 My name is Steve Hadley, and I chair the board at the United States Institute of Peace. And on behalf of the Institute, I'm honored and delighted to welcome you to this important discussion on German reunification, the lessons we can learn now some 30 years later, and what the future holds for U.S.-German partnership, a conversation that could not come in a more timely moment. Today, when we look at the events of October 3, 1990, it's attempting to assume that the reunification of West and East Germany was inevitable. But if you ask the key players who were there, and we gathered several of them here with us this morning, they would tell you that the question of German reunification was anything but a given, just as the fall of the Berlin Wall itself the year before was far from expected. Reunification took a tremendous amount of diplomacy, strong international partnerships, and deft political maneuvering. To many of the people closest to the process, it was nothing short of a miracle. As we look at the challenges facing us today, revisiting the story of German reunification can offer important lessons for the road ahead as well as a modicum of hope. We have a great set of discussions lined up, and I'm delighted to introduce our next speaker to tell you more about today's program. Lee's Grand Day officially joined USIP as its new president and CEO on December 1, 2020. Lee's brings 25 years of continuous overseas experience leading, managing, and coordinating some of the UN's largest and most complex humanitarian stabilization and peacekeeping operations. Many were in places where USIP also works. Lee's over to you. Thank you, Steve, for your kind introduction. On behalf of the US Institute for Peace, please allow us to express our gratitude to the German Embassy and the George and Barbara Bush Foundation for their partnership and assistance in making this conversation possible. We have the honor to introduce our distinguished speakers and panelists who are here with us today. I hope everyone joins us in welcoming the Honorable Host Kuhler, the former Federal President of Germany. In welcoming Secretary James Baker III, the 61st U.S. Secretary of State, Secretary Condoleezza Rice, the 66th U.S. Secretary of State. We are very pleased to welcome Holst Tellschick, the former National Security Advisor to Chancellor Helmut Kohl, to welcoming Dr. John Meacham, the Presidential Historian, and to David Ignatius, the distinguished editor, novelist, and columnist from the Washington Post. Our first panel this morning will be a discussion between President Kuhler and Secretary Baker on the lessons of reunification which Dr. Meacham will moderate. Our second panel was Secretary Rice, Dr. Tellschick and moderated by David Ignatius will focus on the future of U.S.-German partnerships. We would like to thank everyone for joining us to celebrate one of the truly miraculous, as Steve said, political moments of our generation and to affirm again the necessity of strong sustained partnerships and international cooperation to confront the global threats to peace and security that we all face. We invite everyone tuning in to engage with us on Twitter with the hashtag Reunification Revisited. I'm delighted to hand over to Ambassador Emily Cobbard, the Ambassador of the Federal Republic of Germany to the United States for her reflections. Thank you and good morning. My heartfelt thanks to go to Stephen and Lisa and the U.S. Institute of Peace for holding this event to commemorate a stellar moment 30 years ago, the peaceful reunification of Germany. The reconciliation hold that we are inaugurating is dedicated to watershed developments in the last century, the fall of the Iron Curtain, the end of the Cold War, the reunification of Germany and ultimately of the European continent. Today's illustrious panelists played a pivotal role in shaping the environment and the process that made these diplomatic outcomes possible. Recent events on the global stage have reminded us never to take anything for granted. The fall of the Berlin Wall was at the time unexpected, like a sudden gift out of the blue. What would come next was anything but clear. The Soviet Union had changed and softened, yes, but was still a potent political force. Influential voices in many countries were not convinced that a unified Germany would be good for Europe. In this moment of uncertainty, visionary leaders came to the fore. Key among them was the American President George H. W. Bush. Months before the fall of the Wall, he had laid out his vision of a Europe whole and free. German unity would not have been possible with the United States and its support. Support throughout the Cold War, but also in those crucial moments of its final days. To this day, Germans remain deeply grateful. Shifting from his recent history to the present, I believe that German-American cooperation is no less crucial today. The challenges we face are monumental, a pandemic, the climate crisis, a fragile world economy, a change geopolitical balance, just to name a few. None of them can be tackled alone. And I would add another, equally fundamental challenge, the deep polarization within our own societies and politics. Distorting of the U.S. Congress was an attack on democracy and the institutions that guarded was a wake-up call, too, for democracies around the world. Distorted facts, radical disinformation, conspiracy theories travel fast everywhere in democratic, communication-driven societies. Radical groups are forging networks beyond borders. And this day in January had reminded us how quickly radical rhetoric can mutate into violence. We can only be successful in defending our democracies. We all act in unison. The transatlantic relationship has changed over the past three decades, as have power dynamics and geopolitical realities. With a new U.S. administration and in Europe committed to transatlanticism, here's the challenge, to redefine our partnership, to design a new transatlantic agenda for cooperation, and to tackle the challenges that lie ahead together. We can do it. As the events, we commemorate reminders. Thank you. John Meacham, over to you. We ready? Delighted to be here. David Ignatius and I are delighted. We're kind of the diversity guest, because we're the only two who have not been Secretary of State or an ambassador. But Ignatius still has time. Thank you so much, Steve and Ambassador. Mr. President, you wanted to open with a few words? If you allow me. And thank you very much. Thank you, Lees, Krande, Stephen Hadley, Emily Harbour for this initiative, in honor of our joint journey to German unification. I'm particularly delighted that Secretary of State Jim Baker is here today. Mr. Secretary, while in office, President Bush and yourself showed America at its best. And America, which was good for the American people, for Germany and for the world. This America is needed just as much in this 21st century. I trust that it will be back with President Joe Biden and Secretary of State Antony Blinken. And I trust that the European Union and Germany are eager to revitalize the transatlantic partnership and, yes, friendship. The German unification remains a monumental moment in history, which showed that the unthinkable can happen. The unthinkable can happen. In early November 1989, hardly anyone thought that the Berlin Wall would fall and that Germany would be united less than a year later. So for me and I think for many people in the world, reunification stands for hope, even under the most adverse conditions. And that means the future is essentially open and people can shape it. The history of German unification is clearly also a history of great political leadership. The new Reconciliation Hall, what I am informed, remembers President George Bush and Federal Chancellor Helmut Kohl. But I ask you not to forget General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev. Without his vision for change in the Soviet Union through Klasnost and Perestroika and his political courage, German unification and the end of Cold War would not have been possible. As a German, I want to take this opportunity to say again from the bottom of my heart. Thank you. Spasibo. