A cool head under fire

As Nato actions wind down in Libya, the defence alliance is now facing calls to intervene in Syria. We meet its secretary-general to discuss the organisation’s smartest line of defence

He arrives at Brussels’ Residence Palace with a grin, which becomes even bigger when he hears the Danish greeting, ‘Goddag’. He bares his teeth like an American politician, but seems keen to engage in a real conversation. His ice-blue silk tie is obviously chosen to match his eyes and the knot amply covers the white shirt collar. This Dane, who has never worn a uniform (he didn’t do his military service), has led Nato since 2009 and is still glowing with the success he deems the operation in Libya to have been.

Earlier this autumn, Nato Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen asked the 28 members of the defence alliance to come up with ideas for what he calls ‘smart defence’. Necessitated by the economic crisis and Nato’s Libyan operation, the strategy would, if successful, see much closer cooperation between the alliance members than is the case today. According to the international conference calendar, ideas for smart defence should be presented at the Nato summit in Chicago in May 2012. So far, though, the notebook of good ideas looks pretty blank. This is symptomatic of the lack of trust in the defence field, where member states hate to share their secrets.

It seems the smartest defence for any country would be to avoid EU defence and security and Nato altogether. And while there has been some progress in the cooperation between the EU and Nato on defence during the Dane’s tenure as secretary-general, the question still remains: Why can’t the 21 countries that are members of both organisations get their act together and get along?

“Before the well-known conflict of the divided Cyprus is resolved, closer cooperation will not be possible,” says Fogh Rasmussen.

Cyprus is divided. The Greek south is a member of the EU but the Turkish north is not. Cyprus is not a member of Nato and Turkey vetoes any Nato information going to the EU (read Cyprus), and the divided island stops EU intelligence from reaching Nato (read Turkey).

In areas where the two organisations are both active, for example in Afghanistan, Nato troops have been prevented from protecting the EU police force, even in situations of utmost danger. This tension has become slightly more relaxed recently, some say thanks to a working relationship between EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton and Fogh Rasmussen.
An EU insider says: “I think they are both action- and result-oriented and get very impatient with these old cumbersome animosities.”

Fogh Rasmussen has a reputation for being relatively aloof among the Nato staff in Evere, but the secretary-general of the defence alliance has definitely raised the profile of Nato internationally, squeezing an impressive number of air miles into an ordinary working week. Rather than use the diplomatic silk glove, he prefers a straight-talking political approach, unimpressed by tales of how things used to be done. This has given the secretary-general more friends in northern Europe than among the southern member states, explains one diplomat.

Up close, the face of the 58-year-old Fogh Rasmussen looks rather like a computer-generated reproduction of a youthful photo that has been artificially lined. I find one such photo on the internet, where a young Anders is staring into the camera at what looks like a university party next to Anne-Mette, his wife since 1978 and mother of his three children. He grew up on a farm in western Jutland, and has a degree in economics from Aarhus University. He’s been a faithful liberal since high school, where he launched his own political club.

The stylish face changes and becomes very real when he breaks up laughing, which he does readily at an unexpected question or the reporter’s intentional misunderstanding of the military sense of ‘Europe’s lack of intelligence’.

Cynics say that the Libyan crisis was a godsend for the defence alliance, in search of meaning since the end of the Cold War and with an Afghanistan still unstable after 10 years of military action there. Insecurity surrounding the planned Nato handover to the Afghan authorities by 2014 still remains.

Nato’s relevance has been proven because its ‘Unified Protector’ action in Libya ended swiftly and with a dictator ousted. According to Fogh Rasmussen, happy young Libyans are celebrating their new-found freedom, thanking Nato for helping provide it. He also points out that there were no “confirmed” civilian casualties during the war in Libya. This was largely due to the fact Nato had sufficient intelligence on exact targets to be hit so collateral damage was minimised.

Fogh Rasmussen considers the war in Libya to be a “template for future crisis resolution”. It was authorised by UN Security Council Resolution 1973, and six days after the decision was taken by the United Nations to protect the civilians under threat in Libya, Nato was up and running.

“Our action was more effective than a Coalition of the Willing [as the US-led invasion of Iraq, which involved more than 30 nations, is known]. It was the first time in Nato’s history that Europe along with Canada provided the majority of the capacity. The US was, however, instrumental in the success because it provided intelligence, drones and air refuelling, as well as strategic airlift.”
The US assistance was more comprehensive than the curious expression ‘leading from behind’ admits. Fogh Rasmussen suggests that in order for Europe to be more independent, and rely less on the US, Europeans will have to upgrade their defence and provide these capacities themselves.

The Americans are worried that their European partners are not spending enough. In fact, while most countries are spending more on defence, Europe is the only region where defence budgets are being slashed. With purse strings tightened, the only way forward is via ‘smart defence’.

The next crisis looming is Syria, which to many observers seems to present the same challenges as Libya, but Fogh Rasmussen is adamant: “Nato is not going to intervene there, or any other place.” Then what do we need the upgrading of the defence forces for? “Libya shows how fast events can evolve,” he says.

Fogh Rasmussen remains confident that the transitional government of Libya will live up to the world community’s demands on it and protect human rights and provide rule of law. If he’s worried about the announcements of Mustafa Abdel Jalil, the chairman of the National Transitional Council, that the laws will be based on sharia law, he doesn’t show it.

