 Good morning. Welcome. It's nice of you all to come and for those of you that made just arrive. We've had some excitement this morning we had Anne Marie Slaughter from the Department of State and Don Steinberg from USAID Kick us off this morning by introducing the QDDR For those of you that have been reading the papers and following this at long last that document is finally emerged I think it's all together sort of fitting and proper for The rollout of that document to begin here if you remember at our last meeting of the USIP security sector reform working group we had Karen Hanna hand Who is the executive secretary of the QDDR process here to describe the process for us and today we had her boss Here to talk about the document itself We're also rather excited with the announcement made by our executive vice president this morning That the USSR initiative on security sector governance has now become a center Here at the Institute, and that's a step up that we've been working on for a long time Today we will look at the unique role which the European Union has played in security sector reform the EU conducted extensive SSR programs in preparing 21 countries for a session to EU membership the EU has also engaged in security sector transformation in peace and stability operations in Bosnia Kosovo and the Democratic Republic of Congo In these very different environments the EU reformed defense and interior ministries and trained operational police and military forces The EU accumulated in the process a very thick portfolio of experiences lessons learned and best practices The first question we're going to address this morning is Does the European Union by virtue of its experiences? It's historic linguistic and cultural affinity with many countries that its large pool of experienced and skilled personnel Have a comparative advantage over the United States in reforming security security sector institutions and training security forces in crisis states and in post-conflict environments This question arises because although the United States has provided Security assistance to a broad range of partner countries that engaged in extensive SSR programs in Iraq and Afghanistan its efforts have produced mixed results Certainly the European Union has real advantages in conducting SSR programs in the form of its parallel Institutions its cultural affinities and its personnel skills when you compare to the United States The United States for example has no national police force our department of the interior is responsible for national parks Not internal security our justice department does not run the court system Which is in another branch of government under the constitutional separation of powers Now this is not to suggest that the United States should abandon SSR to the Europeans But it does however raise a second question and that is what do we have to learn from the European Union in this area? To address these questions. We have a new USIP special report on the EU experience with security sector governance, which is on the table that side I had a copy, but I gave it away to Ann Marie Slaughter I don't for those of you that were there she said she couldn't bridge these two But she immediately engaged in a real argument with Hans, you know Defending the European Union, and so she's really quite expert about this and she took the paper and she said she was going to read it on On the train going back up to Princeton anyway So we have a brand-new special report on this topic. We have the reports author Alex Berg with us this morning You have the bios on the panelists And I will introduce them in the order in which we will speak Alex Berg is a Jenny's Randolph Peace Scholar at the United States Institute of Peace Hans Hubeck is a senior researcher in the Central African program at the Eggmont Royal Institute for International Relations in Brussels and Eva Gross is a senior research fellow at the Institute for European Studies at the Free University in Brussels and a visiting scholar at The Center for Transatlantic Relations at John Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. So we have a very distinguished panel We also have a bunch of people in the audience who know a lot about this topic as well So we'll start and then we'll open the floor for questions when the panelists have finished. Thanks very much Thank you all very much for coming and for for staying after this morning's interesting presentation and thank you to the US Institute of Peace for organizing the session for the opportunity to speak today and The the remarks I'm going to make are based on the paper that Bob just mentioned that I recently drafted And on looking at you experience with a certain aspect of security sector reform and governance The paper is based partly over research I conducted over the last year and a number of post-conflict and Stabilization context with an emphasis on looking at the political and governance aspects of of security sector reform and what the role of foreign Assistances and for this paper I looks I looked at the EU and other actors in my research for this paper I looked specifically at EU institutions and how they're set up and how they've managed some of these challenges some of these challenges the paper actually focuses on One very specific aspect of governance, which is oversight ministries, but some of the lessons I think are applicable more broadly so the the EU and one of things I looked at the EU actually has some real rich advantages as Bob mentioned the diversity of countries of traditions of legal cultures of languages of Experiences that can that can serve as a model For countries embarking on their own reforms. It has unique relationships with different countries But the diversity also and and the number of countries also creates a lot of challenges And how they've managed those is something I'm going to explore a little bit So what I want to do is first just give a very brief kind of overview of what institutions We're talking about and then go through some of these some of