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. President. Mr. Secretary, do you want to say something quickly? Well, I would only like to add to what Horst said that I agree with the statements he just made. I'm delighted to be here today with him. His advice during the lead-up and during the process of achieving German unification, his advice to Chancellor Kohl was critical in achieving German unification, which I think most of us would agree was by no means certain as Ambassador Haber has said. I'm delighted to be here. It's great to be with you too, John. I mean, I think you're one of America's preeminent historians. And if we don't learn from the past, we can't produce in the future. And I think that's what you historians teach us. I'm delighted to be here and thank you. Thank you, sir. You're very generous. I will say being one of the most preeminent historians is like being the best restaurant in the hospital. You know, you want to win, but it's not that hard. But thank you. Thank you. So 32 years ago this month, you and President Bush were assuming power. President Bush once told me, I remember exactly where we were sitting, not far from where you are in Houston. And he said the most important thing that happened on his watch was German reunification. So I'm curious when your term as Secretary of State began, what you expected to happen. 1989 would become a remarkable historic year. And I'm just curious, what was your expectation? Did you think before you celebrated Thanksgiving, the Berlin Wall was going to come down? No way. As I think Ambassador Haber said, it was unexpected. Maybe it was horse juice said that, but it was very definitely unexpected. I can promise you, nobody on the American side anticipated it would happen so quickly. And then I don't think there was any suggestion that I can recall that we would be able to see unification come so promptly after the fall of the wall. People seem to forget that the unification of Germany was by no means a given. In fact, the only nation states that were really for it were the United States of America and the Federal Republic of Germany. America's traditional allies had serious reservations. The British, in fact, I remember a quote from Margaret Thatcher who said once time, she said, you know, I feel so strongly about Germany. I think that there ought to be two of them. And Francois Mitterrand had serious reservations about even though for 40 years of even though during the 40 years of the Cold War, we had preached the importance of freedom for the captive nations of Central and Eastern Europe. When the time came to produce that and to produce unification, there were some reservations. And of course, it was really hard for the Soviets. And I agree with what Horst just said about Gorbachev. I think history is going to be extremely kind to Gorbachev, maybe not in the Russian Federation, but elsewhere because he was the Soviet leader who chose not to use force to keep the empire together the way all of his predecessors had. Mr. President, at what point in 1989 did you begin to see these possibilities? Well, let me just start answering that I had long perceived that things were fermenting in Eastern Europe. And it had started with the founding of the Solidarnoš Trade Union in Poland in 1980. During the local elections in the GDR on May 7, 1989, citizens had publicized electoral fraud for the first time. This content was this content was growing also in the GDR. On Hungary's border with Austria, Foreign Minister Gilla Holm and Aloys Mok symbolically cut a piece of fence on June 27. And beginning in September 1989, regular Monday demonstrations took place in the GDR first in Leipzig, then throughout the country. More and more East Germans tried to leave the GDR. And on October 17, Erich Honiger, the leader of the Communist Party, was ousted from the Central Committee of the SED. And the call for unification began to appear at the Monday demonstrations in mid-December from people in East Germany. From shouting, we are the people. The protesters began to claim we are one people. Around the same time, another slogan appeared in the demonstrations. And I quote, if the Deutschmark comes, we'll stay. If it doesn't come, we will go to it. In the Federal Ministry of Finance, at that time I was State Secretary there, we had been working on the concept of a German monetary union since mid-December 1989. In January 1999, we decided to pursue the concept of an immediate transfer of the Deutschmark. The alternative would have been in a phased-in process, but we decided to have an idea for an immediate transfer of the currency. On February 13, 1990, the two heads of government, Helmut Kohl and Hans Motrow, head of the German, the Deutsche Demokratische Republik government, set up a commission to examine the feasibility of a German monetary union. I was the chairman of the West German delegation, my counterpart, the finance minister of the GDR, Walter Romberg, studied mathematician, and in our joint report to the two governments in early March 1990, we unanimously came to the conclusion that a monetary union was feasible. From then on, Germany reunification was no longer a dream for me, but just a question of smart negotiations. Well, speaking of smart negotiations, Mr. Secretary, give us the American perspective on how the process the president is talking about unfolded. What were the key events, and as important for us now, what are the lessons from the unification process? Well, I think one of the major lessons is that if you have an opportunity to do something that you have supported rhetorically for 40 years, you ought not to let that opportunity go by. That's something that I think my friend and President George Bush understood. He and Helmut Kohl were very close. Early on in this process, we met at Camp David, the presidential retreat, and we agreed to support German unification on the condition that the West German government, Helmut Kohl, would support reunification within NATO. That was a very tough nut, of course, to get through the Soviets. And as I indicated earlier, our long-time allies were by no means enthusiastic about the idea of reunifying Germany. They were worried that history might repeat itself. America didn't, we didn't have that worry, and we worked very closely. We took advantage of what turned out, John, to be a very narrow window of opportunity. And it was a close-run thing. I mean, had we not succeeded in a pretty short period of time, I'm not sure we would have gotten there at all. It was certainly not a given. I think we worked hard to come up with a vehicle, and there was opposition to that internally with the American government at first, and then even within the governments of our allies. And that was the two plus four concept. The two Germanies and the four occupying powers would be charged with coming up with German unification. We first had it four plus two, and Hans Dietrich Genscher, the Foreign Minister of the Federal Republic of Germany, at that time said, no, no, we'll go along with it. It's got to be the two plus four, the two Germanies, and then the four occupying powers. And we finally got agreement to that process. It turned out to be very, very important in the end run, and then accomplishing German unification. We were not particularly involved, as we probably shouldn't have been, in the question of the Deutsche Mark and the Ostmark, as Horst was involved with. Of course, I was Treasury Secretary of the United States for four years before I was Secretary of State, and I knew all of the people that Horst was working with there in the Finance Ministry. And that was one of the big issues that had to be resolved, but it was going to be resolved within the between the two Germanies. Secretary, let me ask you just quickly. When we look back at 89, it's such a remarkable year. And sometimes we don't think about, at least in the popular mind, what unfolded in the first six months, which of course was Tiananmen Square and this impulse for freedom around the world. In the maelstrom of governing, how much time do you have to think about the connection between those dots that people like me and David Ignatius spend our time thinking about? In the maelstrom of governing, you don't have a lot of time to think about those things. I mean, your inbox is full, it's overflowing, you've got to deal with these issues, you've got to deal with each crisis as it comes up. But Tiananmen was a very difficult thing for us, and particularly for George Washington, who had been America's first representative to the People's Republic of China. And he was committed to see to it that the relationship was not severed, totally severed, and yet we knew we had to do something to show our support for freedom and human rights around the world, and we sanctioned China, and we sanctioned them fairly significantly, but we kept the relationship alive. The fact that we had spoken up or stood up, if you will, in that instance for freedom, we were a new administration at the time, I think gave us a little stronger hand in convincing some of our partners that