How about the lynching of Muammar Gaddafi? “I didn’t particularly like the pictures either. I would have preferred for him to have been tried in court,” is as far as Fogh Rasmussen’s criticism goes.

Civil rights movement Human Rights Watch is less convinced of the peaceful transition, pointing to how Gaddafi loyalists have been terrorised in the dictator’s old strongholds, Tawergha and Sirte. The UN Security Council has also expressed concern over the region’s massive weapons stockpile, inherited from Gaddafi.

Fogh Rasmussen seems very keen on Nato not outstaying its welcome in Libya and the country’s slow disarmament is now a UN task. Nato’s mission was accomplished on October 31, exactly seven months after it was started. If there is demand for further assistance, the alliance could help out, by setting up a defence ministry for instance, but it is generally thought unlikely that Nato will be asked to stay. According to a security policy expert in Brussels, the anti-west feelings in the region are too strong.

The secretary-general relates a very sunny picture of his visit to Libya. He didn’t sense an atmosphere of vengeance during his visit and places a good deal of hope in the representatives of the young generation whom he met during his visit. “When asked about the tribal disputes, young Libyans say they don’t think in terms of tribes. It’s a generational thing. What’s encouraging about the Arab Spring is that it’s based on the internet and Facebook generation. They have seen what freedom can bring and they’re not focused on religious extremism. They want to get on with their civilian lives. They want jobs and economic opportunities.”

New social media is important to the secretary-general. He has taken the alliance into hitherto uncharted waters of blogging and turned the communications department of Nato into a sophisticated news and PR machine. During his time as prime minister of Denmark (2001-2009), he also built up a strong communications organisation. His spin-doctor’s generous salary created a scandal in Denmark.

Introducing transparency in Nato goes against the grain, but Fogh Rasmussen insists the organisation needs to be more open. He reaches out to the Brussels-based press corps by organising a monthly press meeting in the EU quarter, well beyond the confines of Nato HQ.

Freedom of speech runs as a current through this liberal’s political life. As prime minister, he defended the freedom of expression when faced with the rage of the Muslim world following the publication of Mohammed caricatures in the Danish daily Jyllands Posten. Nato member Turkey resisted his nomination as leader of Nato, because of this.

“The fact that there was a vigorous debate before my nomination is only natural,” he explains. “Nato decisions are taken by consensus. Since then I have had excellent contact with Turkey and excellent relations with political leaders across the Arab world.”

This story was brought back into the news last month by the firebombing of the French satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo, which ran a drawing of the Prophet on their cover, with the caption ‘Charia Hebdo’. “It’s not clear who was behind the bomb. Freedom of speech is essential to any democracy.

Nato is a community of values. It’s not only a military alliance. We defend democracy and the rule of law,” says Fogh Rasmussen, who on his election to Nato, which coincided with the alliance’s 60th anniversary, called it “the greatest peace organisation ever”.

He’s halfway through his four-year mandate at Nato and will now have to deal with a Danish government led by a social democrat, Helle Thorning-Schmidt. “We have a good tradition in Denmark of supporting our international appointees, irrespective of party affiliation. I can confirm we see eye to eye. We have a long-standing tradition of consensus in the field of foreign and security policy. I have been very encouraged by the commitment of the new government to Denmark’s obligations abroad,” says Fogh Rasmussen, and this diplomatic language is continued at a meeting in Copenhagen with Thorning-Schmidt and other members of the new government the day after our interview.

Defence budgets may be cut, but the 28 member states will have to fork out approximately €1 billion to pay for the new Nato headquarters in Evere, right across from today’s compound. The eight-winged state-of-the-art complex is due to be inaugurated in 2015 and Fogh Rasmussen welcomes what he sees as a “new home for a new Nato”. The provisional arrangement of Nato’s Evere buildings will by then have lasted for almost half a century; they were constructed in 1966 when the French president Charles de Gaulle took France out of Nato and kicked the Nato headquarters out of Paris (France re-joined the alliance in 2009 at the request of Nicolas Sarkozy).

Fogh Rasmussen likes to spend as much of his free time as possible either biking or kayaking, both sports which require a very strict sense of equilibrium. The level-headed Dane is an athlete. Only a highly competitive sportsman would be able to explain that his kayak is very sophisticated, and not a stable vessel favoured by amateurs.

He doesn’t give any distances but we are meant to understand that when the secretary-general goes biking during his free weekends in Brussels, it is not a leisurely tour in the beech woods with a picnic basket, but rather a sweaty affair (so energetic in fact that shortly after this interview he fell from his bike in a Brussels forest and broke his left arm). He cycled the dreaded Alpe d’Huez stage of the Tour de France in 2008, at the invitation of the legendary Danish biker, Bjarne Riis, the day after the field passed.

“Being locked up in an office all week, I try to get out into nature as much as possible during the weekends,” he explains. And when I ask him if his sports sharpen his sense of equilibrium and thus also his negotiating skills, he agrees with a smile.

I enquire about his dancing technique. Ever since she participated in the Danish version of TV dance contest Let’s Dance in 2008, his teacher wife, Anne-Mette, has gained something of a reputation as a ballroom dancing star and fitness guru. At a fundraising ball at Nato, her dance performance raised €10,000 that was used to help fund the education of Afghan women.
“I tend to favour standard ballroom dancing over Latin. Quickstep is more my style,” says the secretary-general as he adjusts his very broad blue silk tie knot and turns towards the photographer with a toothy grin.