deploy rapidly civilian authorities and experts to deal with these kinds of civilian crises there is a tremendous interest in the state department in working with the e u in this area of civilian to civilian cooperation  more coherent e u capability would certainly be in u s interests we're just building in fact our capability e u already has eight missions underway around the world in this area where they deploy civilians they have three thousand or more people on the ground in other countries doing things either with united states or instead of the united states because it's relieving some of the burden this is not an area we have developed very well it's an ad suitable candidate couldn't be found maybe they should do interviews to try and find the best person for the job and they were told to shut up go away we will find someone tonight revolutionary concept try and find the best person for the job seen in afghanistan europe doesn't have sixty thousand men that he can deploy on a moment's notice so i think this definitely does pose a challenge to missions that america wants to undertake in the future in terms of where the e u can help i agree with both of my nine in your testimony to an article that you had written co written could you elaborate a little bit for the committee what you what you how you invest in that absolutely sense this is connected to the conversation that we were just having as well which is how can the best contribute to the challenges that we face and i would argue that it is on the civilian side much more than the military side and i think the test for the e u is if it can produce a result that is greater than the lowest common denominator if it can produce a result but it's not just the sum of the individual parts there are twenty seven member states in the e u and certainly the u s can approach each one bilaterally and say we need help  afghanistan what can you do instead secretary clinton could go to high representative ashton and say you do this for us you rally resources for afghanistan that will be hugely beneficial now we can you know you can look at the glass as half full or half empty and you can say europe hasn't made a huge contribution to afghanistan or you can say a billion euros a year for afghanistan is helpful to what the u s is trying to do could the europeans do more would we like them to do more absolutely let's try to figure out the right mechanism for doing it and i was struck when secretary clinton was at the nato foreign ministers meeting in early december secretary gordon reference that in his testimony and nato put forward seven thousand additional troops interesting lead germany and france were not willing at that point to step up their military commitment to afghanistan saying they wanted to wait for this international conference on afghanistan in late january so we have two of the big member states already having given incredible significance to this conference in late january and that's why my hope is that if we encourage not only those two member u to step up and say in the wake of this renewed commitment that the obama administration is made to afghanistan we want to be there on the civilian side as a key partner so maybe that's a hope babies an aspiration but i do think it's an area where we should be pushing if i could just make one comment on the democracy point that congressman gallantly raised because i i don't want to leave the impression that the is an undemocratic institution if we think about the council the parliament the commission the council is representing the member states and all of those individuals are directly elected the heads of state if we think about the parliament those are members that are directly elected and you have the commission commissioners are proposed by the member states and then their selection has to be approved by the parliament so you know beyond the fact that the parliament's powers were increased or the role of the national parliaments were increased in lisbon there are democratic controls that exist and i don't think we should we should be careful to distinguish between direct democracy and representative democracy referenda represent direct democracy we tend not to have those in the u s we have a s representative democracy you are elected by your constituents and if they don't like what you do here then you're not really like to please your doctor you can that would not happen in your case i'm sure but my point is that representative democracy we in this country feel is a reasonable way to check the legitimacy of action so the referendum is necessarily the only instrument of democracy in fact may not be the favored one in lest you have a system of direct democracy so i just want to suggest that represent of democracy is alive and well in europe and also is reflected in the way the european union is structured thank you dr mr mcnamara i got the sense from your testimony what you said in follow up is that you're really not a big fan of this lisbon treaty is that fair to say and is is it do you have the same feeling towards the e u itself its existence i neighbors not supranational treatise the thing is though i guess with the gentleman from that certainly i think there's a certain philosophical view is it fair to say that you called margaret thatcher that she would not be a fan of united states of europe for example no one is really a fan of the united states of your history is against it if you look at the european parliament as well turn up for the european parliamentary elections with forty three percent if you had a forty three percent turnout for your presidential election do you think it was a crisis well i please you're getting very thin ice here because we've had some elections recently that were happy to get twenty percent i find it interesting that you know you quote margaret thatcher and i didn't realize that  who said the time has arrived for united states of europe given the lessons learned from world war two and he certainly wasn't submitting it as a purely economic relationship with with neighbors it was clear if one reads the speech in full that he was talking about engagement in a very he wasn't going to find a second to be subservient to the germans well he also said this in that same speech the structure of the united states of europe will be such as to make the material conflicts in the balkans and hundreds of thousands of lives millions in europe and hundreds of thousands of americans as well so there has to be i think some steps in the right direction i guess you think the applied to american companies and we saw how microsoft was terribly persecuted for creating a very successful product i think the e u is going in the wrong direction the lisbon treaty takes out for the first time the e u is commitment to undistorted competition overwhelmingly we're going down a protectionist direction president sarkozy has convened a meeting of twenty two e u member states not the united kingdom and those who are in favor of reforming it in order to protect the common agricultural policy now i'm not here to i want these other members to have an opportunity so let me go to mr bozeman the thing is we're having votes so i want to give everybody a chance and not ask the three of you to linger any longer you have been remarkably patient well i think and i really don't have a question but in entering into the discussion i think that the e u has the same problem some lot we as americans if we entered into a north american you know pact and say to sovereignty to mexico and canada in my district i would have major problems explaining with that and it would be huge problem and so that's something i would be very much against i get a lot of mileage you know about things like that so these are difficult problems that really are and i guess the the  l balancing act is trying to figure out you know how you're populations are happy with the the final product that you come up with so like you say it takes the wisdom  military component of this joint defense is the major call going to