we should do the same in the context of Germany, that it wasn't enough to rhetorically support freedom for the captive people of Central East Europe for 40 years, and then the time comes where you have a chance to do something about it and not do something about it. Mr. President, when you look back and when you both look back and look around, to your mind, what are the lessons of the unification process, and particularly the American role, and how indispensable, how relevant is the new world to the old? Okay, could I add a point to Jim Baker's presentation about the process of German unification, and that is the question of the withdrawal of the Soviet troops. As you know, parallel to the two plus four talks, there was the process, and I was in charge of that together with the Minister of Finance, Theo Weigel, Jim, to negotiate the withdrawal of the troops, and we did this where I prepared for these negotiations, and I learned that the Soviet Union had withdrawn troops from Hungary and subsequently had to accommodate them in tents at home. I suggested to Helmut Kohl that we build homes and facilities in the Soviet Union for the troops withdrawn from Germany, and Kohl immediately agreed with me and told me Mr. Köhler always treats the Red Army with greatest respect. That was Kohl's advice to me, and similar to the former German Federal President Richard von Weizsäcker, you see, Kohl considered the end of the Cold War, the World War II, as Germany's liberation from national socialism and wanted to enable the Soviet troops to return home in dignity. That was his philosophy and attention, and we devised very shortly, in a couple of weeks almost, a housing program and included also a retraining program for the soldiers. My proposal was immediately in the negotiations, welcomed by the high-ranking officers in the Soviet negotiating team. It took a bit longer for me to win over the civilian negotiators, Jim, the Prime Minister, Sita Jan and Minister Kattuschev. They had been mainly hoping for cash. On August the 31st, Federal Chancellor Kohl, 1994, Federal Chancellor Kohl personally put attention to bait farewell to the last soldiers of the Red Army in Germany in the presence of President Yeltsin. The Soviet soldiers had been withdrawn without a shot being fired. And I do think ensuring that the other side didn't leave as looser. That was the shared understanding of Kohl, of Jim Baker and myself. That was, and I wanted to add this to Jim's presentation because I feel it has a meaning. Now, what kind of lessons? A short little presentation. The first is, but I have to say, a world of caution is needed for anyone looking at negotiations as a kind of template for the management of other diplomatic crises or conflicts in the world. But there are, at least from my perspective, and this is your request, some takeaways from our experience. My first point is, get ahead of developments, prepare to expect the improbable and have the guts to lead. And Kohl had the guts to lead in this situation. Second, trust is the coin of realm. That's a quote from George Schulz, Jim Baker, you know it. And summing up his experience, the trust, Bush, Gorbachev, and Kohl had in each other made it possible for them to seize the kairos, the right moment to act and to overcome the skepticism of other European leaders. But trust requires investment in reliability and credibility and takes a long time to mature. In negotiations, furthermore, the human factor is always an important element. Bush, at least how I observed it, never tried to dominate Michael Gorbachev during the negotiations. And he understood the domestic situation Helmut Kohl was in and gave him latitude. That was also very important. My third point, keep your promises and make sure others are aware of it. The US had consistently supported the quest for German unity and liberal democracy in Western Europe. This was part of the West's normative clout and its appeal to Central and Eastern Europe. Transactional approaches, what we have experienced most recently, ignorant or disparaging of the long-term effect of investment in reliability and credibility would have made this outcome impossible and would have opened space to those who wanted to prevent it in my view. Fourth point, foreign policy begins at home for nations as well as for alliances. No external strength without internal strength. And I do think in so far everybody knew that the East German economy had been run down and it was the same situation in the Soviet Union. And I'm personally absolutely not surprised that President Biden and his national security advisor, Jake Sullivan, made a proposal, had a paper, want to make US foreign policy work better for the middle class. That is the stability foundation for a good society. My final takeaway, don't go it alone. That's my final takeaway from this process. It was a time of historical challenges that needed a multilateral response. There was this framework of multilateral talks and negotiations. And in this framework, strength and cohesion among Western allies was key. Jim, I hope that you can agree with these kind of takeaways. Well, I do indeed. And I agree with your points. I might interject here if I could, John, that I think another takeaway, and this may be self-serving, coming from an American, is the importance of American leadership abroad. I mean, when America is engaged, I would argue strongly that we are a force for peace and stability that had America not been engaged the way we were during the process of German unification. We never would have gotten there. I think that leadership is critical. You don't get that leadership by isolationism or protectionism. And so as a former Treasury Secretary, one who understands the benefits free trade and the substantial benefits of alliances appointed horsemaid, alliances enable you to leverage your power. America's alliances are extremely important to us, and we need to carefully tend them and not renounce them. But more broadly, we need to remain involved internationally, engaged on the world stage. When America is engaged, we are a force for peace and stability. When we have free trade agreements, free and fair, yes, but free trade creates economic growth. Economic growth creates jobs. Today in America, both the left and the right have almost recanted their support totally for free trade. We need to get back to that. We need to understand that the world is a small place these days, and nothing we do here is going to be successful without some input from allies, and we need to tend to those alliances and keep them healthy. Mr. Secretary, let me follow up on that. When our greatest diplomats in American history, both in the presidency, Secretary of State, in the broad structure, have been really good politicians. Franklin Roosevelt, George H.W. Bush, a guy named Jim Baker, you know, they knew the world in which they were in. They were not living on Olympus, they had been in the precincts. FDR, when he was dictating the Four Freedom Speech for the State of the Union in 1941, he was dictating to a speechwriter and he said, the freedom from fear everywhere in the world, freedom from want everywhere in the world. And Harry Hopkins, his assistant, said, Mr. President, I would not say everywhere in the world because nobody in America gives a damn about Asia. And FDR came right back at him and said, the world is so small today, Harry, that they're going to have to give a damn, which is your point. I'm wondering how, as you look at this odd moment, to say the least, we're in, how do you articulate the case for American engagement at a time when there are flowing populist forces that are in favor of protectionism, that are increasingly nativist? You know, we literally just went through a moment in American life where we're here celebrating the fall of a wall and we damn near built one. How do you make that case to the American people for engagement? Well, I think to some extent you have to make it the way I just mentioned and point out how important our engagement abroad has been to global peace and stability, yes, but also to the betterment of the United States from a security standpoint and from an economic standpoint. I regret strongly the fact that we did not take advantage, we meeting the Republican administration, of the Trans-Pacific Partnership or the Trans-Atlantic Partnership agreements that the Obama administration had negotiated. That would have been a far better thing for us to do than to simply say, we're out of those, we don't do free trade agreements. Those agreements, particularly the Trans-Pacific Agreement, was every bit as much a security agreement as