these challenges So just to make sure we're on the same page the EU is a very complex set of countries and institutions They're they're 27 member states. They're a whole number of institutions and agencies When we talk about their role in security sector reform and assistance overseas talking about two main institutions So just to be clear on what they are the first one is the European Council The council is actually the the main Decision-making body of the European Union. It's made up of the heads of states of the member states It has a rotating Presidency and it's a political body made up of Political heads of states, but the council also has a secretariat and is responsible for one of the three pillars of Of the EU which is the common foreign and security policy Which includes what's known as the common security and defense policy or the CSDP which I'll refer to a bunch of times The CSDP is basically the EU's capacity to respond to crisis environments So since 2003 I believe was the first mission in Bosnia They've fielded about 22 different missions that include both military and civilian personnel from the EU member states with the real focus on the civilian side establishing rule of law reforming security sector institutions Through secunded personnel that have advised and mentored personnel The the other main institution is the European Commission, which is which is the EU's main Executive body basically it manages policy and regulation and programs including the EU's development activities around the world So it has a broad portfolio of institution building and development programs around the world including a specific Mandate to do security sector reform activities with the focus primarily on the governance aspect So oversight ministries legislative oversight working with civil society just a sector Reform and so forth. So so that's more kind of the long-term Institution building development side whereas the CSDP is more the crisis response side But of course in many countries there they both operate There of course a number of other institutions the European Parliament being kind of them the main one But I'm going to focus on those two the other thing I should mention Which hopefully my co-panelists will go into a bit more is the Lisbon Treaty which makes a number of changes to the way These institutions are organized not going to mention them too much, but hopefully we'll we'll hear about some of that The other aspect of the EU that that I'm going to touch on quite a bit is the EU enlargement process And this is I think a very instructive Experience particularly with respect to security sector reform as you know The EU grew from initial about six members to current 27 and successive waves the biggest wave of which came in 2004 and 2007 when 12 countries of Eastern and Central Europe joined and and the process entailed some some major Institutional transformations including in the security sector the countries had to conform to the Aki community which is the set of rules and regulations by the EU and the EU member states had some particular interest in the security sector Which is that they wanted to make sure these new states could control the expanded borders and could cooperate on on law enforcement and security issues Especially in the wake of 9-11 So there were there were major reorganizations to the forces to their roles and responsibilities to oversight ministries To the way personnel were recruited and selected all of the aspects that we talk about in terms of security reform for sector reform In in a pretty comprehensive way and this process was managed primarily by the European Commission Which both managed the negotiation and then provided assistance So there's there's a lot to learn that the kind of transformation is is is pretty Unparalleled anywhere else except maybe by the transformation in the defense sectors This was mostly on the on the civilian law enforcement and border side at the same time the defense sectors were being transformed in the same country through the NATO accession process so I think there are a lot of lessons here both what they did well and some of the challenges and And some of these are actually applicable to other contexts like post-conflict and stabilization I don't want to overstate the parallels because there's some very unique features of the EU enlargement process Particularly the carrot of the EU reform which created a huge incentive and also the level of capacity in the countries But some of the same basic issues. They're still struggling with so what I what I'm going to do is highlight about four of these challenges Which which I see is kind of fundamental challenge to addressing security sector governance issues and Talk about what the EU has Has done what the how the enlargement process worked and what how they've been trying to deal with them in in post-conflict and Stabilization context and hopefully my colleagues will actually talk a little bit more about how these have played out on the ground So there the the the four kind of Challenges that I look at the first one is is defining a clear structure Envision for the security sector for the sector as a whole or for the particular institution that you're trying to deal with This is one of the main lessons from the EU enlargement process The EU had a set of requirements and benchmarks that they had to meet But each country was left up was left to design its own structure Division of roles what sets of authority and so what you had was a was a structure that was developed and owned by the officials in the country and With the EU sort of monitoring and providing benchmarks for moving forward with it and one of the clear lessons Was that assistance provided by the EC was much more effective once those kinds of basic issues were defined Then before and so then you could develop the appropriate policies and training But before you did that it didn't have as much impact and in post-conflict countries This is this is a major issue the level of capacity lack of experience in doing this kind