Atlantic Council blogs

NATO in Lisbon: A Moderate Success

By David Smith

Although the pre-summit hype—mostly generated by NATO itself—had observers thirsting for more, the 19-20 November NATO Lisbon Summit was a moderate success. The alliance took some measured steps toward dealing with new challenges, deftly sidestepped some political landmines and laid a reasonable foundation for the considerable work that remains. Perhaps most important, in Lisbon, NATO reinvigorated itself.

WikiLeaks Show American Diplomats in Good Light

By James Joyner

The WikiLeaks fiasco has doubtless lowered confidence in the American government’s ability to keep secrets and manage classified information.  The latest dump provided some embarrassing moments for the State Department in particular.  But they also showed that those handling America’s day-to-day foreign policy are quite capable.

European missile defense system either with Russia or against Russia – NATO envoy

By RIA Novosti

Cables Reveal NATO Split over Russia

By Andrew Rettman, the EUobserver

From Andrew Rettman, the EUobserver:  One cable dealing with an extraordinary meeting of Nato ambassadors in Brussels on 12 August ran with the sub-heading: "Nato allies lack cohesion during first meeting on Georgia crisis."

Cables Praise French Friend With ‘Mercurial’ Side

By Katrin Bennhold, the New York Times

From Katrin Bennhold, the New York Times:  President Nicolas Sarkozy is an unusually solid French friend of America. He is also a “mercurial” man operating in “a zone of monarch-like impunity&rdquobreak–>; surrounded by advisers often too fearful to give honest counsel, according to leaked cables from the United States Embassy in Paris. “Élysée contacts have […]

U.S.-China Relations: Gone Fishin’

By Banning Garrett

When I was about eight years old, my father took me fishing in a stream a few miles from our ranch in California. After a long day, we came up dry. Dad saw I was disappointed, so he pulled into a fish farm on the way home. I eagerly dropped my line into a pond […]

A Swiss Alternative to Competing Visions of Europe’s Future?

By Kenneth Weisbrode, the Diplomatic Courier

From Kenneth Weisbrode, the Diplomatic Courier:  Calls for the transformation of Europe into something resembling a larger version of Switzerland have grown louder of late. Although European “neutrality” was a periodic Cold War bugbear, it now seems less offensive. Who would object to a prosperous, peaceful, stable and relatively liberal, multilingual polity? … The reason […]

International Subversives

By Arnaud de Borchgrave

Undressing electronically with eyes wide shut is what the world’s only superpower has done in a global striptease worthy of the Marx brothers but hardly a word has been written or spoken about the motives of the WikiLeaks’ chief leaker. Australia’s 39-year-old Julian Assange was 19 years old when the Cold War ended. His parents […]

Al Jazeera Questions the Lisbon Summit and NATO “Expansion”

By Al Jazeera

From Al Jazeera:  Is this alliance anything more than a fig leaf for US foreign policy? And what sort of relationship can it strike with reinvigorated Russia?

Romania: What NATO means for us

NATO has released new videos on YouTube providing national perspectives on the Alliance.