it was an economic agreement and it would have been very, very wise of us to, here we are today in a Cold War situation, again with Russia. I mean, there's no denying that fact and in an emerging Cold War situation with China, how could we have, what better way to lead and to prevail in a Cold War with China than to have all the rest of the nations in that part of the world with us and that we would have had that under the TPP. So I think you got to go out and you have to point, you have to build up the political support. No foreign policy can succeed that doesn't have support at home. So we have to educate the American people that, and this would apply perhaps as well to the Biden administration, America first is a great slogan politically, but that's not a good economic approach and it oftentimes is not a good security approach and we just need to make that sale. You mentioned political experience, political experience to my way if thinking is invaluable in diplomacy, particularly if you're Secretary of State, I mean, you're Secretary of State, you're engaged in negotiations, you're negotiating for your country instead of for your client, as you would if you were a lawyer. I named the memoir of my four years as Secretary of State, The Politics of Diplomacy. That's very important because the people sitting across the table from you are also politicians and one of the most important things you have to do is understand what their red lines are just as you need to make them understand what yours are. I also strongly agree with Horst's point about trust. Trust is the coin of the realm, you're not going to get much done if you and your interlocutor don't have a basic element of trust between you. That doesn't mean that you build personal relationships at the expense of your principles or your country's principles, but trust is extraordinarily important. Would you do anything differently looking back on the German experience? Well, I think we might have done something differently in the aftermath of the Bush administration. Our policy was the peaceful expansion of NATO. NATO has been, I wrote a memoir once that went to the current administration saying, look, stop dumping on NATO. NATO has been the most successful alliance, defensive alliance in history. It's been very successful. It's really important to the United States. We may have been too dynamic in our expansion of NATO, but that was our policy. The countries of Central and Eastern Europe wanted to join NATO. There are still countries on the border of the former Soviet Union today that want to join NATO very badly. And of course, we want to be in a position to welcome freedom-loving and peace-loving nations, but we might have been a little bit better off to temper the pace of our expansion of NATO. I mean, we've talked a lot about expanding NATO now in places like Ukraine and Georgia. The impetus for that is there, and I understand the rationale behind it, but I think I can also understand why it didn't provoke the Soviet, but it worried the Soviets considerably. I don't think that justifies what's happened in Russia. I think what's happened there is that Putin got in trouble domestically, and he needed a whipping boy, and the most available whipping boy was NATO and the West, and particularly the United States of America. So we've got to start doing some of the things we did during the Cold War to find our way out of this. It's not a sustainable situation. For 15 years after the German unification, we the West had excellent relations with the Russian Federation, but only later did it all fell apart. The first 15 years after 1990, we had very good relations with Russia. Mr. President, same question. Is there anything looking back you wish had been done differently? I think because time was of the essence, we couldn't really do it very different. We all admired, for instance, Mikhail Gorbachev's courage for reforms in the Soviet Union, but we also perceived relatively early that he was moved at the traditional victory parade in front of the Kremlin in May 1990. At the G7 World Economic Summit, and Jim had already hinted to it, the news of the push against Gorbachev burst in. And in this moment, I was very glad that unification and not least the agreement on the withdrawal of the Soviet troops had already been done, the negotiations. So time was of the essence for this process. So what we did then? I would do it again overall. How we did it, I'm not so sure. I give you for Germany an example. The transformation of the East German economy from a state economy to a market economy came with painful disruptions for many, many people. Chops lost and so on. Many of the people failed as mere objects and not subjects to of the tremendous transformations. They thought that their biographies had been unfairly devalued. People felt that too little was explained. This frustration continues, by the way, to have an impact today even. And perhaps it would have been better to organize the privatization in a more decentralized way with greater participation of the people at the spot. They've played a bit too much in distance of this. That was to Germany how I would try to think, how I would do it different in terms of how to do. Second regarding Russia, Federal Chancellor Henwood Kohl tried hard to get the support of the G7 for President Gorbachev's reform course in Russia. But I must say, Jim, I hope that you are not angry with me. But while there were many warm words from his colleagues, Kohl's colleagues, few concrete action and I could also say money of help showed up. So the privatization processes, the second point, received too little attention also in Russia or the Soviet Union at that time from the international financial institutions, the IMF and the World Bank. They relied too much on a kind of pure market force driven process. Afterwards, I can't see, yeah, yes, now you are back. Even with the region, the European Bank for Reconstruction, which I became president in 1998, just two weeks after the so-called Russia crisis. And I had negotiated the statute for the bank and the statute had, I had personally written in the main purpose of the EBRD is to support, to create a middle class in the Soviet Union if all this transformation. But when I came into the bank in, I think, September 98, the main investments had gone privatizing banks and larger enterprises. But not too much of the energy and investment to create this middle class. So here are points where I would, in the hindsight, would have done something different. Thank you. Thank you. As we sort of power down here so that Hadley doesn't have to send in the troops. Mr. Secretary, I'll ask you first, what's your basic disposition at this point in terms of optimism, pessimism about America's role in the world. We were in a nation that, not least because of you and President Bush and so many others, who did in fact play a decisive role in helping the captive peoples fulfill a fundamental human destiny, which is the impulse for liberty. So I'm wondering about your basic outlook at this point about the progress of democracy, but also the perils of democracy, which we have seen in America so starkly, particularly. Well, you're absolutely right, John. Democracy is far and away the best form of government who, as the Churchill said, it's got a lot of warrants, but it's better than any other form of government. There's no doubt about that. It's hard to maintain against a lot of populist sentiment sometimes. I happen to believe our institutions here in the United States are strong. I think we've just been through an experience that shows how strong they are. I think they will prevail. I think it's up to leaders here to take lessons, learn lessons from the past and learn what we gained when America was involved globally. And we gained a lot and we prospered and we had peace and prosperity. And there's no reason why we shouldn't get back to that again, but it's a case of making the political argument to your domestic population and that's leadership. Leadership, you know, James McGregor Burns said it's a commitment to values and the perseverance to fight for those values. Well, I think to say it a little bit more simple way, you could just say it's knowing what to do and then doing it. I think we know what to do. The doing it is always the tough part. One of the successful lessons of German unification is that George Bush knew what to do and he did it with strong help from Chancellor Cole and with the strong help indeed from Mikhail Gorbachev and Edward Shevernaz and Hans Dietrich Genscher and so many others. But I think it's just a case of looking at the prosperity