of work competing political interests But donors will come in anyway Analyze what they think the problems are what their visions are for a form And those might often compete with local priorities and create a whole host of problems and and the EU for you know one example and maybe perhaps Eva Gross will talk a bit about this in is in Afghanistan Where the EU and the US had very different visions for what the police force should look like whether it should be counter insurgency or More civilian community oriented policing and that really delayed the whole process of building up police force for a long time In the absence of a clear model advisors will come in and without sort of a clear structure. They'll fall back on whatever Experience they had from their countries So in Kosovo for example, you had different officers from different countries Providing conflict conflicting advice everything had a contract conduct patrols and write up a crime scene report to and how much oversight the ministry the minister should have over the forces and Introducing different laws different databases which has created a whole host of problems and it really undermines the credibility of all the assistance That's provided when you get that kind of situation So what are some of the things that have been done? The EU is actually experimented in interesting ways One is to try to get a clear sense of in the mandate before you go in the CSDP emissions negotiate a Mandate with the host country generally And so there's some ideas of trying to get a clear structure within that or at least some benchmarks to process for achieving it As the the mission deploys another is to support strategic planning processes as part of the mission The EU is involved in this in Afghanistan for example And I think it's been helpful in terms of getting everybody on the same page Within the ministry is within the police and so forth. So those are just a couple of things to deal with that the second area I want to highlight which is a big one is Finding and deploying the right personnel and Emory Slaughter. I think Raised this issue in terms of bolstering US civilian capacity The US has gotten gradually better at getting people but as Bob mentioned US has some major challenges our law enforcement forces are decentralized We don't have national level ministries We've gotten better at getting police officers out But there have been some real gaps especially on the law enforcement side in the civilian administration Management policy issues that are really critical to the governance aspects the EU on the other hand has 27 states with many different ministries different structures Languages that may be more or less relevant to the to the countries. They're they're operating in a wealth of experience to tap into But there are a few lessons I think additional to that from the EU enlargement experience that are worth highlighting One is that the you know getting the right skills is important But it's just not it's not just the the technical skills Experts need to know how to mentor and advise and train they need to understand the context So preparation and training beforehand is important Another one is that they need to be there for a sufficient amount of time There are many examples of people rotating in for six months by the time they get up to speed on what's what's happening in the country It's time to leave and the next person has to start over So a lot of the evaluations suggest at least a year and preferably more than two years for people working in those contexts And then a third lesson is is the ability to facilitate longer term relationships between individuals and institutions an Interesting experience in the enlargement was a twinning program where the the European Commission funded their partnerships between Institutions and like training academies ministries in member states with those in candidate countries And they sent kind of series of advisors and when when those worked well You could get these sort of longer term relationships for forming or after they went home They could pick up the phone and and get continuing advice So having officials to work with rather than they're just only private contractors can can make a big difference Now how so how are these lessons applied in in other kinds of contexts? Well, the Commission has actually tried to do this this sort of model and contracting directly with institutions Outside of candidate countries in a few cases and that's actually something the US might explore in our relationships with state and local governments For example, it's interesting model another is the CSDP missions which have spent most of their effort on Building capacity to recruit the right kinds of personnel So they've done the the council secretariat which is managing these things They've developed what's called the civilian headline goals and spent a lot of time analyzing missions developing scenarios Identifying the right skills for different kinds of missions actually writing up job descriptions having them in their database So that then as soon as there's a mission they can go out and get these people quickly They've also just started to develop some training programs. Although that that's that's still in its infancy, I think But of course it's still been a challenge to get people that the challenge with the EU is that they have to rely on the Member states to actually bring these people some member states have really well organized to do this Some are still having trouble And there's just a limited supply of experts the best people are valued by their own institutions So don't want to get let up people don't want to serve in insecure environments and so forth So the EU has really been exploring how to work with member states to overcome these problems And that's something again that we could look to in in terms of how we do this The US has I think advanced in this area the Department of Defense has been mobilizing civilians through the MOTA program But we could I think we could learn a little bit from