wheel that brings about your major level of discomfort let me let me ask you each of you do you see america it was the french defense minister who said america was a hyper pre song it's a high powered and we need to find a way and it's only the e u that can counterbalance that i could bore you to death with about a hundred quotes from european leaders who have said similar things but i won't do so on the military component serves as a as a a confrontation no conflict with the nato who has a military component but also with in the twenty three nations themselves who each have their own military component i mean which takes precedence over which then on the other side there is the argument that a military component being a to the european union kit very well if used properly is strategically add to the effort for global security particularly in an area that we have not touched upon but it's a major growing threat and that is a piracy so i'm wondering if each of you might comment very briefly on the pros and cons of this  to kind of get a an opinion of what do we have to gain from getting a military component and why do we have to fire if the gentleman who would you know put the moment i just would make the note that in fact in terms of the anti piracy effort that is ongoing in so called hot spots there is an e u presence and then there is a nato presence which i think does compatibility in this seems to be coordination even with nations such as iran with whom we have a frosty relationship this is chairman to me tell you what i'm really getting at here the big problem with the piracy situation is that we have no one no mechanism to get in and do what is essential to bring about some resolve to it which is to provide a way to give some stability becoming again another threshold of terrorists and that horn of africa region several of us in the nato meetings examine that and it is a very very topical issue within nato and how we can respond to that but let me get to a couple of the questions i want to know about the future enlargement of your opinions on the future enlargement of the european union one critical point is out of turkey will lay lisbon treaty give any movement one way or another to turkey's request to become a part of the european union and do you see a problem with that and isn't it a good car owner for the movement by some in the european union to not want turkey because of the muslim culture but that is also checkmated because turkey has a very very significant european and christian foundation so i'm wondering will we see more positive movement of them bringing turkey into the european you've got to do x y and that but ultimately i don't think politically it will ever happen because as long as fonts in germany and austria don't want it to happen i don't think it will happen the list been treaty i think will allow croatia to get in and some of the less controversial a session process that will last for the next ten to fifteen years there are forty thousand pages of legislation that turkey has to assume and my fervent hope would be that the austrians inferences of europe would not talk about turkish membership and whether they wanted to or not because it's not going to happen in sarkozy's term in office and so i would prefer to say let's have a negotiating process where heard and i think everyone agrees it's a good thing for turkey to be looking west and not because they want to create some multilateral nightmare but because these countries of europe realize they are a national power the british foreign secretary in october gave compelling speech where he said the choice for europe is simple get our act together and make the e u a leader on the world stage or become spectators in a world by the u s and china the member states want to aggrandize their power and i think you were saying this lisbon treaty with the reforms for the new reforms for the economic and the european union will have a direct impact here in the united states on is where in this debate on the security side as if this is an either or kind of choice between nato and the e u and i go back to my basic point these are all the same nations twenty one of the countries are the same countries and the others are all members except one of the partnership for peace with nato if you ask you know who is with us traditionally nonaligned countries like sweden which are not in nato are actually some of our best allies so  they're not creating some separate entities here is one set of forces on the military side they are double or triple have it depending on the kinds of engagements they're in and we have to step back a minute and not get locked into this institutional debate it seems to me because we're all the same countries we're trying to engage on these kinds of issues and if we look at that it's not a it's not the luxury of you know which institution gets to go deal with these challenges a there's enough to go around and given strapped resources for the united states and for european allies if they can pick up some of the slack in areas where the united states either does not want to be or cannot engage because of our other preoccupations that should be welcome our concern should not be about a competitive strong you know european counterweight at the moment although there are so i agree there are some in europe that think that way it is a weak europe it is the weak europe that has gotten us into trouble in the past it is a week of fragmented europe that was the principal preoccupation for the united states in the twentieth century and it is the potential for a stronger chairman said on piracy it's a combined effort there is i think really zation both institution at the work together in that but as you said the real answer the piracy is not in sea it's on land here again the question is can we work together exchange watch lists of failing states with the crisis center can we have deployed the civilian authorities to deal with terrorism that's now building and somalia and yemen and other places that's actually through the e u that we would do that it's not a nato per se effort and so those are the kinds of things we have to do on the enlargement issue the basic principle that is i think given a success is out of the open door who is to say today what europe will look like in the future is dr don fried said our successes of come to say let's build on the dynamism of change and you know fifteen years from now it may be different the president said let turkey in on the same conditions that you've let other countries in no more and more no less it'll take years it is not an operational issue for today for this administration i believe it will be something for the future and finally on your question about the mastic of my point was simply that our relationship per s with europe reaches deep into our societies is driven by the private sector is driven by our people we have no deeper links than across the atlantic in those links since the end of the cold war seems counterintuitive  ed not loosened and so i mentioned state of georgia there are just tens of thousands of pizza georgians who are employed by european companies more than anybody else in the world  on short jobs come from europe most of them in the united states so how lisbon affects that whether it helps or hinders those kinds of rules to provide free flow of goods and services and ideas will be important to that underscores the use do you use in bishan to become a global power and challenge american leadership in the world you know that conjures up in my mind a little cabal sitting over in the coffin applauding our demise i tend to agree that you know these are not though it these are not those stock kind of choices and i don't think they're necessarily adversarial and maybe because it's my age i  one thing and the only certainty is that there will be change in you and what we're trying to accomplish is change that is nonviolent and change that evolves over time with input from everyone but you've been a great panel and i concluded sharing the journ