and peace that we enjoyed when we were leading internationally. We need to get back to that. We are still the strongest country in the world and we have to lead and our partners want us to, particularly our transatlantic alliance partners. Thank you. Mr. President, same question. Do you look out on the both the European world and the broader world with hope at this hour? And if so, why? And if not, why not? I think I'm looking out to this world observing challenges, but also I'm looking out with a kind of self-confidence that the Western ideas, the leadership of the U.S. again, could make the best out of it. But that doesn't mean that democracy, growth in the world, peace by itself is coming and remaining. There's a permanent attention necessary looking to a new risk, to new challenges in order also to define the process how to respond to challenges. For me, for instance, in Germany, as you know, we have also a growing right wing development in our democracy. And we need to look very carefully to that and demonstrate that the democracy with us can handle these kind of developments and will of course prevail. I have no doubt, but it needs to be aware at the politician's head and the whole society, don't take it as granted that there's always democracy and growth and a nice life. My favorite philosopher Carl Popper made the sentence, all life is problem solving. And that is what we need to have always in mind in the Western world, where we are used to have progress, where we are used to have improving social standards. We need to always be attentive to new challenges. And one thing is very important and I would like to add to Jim Baker's comments, education. Education has always been at the forefront to make people, the society, aware about fragilities, about difficulties to survive. Therefore, this kind of complacency culture, which you could observe sometimes in your Western cultures, is a little bit of a weakness. And we should work that it's not getting too big, it's complacency culture in our societies. That's wonderful. Thank you. Just a point of personal privilege. It's a great honor for me to be with you too. President Bush said in 1992 that moods come and go, but greatness endures. And you two were vital figures in one of the great chapters in modern history. And it's an honor to hear your wisdom. And I will yield the balance of my time to Mr. Hadley. Very nice comment. Thank you, Secretary Baker. President Kohler and John Meacham for getting us started with that terrific discussion. As John Meacham noted, Secretary Baker and President Kohler were pivotal in bringing order and unity to a long, complicated history. And we are honored by your presence and the wisdom and experience you shared with us today. Thank you. Before we move on to our next panel, let me note that if we were on USIP's campus today, we'd be able to show you the George H.W. Bush Peace Education Center, which recognizes President Bush's crucial role in ending the Cold War without violence or armed conflict. Thanks to our lead donor, Aaron Utker, and several other individuals with whom we are in conversation, today we are able to mark the dedication of Reconciliation Hall in the Bush Center to honor the cooperation between the United States and Germany in ending the Cold War and reuniting Germany. Through their joint efforts, the United States, the Soviet and Russian leadership, Germany, and other European friends and allies were together able to navigate safely the treacherous path through a post-Cold War world and to a reunified East and West Germany. In all of this, the close partnership between the United States and Germany was key. Working together, President Bush and Chancellor Helmut Kohl literally changed the face of Europe and pursued a shared vision of a Europe whole, free, and at peace with Russia as a partner and not an adversary. Continued German-American partnership will be as essential to meeting the challenges of this 21st century as it was in meeting the challenges of the 20th. It is to the past and future accomplishments of this unique historical partnership that Reconciliation Hall is dedicated. Again, we are grateful to everyone who made this dedication possible, and we look forward to hosting you all in person in the Bush building and in Reconciliation Hall when that long-awaited day comes. And with that, let me turn it over to Washington Post columnist David Ignatius to moderate a conversation further exploring the important partnership and what lessons can be drawn from this example of German-American cooperation. David, over to you. So I'm pleased to welcome everyone to this second session of our celebration of German reunification 30 years after. I'd like to thank the USIP and our distinguished panelists before and now in this our second panel. Like many of you in the audience, I'm sure I have in my office a tiny fragment of the Berlin Wall kept in loose sight on my desk as a reminder of that transformative event of my lifetime of our world. The focus of this second session is the choices that were made, often invisibly, quietly, that made the great outcome that followed the Berlin Wall unification of Germany possible. We would also in this panel like to look ahead as well as backwards to the new era in Europe that's beginning. This I hope will be what the late Professor Ernest May and Professor Graham Allison at Harvard like to call applied history, where we'll think about what we live through and what its uses are in understanding the present. As you know from the introductions, our two panelists were key advisors in the reunification process, and they've remained active participants in framing security policy in the United States and Germany. First former Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice, who 30 years ago was NSC Director for Soviet and East European Affairs, advising President Bush, joining her is Horst Telczyk, who served as National Security Advisor to Chancellor Helmut Kohl. And for many years after that was the director of the Munich Security Conference keeping on the debate about policy that was so central to the alliance. So Madam Secretary, let me begin with you and I'd like to begin by asking you about the choices that were made in this remarkable process of reunification. The choices by President Bush, Chancellor Kohl, and General Secretary Gorbachev, as you look back, what are the choices that strike you as most important? Well, first of all, I want to start by talking about those choices because we very often in retrospect it looks like everything was foreordained when we look back on history, but of course these were human beings making choices where the future was not self-evident. I would concentrate on one big choice which was the choice that both President Bush and Chancellor Kohl shared and that was the choice to trust German democracy, that in fact Germany had become after the experience of the war and now some 45 years of the Cold War, Germany had become a reliable democratic ally and George H.W. Bush very often articulated that in his own inimitable self-deprecating way, he said, I fully believed that Germany was democratic when I went there as vice president and people egged my car. He said I knew then that German democracy was alive and so that trusting of German democracy was very important. Secondly, they agreed that they needed to provide an opportunity for Gorbachev to take the hard choices that he had to do without embarrassing him, without triumphalism, without a sense that the Soviet Union had lost the Cold War and West Germany and the United States had won. They were with all of their aides and with all of their statements determined to show that this was not a defeat for the Soviet Union but a building and a making of a new Europe in which the Soviet Union and later Russia would have a part and that too was a choice and then I think one of the most important choices that Helmut Kohl made, Chancellor Kohl made that President Bush supported was to go fast. You know, there were a lot of people who wanted us to have long conferences, long negotiations about German unification but they understood that there was a window of opportunity and that that window of opportunity might not be open for very long and if you fast forward a little more than a year, Gorbachev would have been out of power. The Soviet Union would have been in collapse. There was a window and they pursued it and in pursuing it, for instance, Chancellor Kohl decided that he had to have the Alliance for Germany win in Eastern Germany and took choices about a one-for-one exchange of the Deutsch mark for the Oist mark so that East German