from some of that So the third area that I want to highlight is what I call managing political Obstacles or managing organizational change if you have the best people The right mandate you're especially in post-conflict environments Security sector reform as we know is a highly political process. It's highly contested You're you're dealing with With power relationships and that that could be jeopardized And so they're always political obstacles in any process of reform, especially this one The EU enlargement experience was kind of unique in that you had this amazing carrot of EU membership But it wasn't just having that carrot it was how they managed it and I think there's some interesting lessons there as well One is that they had very clear benchmarks. There were annual plans There was ongoing monitoring that helped keep focus not only on the overall principles, but really specific issues And when there were problems the the commission kind of functioned as this focal point That would raise issues rated raise them to the council and the member states and then they could get involved in the diplomatic Level to follow up and make sure these things were happening Really this linkage between the technical level and the political level that underlie I think what was talked about this morning in terms of the qtdr, which has been a major gap in a lot of these programs Um, but even without the carrot of EU membership There are ways to use some of these same principles if you have a peace agreement or a constitution or better yet A strategic plan you can use that in in terms of developing specific benchmarks The cstp by having people on the ground monitoring the head of mission can actually Play that role work directly with met with with counterpart ministers raise issues to the To the political level with with member states But another approach to doing this which the EU did not focus on as much in the enlargement process Which was really a top down is to look at the broader constituencies in a country for these kinds of reforms Um, the commission does work with civil society with legislators With with political parties and especially when there isn't that kind of top-down pressure That political support is often crucial to to get things done, but we'd often don't You know much like our programs here where usa id might engage with these groups and do the state department is doing the technical stuff Those linkages aren't there If they were that could actually help move these things forward over time and enhance sustainability Of course that requires coordination and that's the last point that I that I want to highlight Dealing with the political obstacles the technical obstacles requires a high amount of coordination And this has been actually really a real challenge for the EU One between the various member states When they're on the same page things work work really well an example that is often highlighted is Is georgia where you had a really unified EU there were some problems at the technical level in terms of getting through some of the reforms And they were able to work through those Kosovo is probably the opposite end of the extreme where not all the member states agree on the sovereignty of Kosovo And that's really created all kinds of problems for the mission in being able to engage with different institutions And even when you have the member states agreeing you've had major issues between the the commission Sort of long-term development approach and the the csdp crisis response missions Where where it works really well The the advisors can highlight issues raise them for the commission the commission can design long-term programs to deal with them And that's actually been very complimentary in other places like the democratic republic of congo You had two different programs with separate reporting structures not talking to each other at all Which which was a major problem So and and then of course even with if the u is is In the same on the same page. You've got other donors as I mentioned issues in afghanistan and kosovo and other places So there are ways to deal with this of course One is to really address this issue of coordination and cohesion between longer and shorter term approaches We heard about some of that this morning And another is is is collaboration between different donors the us and the u in this case Join assessments combine benchmarks combine evaluation and indicators steering committees bringing different groups There are lots of ideas out there Which unfortunately take a lot of work and a lot of effort and a lot of preparation and those are the kinds of things that I think could be explored The one just the last point that i'll just mention quickly Is that the u in large in process was embedded in this much broader Administrative reforms the reforms to the civil service to how you hire and approve people And that made a huge difference in terms of the ability to do things in the security sector That's a major issue for post-conflict states. And so looking at these really broader issues of civil service reform and salaries and pay scales Um, those are kinds of discussions that that need to happen as well So i'm i'm going to sort of leave it at that. I highlighted, um, I think four areas In terms of defining a clear structure mobilizing the right personnel Managing political obstacles and donor coordination. Um, and hopefully some of my colleagues will address how some of these things have played out in practice And i'll just leave with with two sort of final Points that I think summarize this one is that in terms of approaching this us does need to focus more on the governance and political aspects And and how to manage these things and there are some really interesting lessons From the eu and at both the enlargement and crisis context in terms of how they've done that Well, or not so well and the second one is there are a ton of opportunities for cooperation That would really have a big impact on the ground and hopefully we can talk about some of those So I will