.with Transcript
.
looks likely to become NATO's next
Secretary General Romania's president
who was the sole Challenger has
withdrawn his bid and is now endorsing
Mr Rutter to take over when Yen
stoltenberg stands down in
October as Yen stoltenberg hands over to
Mark routa it's the outgoing Dutch prime
minister's personal motto of go with the
flow come to life it's hard to imagine a
successor more similar in nature to the
stoic Norwegian who led the alliance for
a decade they're pragmatic they're
likable uh they're very capable of of
forging coalitions and and bringing
difficult positions together routa is
famously lowkey he lives alone in a
modest apartment in the he teaches
weekly at a local school and gets around
the city by bike a few years ago a video
of him cleaning up his own spilled
coffee went
viral this image of calm competence plus
familiarity after more than a dozen
years as Dutch prime minister won him
early backing by most allies dashing the
hopes of Estonian prime minister Kaya
kalis that it was finally time for a
female Secretary General from an Eastern
flank country Romanian president Claus
Johannes meanwhile did throw his hat in
the ring holding up consensus until
today that also allowed regular EU
consensus spoiler Victor orbon to
exploit a personal grudge against route
with whom he he had clashed bitterly
over the years on rule of law issues the
Dutch man is the real responsible man
for whole M we have the goal is to bring
hunger to its needs this time rout had
to compromise by signing a letter
confirming he would maintain a pledge
made by stoltenberg to allow Hungary to
opt out of supporting Ukraine at NATO
that deal is a controversial start to
ru's term in a way you erode the
unanimity the consensus rule at NATO so
uh I hope
R will not make more of these kind of
concessions to national leaders
depending on the outcome of us elections
in November rout may have bigger
problems allies backing his candidacy
seriously evaluated his ability to
assume stoltenberg's mantle of trump
Whisperer but rout has a track record he
has publicly rebuked Trump's acceptance
of us EU trade tensions if we don't
it'll be positive also because no we
just think about those cars that pour in
here we do something right but it'll be
it'll be positive but in a lesser known
incident at the 2018 NATO Summit Trump's
rant against Europe's low defense
spending was so virulent stoltenberg
asked almost everyone but national
leaders to leave the room Teo Koster was
there and says Ruth stepped in and told
Donald Trump that hey he could actually
take credit for the recent increases in
spending which was not entirely correct
but it it sort of calmed down president
Trump and uh he found a way to spin the
situation as uh something that uh he had
achieved but the turnaround in defense
spending didn't start under Donald Trump
it started under Obama true um but I
think the most important task of any
Secretary General is to uh make sure
that there's Unity uh within the aliance
that's going to take all routz
considerable maneuvering skills with now
32 allies political shifts underway and
a war next door that's bound to run on
long into his tenure expected to begin
October
1st well that report from our
correspondent uh in Brussels Terry
Schulz who joins us now welcome Terry so
Mark Rutter's path finally clear but
there were others who wanted the job as
you mentioned in your report is this
likely to cause him
problems you know what was really the
issue here is that Eastern European
countries Eastern allies were saying it
was time for them to have have the top
rule it's been now this will be the
fourth Dutch Secretary General of NATO
you've had the nordics you had uh Andre
for rasmuson from Denmark and now uh Yen
Stenberg from Norway for 10 years so
they're saying quite fairly I think that
it that it's their turn and that's why
kayak kalis who would have also liked to
be the first woman and uh Claus johanes
threw their hats in the ring uh but you
know I think that uh you can't go
against consensus at NATO and it soon
became uh soon became obvious that no
one else was going to get the support
and so will a change of Secretary
General affect the alliance's attitude
towards Russia's invasion of
Ukraine I don't think so because Mark
rout has come out very strongly uh in
favor of of supporting Ukraine with with
everything that allies have to give
which is continuing the stoltenberg line
uh the Netherlands was one of the the
biggest supporters it it's in the top 10
by GDP in terms of what they contribute
to Ukraine right now the Netherlands is
giving f-16s part of this Coalition
that's saying it's going to get f-16s to
Ukraine as soon as possible and unlike
Belgium which is also giving f-16s uh
the Dutch are not putting any
restrictions on where they might be used
so already markout has put himself out
quite far forward uh on on Aid to
Ukraine and you know it would be hard to
to roll that back once he becomes
Secretary General even though of course
he'll be speaking for 32 countries at
that point and not just his own so we so
as as NATO checks its defenses against
to Russia because of what it's doing in
Ukraine maybe now is the time to ask
well what is the job of Secretary
General the civilian head of a military
Alliance who has to report to national
leaders what power does he
have well that that's true you you might
ask that but when you think about having
to get 32 countries on the same page I
don't know if it's a job everybody would
want to try to accomplish sure there
there is also the military headquarters
down in Mons Belgium and that's where
the military planning is done and of
course you have the Supreme Allied
Commander Europe uh Christopher cavoli
who who runs the military side of things
but Yen stoltenberg and of course now
Mark route they need to really build the
consensus they need to sit in the room
with the leaders and come up with these
deals that get everyone on the same page
again you can't have one single country
opposing policy at NATO just like in
some cases at the European Union and so
it is really a grueling job at times to
get this ever increasing number of
countries to come to an agreement and
now that's why this was mentioned by
teimo coaster in my report now that
Hungary has been allowed to opt out of
supporting Ukraine there already feels
like there's going to be a crack in the
unity of NATO and that's something that
I think people will be watching very
closely to see if this sort of um you
know shows the a declining strength of
of a NATO statement a NATO position
thanks Terry DW correspondent Terry
No comments:
Post a Comment