citizens would vote for the Alliance and we could reunify fast. And finally, Gorbachev himself, the choice to live with what now seems to have been something of an illusion that the Soviet Union could be a normal country within Europe, that he could get rid of all of the lies and all of the coercion and he could accept the unification of Germany. They could have tried to stop it. They had their most important, most capable troops in East Germany and yet he made the choice time and time again not to try to stop this tide of history and so I think these were critical choices and we're very fortunate that we had leaders who made them. Thank you, Madam Secretary. I want to turn to Mr. Telchik. I want to ask the same question about choices but ask you to focus in particular on an aspect of this story that we sometimes forget, which is that it wasn't inevitable that this be a peaceful transition. As Secretary Reis just said, there were thousands, hundreds of thousands of Russian troops in East Germany and you, as we were preparing for this panel, movingly described conversations with the then Foreign Minister Edward Shepard-Nadze that made you aware of just how delicate the situation was. Perhaps you could talk about those conversations for Germany, the U.S. and the Soviet Union. Well, we have had 380,000 Soviet troops posted in the GDR and all over Eastern Europe, 500,000 Soviet troops were posted and including their weapon systems. For example, the Hungarian Prime Minister named it when he came into office in 1989. He told me that he had to learn that even Hungary, the Soviet Union had deployed nuclear systems. I think one of the striking success stories is that these Soviet troops, 500,000 all over Eastern Europe, together with around about 300,000 family members with about 600,000 tons of ammunition, were withdrawn within a great time of four years from all over Eastern Europe. It's a tremendous story. Well, but we didn't know this from the beginning. We were aware that demonstrations in the past were brutally fought by Soviet troops, think of 1968 in the spring of Prague, where people demonstrated and they were attacked by Soviet troops, the same in Hungary in 1956, the same in East Berlin, 1953. Therefore, we were not sure what will happen now in Eastern Europe. President Kerler mentioned Solidarno in Poland. There was for some time a great fear that the Soviet troops in Poland, together with the Polish troops, will intervene and stop these developments. Therefore, the issue of security was one of the main topics of the photocopies. And what was important for us was the message that Gorbachev had told his allies during a workshop packed summit that he will not anymore intervene in domestic affairs of his allies. And Hungary was one of the first proofs. Poland was another proof that he kept his word. And therefore, we were quite sure that this wouldn't happen in the GDR as well, that Soviet troops won't interfere. But I tell you, the foreign secretary, Shevodacev has told me after he had resigned, I met him in Moscow. He was running a small institute on foreign affairs. And I asked him a lot of questions because he was out of office. He was very friendly, open-minded. We faced a difficult situation in January 19. Helmer Kohl was eager to meet Gorbachev personally. The first meeting after the wall had come down. And we learned by media that Gorbachev had canceled all meetings with foreign politicians in January 19. And we didn't know why. And I asked Shevodacev what was going on in Moscow in January 19. We were waiting for a date with Gorbachev and didn't know what was going on. And he told me, Mr. Telchik, we had discussions within the leadership whether we should militarily intervene in the GDR or not. Fortunately, they didn't. And I asked him a further question. I asked him who was the main driving force of such an idea, of military intervention. He just mentioned one name. This was the head of the foreign policy department of the Communist Party. This was Ambassador Farley. And I made this later on public. And Farley said that's wrong. But I'm quite sure that Shevodacev was not lying. And therefore, on the one side, we were quite sure that Gorbachev would not intervene, but we were not sure what's going on in Moscow. And fortunately, we got the first date with Gorbachev early February 19. And the big surprise of this meeting was, after 10 minutes introduction, both gentlemen, Dr. Helmut Kohl and Gorbachev started the meeting discussing what happened to their family and to themselves during the Second World War and afterwards. And suddenly, Gorbachev said, well, Chancellor, it's up to both German governments whether they want to unify, how they want to unify, and how fast they want to unify. And it was really unbelievable. And I whispered to the Chancellor and said, try to get him to repeat this sentence, because I was not taken, you see. And it was important to get everything right. And fortunately, Gorbachev repeated this, and this was sensational. So that's a fascinating piece of history. So interesting to hear it. Secretary Rice, you had some thoughts about what the first talk just had to say. Yes, but I have to start by saying we had a similar experience with Gorbachev about whether Germany could choose its own alliances. It was in May at the summit in Washington, DC, and President Bush said to Gorbachev, under the CSCE, any member state can choose its alliances. And Gorbachev said, yes, that is right. And the President said, any state can choose its alliances. And Gorbachev said, yes. And we could see that the Soviet delegation was shifting around. They were very nervous. Clearly, this hadn't been cleared. It wasn't in Gorbachev's talking points. And we did the same thing. Mr. Talchuk, we said, get him to say it again. And Gorbachev said it again. And I actually then called the Soviet ambassador, and I said, tomorrow morning at the press conference at Camp David, President Bush is going to say that he and President Gorbachev agree that countries can choose their own alliances. Let me know if there's a problem. I stayed up all night waiting to hear from him. I never did. And the next morning, President Bush said it and Gorbachev nodded yes. And so that was another one of those moments. The other point I wanted to make is that we felt we worried that East Germany would be different from Poland or Hungary. It was maybe said best by a Soviet academic, member of the intelligentsia, who said, even after communism, there is a reason for a Poland. Even after communism, there is a reason for Hungary. But if there is no class struggle, what is the rationale for two Germanies? And we know which Germany will win. And so we worried that actually Germany might be the turning point. Fortunately, as Horstus said, it turned out not to be. I want to ask Mr. Telczyk about one of those what ifs in history that occurred to me as I was listening to you speak about those 380,000 Soviet troops in East Germany. And the what if is this? What if they had at least initially taken military action? What if back in Moscow that had been a coalescence against Gorbachev? And we'd had the beginnings of violence in Germany. What do you think would have happened next? And where would this story have gone? Would reunification have frozen or would it have continued and surged onward despite the violence? Well, what we could watch day by day was that more and more East Germans tried hard to leave East Germany. At the end, we have had about 200,000 East Germans leaving the GBR via Hungary to Austria. And if you watched watching these people, there are mainly youngsters, young families with their children. And the same started via our embassy in Prague, in the Czech Republic. The same happened in Warsaw via Poland. And we got the message that already in autumn 1989, the GDR had a lack, a shortness of medical doctors. Those people who were well educated, who were relatively young, tried to leave as soon as possible. And the country can't survive if the best youngest people are leaving. Then the demonstration started in September in Leipzig and all over the GDR cities. And fortunately, the Communist Party of East Germany are not intervening. They can tell you a story in Leipzig, Saxonia, where there's a mass demonstration of several 10,000 people. And GDR troops were posted there with their weapons to stop such a demonstration. And I was told by one guy with Leipzig, that one of the GDR officers, when the demonstrating people came up, told his soldiers, don't shoot, because my son is there as well, is part of the demonstration. You see? And therefore, not a single shot was fired. And