leave the rest to my colleagues. Thanks very much hans Good morning. Thank you The eu and ssr It's a very interesting topic and it's got me thinking as well because i'm mainly working on on african issues My my daily research is let's say on the great lakes region And specifically on Security sector reform in the drc where the european union is a is a strong actor But I look at it from a geographical perspective and not really let's say as in As an institutional analyst on what the eu is doing or how the eu is doing things So it got me thinking these last two weeks three weeks since I was invited And I think that some of the things I will say are probably a little bit provocative And I must also warn you that i'm not necessarily an optimist But working for 10 15 years on central africa does not really induce a lot of optimism in the capacities of the international community Let alone the european union in getting its act together in Post-conflict reconstruction and in security sector reform in in particular Now as was asked I will start with a few broader comments on on the european union Again, i'm not an expert on the european union as european union as such but living in brussels Within and between eu officials Almost on a daily basis. Of course you you here and see a lot of stuff And wiki leaks should probably try to find someone in the eu to To put some interesting stuff on the on the net that it could could could create some interesting debate as well Um, I think a lot of what what alex said describes quite well the challenges and issues of the eu pre lisbon post lisbon And specifically again for this exercise. I met a lot of people I talked to a number of diplomats also last week What is going to happen? Well, nobody knows Um, it is one big Especially the setup of the european external action service It should be at the heart of what the eu is going to do as an external actor It should take the lead and it should overcome the issues of at least to a large degree of coordination and coherence Between commission and council Um But so far nobody really knows what is going to happen people are still taking Their offices moving into new offices moving into new structures And the european external action service itself is still finding its place within the institutions of the eu And also amongst the member states One of the big questions here and one of the big uncertainties is Is the external action service going to become the first ministry of foreign affairs of the european union or will it just be the 28th Ministry of foreign affairs of the eu So far Indications and frustrations of a lot of people working in Brussels point to the ladder The external action service is not going to be the premier player of the eu Or of europe let's say in peace and security issues Disposition remaining very clearly with a few key member states, which brings me to the missions There's one clear thing you can say about any mission be it's a brilliant or military that european union engages engages itself into um You need alignment between at least three countries the rest can join but you need alignment between The front the french the uk and germany If these three do not agree on the needs to have a mission there is no debate There's not going to be discussion So that's how decision-making within the eu currently functions And this is also why a number of missions are being undertaken Now why a number of missions are not going to be undertaken so be it civilian or military missions And then the external action service is not going to be able to overcome this issue Of course, it's going to be very well embedded in this foreign policy by france the uk and germany Now if there's one structural thing you can say about EU engagement and crisis or post-conflict intervention I think you have to make a distinction in the way between cosovo and the rest of the world cosovo being geographically in europe In future probably going to become a part of the eu at least that is one of the big carrots that is always presented to to cosovo And to the to the entire region so cosovo is a specific issue as a specific Interest for the european union to deal in but in other areas the eu has one Common element that is it is Very risk averse We do not want to take risks We have very short missions with mission statements that are relatively Unspecified or very specified to avoid any specific risk and everything is very much oriented towards feasible exit strategy Which in a way is understandable. We have a very young institution, which is still trying to build this legitimacy So you cannot have failures Look at our military missions for example in the drc the mission in Ituri in 2003 was very short about three months very clear very Exact mandate. It was a very important mission. I think it has been Criticized a lot for unjust reasons, but it was a very Low-risk mission as such And the same is for the the other missions in in kongo that that followed also for the civilian missions as such I'll talk a bit more on the kongo later The member states and I want to go into a number of of of of elements that alex mentioned not necessarily in in in a chronological order, but Yes, we have diverse Experiences. Yes, we have a very rich Cultural organizational structural Legal whatever framework of the different EU countries that can be an advantage in in security sector reform But I would not overestimate that either It is very difficult to send policemen for example Everybody wants to give the policemen at home If you go to the minister of the interior in any EU country, they will say well, you know, we have this insecurity. Why should we send Policemen to afghanistan. Why should we send them to kongo or what have you? So these engagements are always relatively short term and there is very little There are very little incentives for Governments and ministers of the interior, let's say to to deal and the same goes with justice sector All our justice or legal systems are under strain. It is very hard to find countries that are willing to