therefore, it was quite sure, knowing that the Soviet Union would not interfere anymore, that the question is how fast can we manage the unification. And as President Kurla told you, part of this, it's gone. Can you hear me? Yes. And thank you for those bits of history. Madam Secretary, I want to ask you about another of the fascinating intangibles that helped shape this history that I think is relevant as we think about policy today. And that is the chemistry between the leaders that made these extraordinary events possible. George H. W. Bush was an interesting combination of caution and boldness. And I'd say similarly, each of the people involved here had unusual characteristics for leaders. Could you just speak as somebody who is observing this so closely about that intangible chemistry between people and how it affected events? Well, there's no doubt that President Bush and Chancellor Cole developed a very close relationship. Of course, there was the visit to Camp David in February and then the follow-on visits. And there was always a sense of trust between them. I have to just say that the man who is on this panel with me, Horst Telchick and Brent Scowcroft, also developed extraordinary relationship of trust. And they could very often prep their principles for what really needed to be done. So don't ever underestimate the importance of an advisor like Horst Telchick and her advisor like Brent Scowcroft. There was actually a growing, if not trust, empathy of George H. W. Bush for Gorbachev. He was always cognizant of what Gorbachev was going through. And Gorbachev so desperately needed to be recognized for the turmoil that he was taking his country through. He needed to be understood as somebody who really wanted to be a reformer. I remember, David, in one circumstance, Gorbachev had decided or the Soviet Union had decided that it would no longer be governed by the general secretary of the Communist Party. It would now be governed by a president. And Gorbachev, when he came to Washington in May, they told us, never call him General Secretary Gorbachev, called him President Gorbachev. They said, you have to recognize that this is the new authority. And so we were all schooled, never to say General Secretary Gorbachev. At one point, Gorbachev and President Bush were in his office at Camp David. And the president took out a little card, and it had his schedule on it. And Gorbachev said to him, what's that? He said, well, through translator, well, that's my schedule. And Gorbachev said, I don't have one of those. And the president said, well, my chief of staff does this for me. And Gorbachev said, I don't have one of those. And President Bush said, would you like us to send a delegation to Moscow to talk about how to organize a presidential office? And a number of us with Johnson and Nunu at the head were dispatched to Moscow to actually meet with Gorbachev's aides on how you organize a presidential office. I tell that story because it wasn't just about the grand issues of German unification and NATO. It was also about knowing where the other guy was coming from. And Gorbachev, we always said, we're not going to push him into a corner. So he has to say no, because he's letting history unfold. Let's just keep history unfolding. So, Mr. Totschik, continuing in this vein of thinking about the events then and their importance for our world now. You mentioned in our earlier conversations the often forgotten Treaty of Paris in 1990 that set forth a vision that was important to Gorbachev, that was central to this process, that described the way people imagined the future would proceed in relations with Russia and Eastern Europe. And maybe you could recall for us what that Treaty of Paris said and what implications it has as we think about where Russia, Europe and the United States are today. Well, first of all, I would like to confirm probably about the chemistry between our post-administration. I think it was absolutely exceptional and great. I said once to Jim Baker, many years later, we met in Germany and I said to Jim Baker, we have had a great time together. And he answered, of course, it was the best. I think he was absolutely right. And concerning the relationship President Bush and Helmut Kohl, the first meeting was already in 1983 when Vice President Bush came to Germany to celebrate the 300th anniversary of German Saddlers from Clayfield to the United States. And they were confronted with mass demonstrations in Germany against opposing the double-tracked decision of NATO. And Bush was deeply impressed how Helmut Kohl reacted on that. He was not nervous. He was confident that Germany can manage the deployment of American nuclear missiles. Well, one topic concerning this double-tracked decision, you have to know, but the main interest from the very beginning, I think it was a reason why we got the brakes through, was each topic of security for Kohl and Kohl. And therefore, it was important, for example, that President Bush took the initiative in June 1990 for a special NATO summit. And during this NATO summit, they passed common agreements saying we reach out our hands of peace to the Soviet Union. This was an important message. And because a few days later was the party convention of the Communist Party in the Soviet Union, and there was a risk that Gorbachev would have been forced to leave his office. And the bilateral breaks through between Germany and the Soviet Union happened when Helmut Kohl came forward in April 1990, proposing Gorbachev a treaty negotiated before the unification. But this treaty should explain how we want to shape the relations with the Soviet Union after the unification. And the main part of this treaty, we drafted it before the unification happened and it was ratified afterwards in November. But an important part of this common treaty treaty are security agreements between the Soviet Union and Germany, as it is part of the two plus four agreement as well. Therefore, security was a key issue. Sheva Nazi came in May 1990 to Bonn and said to Helmut Kohl, this is exactly what we do need a treaty negotiated before the unification happened, giving us security, how our unified Germany will behave. And the same topic in Paris. You see in November 1990 all 34 presidents and heads of governments met in Paris, signing this famous charter for a new Europe. Gorbachev called it a treaty for a common European house. And the picture is gone as well again. And the main interest of Gorbachev all the time was we want to be part of an all Europe from Vladivostok to Vancouver, where everybody gets the same security as the others. And for me it was an unbelievable vision, a dream. I have a dream. And as you know, we agreed on the principles how to shape such a common Europe. We agreed on first instruments, how to establish it. But the result is shame, because nobody really took care of this charter to implement it. So, Madam Secretary, let me ask you to take this theme of a European idea that stretches from Vancouver to Vladivostok. And I mention it in the context of the recent protests, not just in Moscow, but all over Russia. When I called Alexei Navalny's chief of staff this week to write a column, he mentioned to me that the goal of this movement, very courageous leader obviously, but the thousands of courageous people in the streets, is to create in Russia a normal European country with the rule of law, with free media, with the things that a normal European country has. And I want to ask you, in light of what Horst Teltrick said and then these recent events, what do you think that idea is one that the United States, Europe, can try to reanimate going back to the kind of language that Horst Teltrick mentioned in his comments? Well, let me first say that the idea of this common European home or Europe from Vladivostok to Vancouver, I think was very much something that Gorbachev believed. He told me once, I just want the Soviet Union to be a normal country. And he had this notion that it could be the sort of far and left corner of the European political spectrum. And he really believed that, I think. The problem is, of course, before any of this could be implemented, even if you believe that it was possible with the Soviet Union, the Soviet Union collapsed. It was replaced then by Russia. It was replaced by Boris Yeltsin, who governed in many ways that we liked, but frankly never spent much energy to build the institutions of a Russia that could be a normal European country. In fact, ruling by decree, for instance, against the parliament. And then, of course, this very strong presidency is handed off to Vladimir Putin. And a strong presidency under Boris Yeltsin is one thing, a strong presidency under Vladimir Putin, who by the way was a KGB officer in Potsdam when the German unification events happened. That's a very different situation. And so, I think you now have a split, really, between many of the people in Russia led by people like Navalny, who in the 30 years since the collapse of the Soviet Union have experienced being outside of Russia, who have gone to American and European universities, who have traveled. David, when I was a graduate student in Moscow in 1979, nobody traveled. The Soviet people looked at their feet. They didn't know the outside world. Well, thanks to Gorbachev and the 25, 30 years since the collapse of the Soviet Union, these people do know that there is another world out there. And I think for many Russians, particularly younger, more educated Russians, there is a desire to be a part of a normal European country. And I very much believe that Navalny thinks exactly that. Now, the problem is, of course, that is not Vladimir Putin's conception. And he instead talks about the uniqueness of Russia, about Russia as a bulwark against the collapse of Western civilization. That is, he sees Western civilization, democracy as flawed and as collapsing. And so it's very hard to reconcile that notion with a Europe in which Russia is a part. But if we're patient about it, and I will say this, if we continue to cultivate the young Russians who do have that vision, if we don't cut off Russian, Russians and Russia in order to deal with Putinism, I think this idea still has a lot of life in the Russian population, and it may come back around. But we have to keep connectivity with that younger Russian population that wants to be normal. Thank you, Madam Secretary. And anyone who hasn't taken the time to look at the video that Alexei Navalny posted after he was in prison, that's courage for you. I urge people to take a look, not least because it's in parts extremely funny in its sarcasm about President Putin. So of course, I want to ask you about another issue that people discussed with great concern at the time of German reunification. And that was their fear. Margaret Thatcher was the most obvious example of this, that a reunited Germany would be too strong, that it would overwhelm the institutions of Europe, even putting aside fears about return to war in Europe. There was just a feeling that this big Germany was just too big for Europe to accommodate. Well, I'd like to ask you how you think that process has gone. Chancellor Merkel, in a sense, is the person who, you could argue, brought that balance to fruition. But how do you see that story of this much bigger Germany learning to live in Europe? Well, this was indeed an important topic. President Mitterrand was afraid that Germany will get even stronger and bigger than France more than before. And he had doubts whether this bigger Germany or stronger Germany would continue pushing the cooperation with France and the European integration. This was his main concern because the relationship with Helmut Kohl and Mitterrand was very, very close. And I tell you, I took part in about 70 bilateral meetings between Mitterrand and Helmut Kohl until the end of 1990. And they were real friends. That was the reason why Helmut Kohl in December 1989 came forward with a new proposal to move ahead with the European integration. We had decided already in June in Germany to go for an economic and monetary union. And in December 1989, we put forward the proposal to go forward for a political union. And this was agreed immediately by our French friends. And it was agreed during the summit of the European community in April 1990 in Ireland during the summit. Concerning the concerns of Margaret Satcher, first of all, President Bush was very helpful to convince Maggie to agree at the end. This was very, very helpful. But one concern, what you have to know. My counterpart, he is now a Lord, Lord Charles Powell, came once to my office in Spring 1990 telling me what you have to know, he said, what you have to know. Margaret Satcher was witnessing the bombing raids of the German fighters on London. And within the family of Margaret Satcher, a Jewish child was growing up. As you know during the Nazi time in Germany, many Jews, then their children at that time to Great Britain. And in the family of Margaret Satcher, she grew up with a Jewish child from Germany. And this was part of her German picture. It was not her end experience. It was not the best experience of Germany. But another really important concern of her was we have had a more or less stable order after the Second World War, Cold War. But both sides knew if one start to strike, he will die as the second one. And therefore it was a stable system. Now this system will be destroyed. And what's the alternative? There was no alternative visible at that time. This was her main concern. But let me add one sentence to the situation of Russia today. What you have to know is, and this I was told by a Russian lady, professor at the University for History, she told me, don't forget, around about 50% of the Russians of today are born after 90. They are not indoctrinated anymore. They want to live as we do. I was on a trip last year, a holiday trip in Russia. If you go to the cities, you can watch youngsters as in Germany or in the United States, with jeans, with clothes, with American slogans on head, you see. And my perspective is, this is a generation we have to win for us. So we have just a minute left. And I'm going to ask Secretary Rice for just a minute's reflection on what advice you would offer the new administration in Washington of President Joe Biden, in light of the extraordinary experience that we have been discussing today as we look back 30 years. Well, I do think some principles emerge from what we experienced. One is that you do have to trust the democratic peace. Mr. Telsjic talked about how President George H. W. Bush watched Helmut Kohl deal with protests and so forth and recognize that Germany was a strong democracy. So you're always better off when you are helping to build strong democracies. And those people who stayed with Germany for the 45 years of the Cold War were making a bet on a democratic peace. Secondly, the importance of understanding where your friends and allies are coming from, no loyalty tests, no desires to make them declare publicly, really relying on the fact that you share not just interest but values. And in Europe in particular, we have some rebuilding to do around the ideas that we share, not just interest but values. We need some projects together. You know, I look at something like the social media issues and big tech. And I know that they're troubling for democracy. But whatever differences we might have about privacy, they pale in comparison to our difference with the Chinese about privacy. And so let's get back to understanding our interests and our values together and move forward together because I still believe, despite all the talk about Asia, and we have wonderful Asian allies, and that's very important too, Europe remains our most important strategic ally in being able to have a global policy that tries to support peace and prosperity and democratic values. And so spending some time really rekindling the relationship that sustained us through the Cold War and delivered this unification of Germany without a shot being fired. It's a project worth undertaking. So these have been powerful recollections. I and I'm sure all of our audience have found really helpful and provocative on behalf of John Meacham. I want to thank all of the panelists and turn this over to the new head of the U.S. Institute of Peace, Lee's Grande, to close out the session. Thank you. Thank you. All of our distinguished and exceptional speakers and panelists. It's been a real privilege to spend time today revisiting the important history and lessons of German reunification. The recording of this event and information about future events can be found on our website at usip.org. In closing, we would like to invite our audience to join us for a very special conversation we are hosting tomorrow called Passing the Baton, Securing America's Future Together, which will again feature Secretary Rice in a moderated discussion between Jake Sullivan, President Biden's National Security Advisor, and Ambassador Robert O'Brien, President Trump's National Security Advisor. The discussion will focus on the most critical foreign policy challenges facing the nation. Thank you for tuning in and for being part of USIP's efforts to prevent, mitigate, and resolve violent conflict around the world.