send Acting judges and experts to To other countries again Kosovo Given the scale and given the political importance is is is a bit of a difference I would also on on the issue of police, perhaps one caveat Those countries that have a gendarmerie force like italy like france like the netherlands spain Paramilitary units, it's easier to send them out. They are constituted as Organizations that go to That can be deployed and they have a deployable vocation as such But then you come again with a conceptual issue and a conceptual problem There is no conceptual union in the EU on what to do with police reform In post-compact countries Looking at kongo looking at burundi A number of EU countries are proposing community policing Whereas a number of other countries are doing crowd control and then what have you And sometimes these these conflicts run right through EU police missions as is very much the case in the EU mission in in the drc Where belgium for instance was very much in favor of community policing and the french were very much engaged and actually did Quite a lot of training bilaterally That is of kongolese crowd control Units together with the angolians for that matter So Yes, there is a very rich experience. There is a very rich Field of activity of EU countries and of EU institutions as such But there is very little coherence. There is very also very little incentive to get more coherence at least in the short and medium term Now looking a bit more to to africa Which is in a way you could say a laboratory laboratory for the EU's external action service And especially the drc Where the EU got increasingly engaged since 2000 When you saw the first shifts, let's say in the in the conflict The EU was the main supportive structure for the transition government It's spent since 2003 about a billion euros in In the drc and it has deployed two military missions Artemis that I already mentioned in 2003 And you for kinshasa in 2006 And I would say that Given the EU's involvement in security sector reform There has been one moment where you saw an interesting coordination and coherence in the EU's action in the field And that was exactly at the start of the kongolese transition When the european commission trained a thousand strong police unit in kinshasa Following that mission the council sent the Initial Upol mission that was an advisory mission and the follow-up mission for the trained unit by the by the commission But following the the end of the transition period this police unit was immediately disbanded by the new kongolese government And the police mission for for a year a year and a half was basically left without a concrete mission as such It developed slowly into a strategic advisory mission on Police reform and actually it's doing relatively well Relatively in the shade, but also for functioning with the only kongolese institution in the security sector that seems to get some some progress and I say some progress with the you should say some and That is the important thing here Now In almost the same period in 2005 So when the police mission was deployed the EU broadened its engagement and sent the usek mission Which is a mission composed by military officers, but it is a civilian mission as such As a strategic advisory mission on security sector reform for the kongolese army Now usek took a lot of time several months to put itself in place Once it was in place a transition in kongol was over and you had a completely different relationship between The international community and especially the european union and this kongolese government This kongolese government at that point did no longer want or was not longer interested in having strategic advice Or foreigners telling them what to do with the security sector, which from 2006 to today is one of the main causes of Why you do not get any form of progress in Security sector reform in kongol. They do not want to you when but they certainly do not want the EU So this mission has been looking for an identity since and it has found some cause or some goals In working on a number of technical issues, which are important, but which And which had some let's say strategic value, but which have Which remain very fragile And where you have no strategic willingness of the kongolese government to go through with these With these changes the most important of which is the setting up of a chain of payment system And a kind of an identification system for kongolese soldiers Basically after the transition there were about 300 000 kongolese troops of which about 150 000 existed in reality And of which about 25 000 received actual salary the rest Of this huge mass of salary that left the national bank every month Was kept in the pockets of the high command of the kongolese armed groups and armed forces Um, so dealing with this huge problem of corruption Which is also one of the reasons why this army is looting and and pillaging parts of the country where it is deployed Is an important mission. It has been stated as a success so far people on the grounds Tend to see it differently. You have identification yes You have the setting up of a chain of payment system. Yes In the number of in the number of areas it is But the implementation as such on a daily or monthly basis remains incredibly weak Again, the problem of commitment and that brings me to let's say an overarching thing. Yes, you have Uh, technical involvement daily through upol through uh, usag insecurity sector reform in kongol And a relatively important financial investment in the field of development by the european commission But you have little to no political clouds associated to this The eu is not capable of acting as one political voice in kongol in dealing with this kongolese government So yes, you have a number of advantages in setting up this kind of missions And yes, you have a number of countries that can bring expertise experience that is Well defined for the kongol, but you do not have a political face of the european union That can hammer down the message One of the reasons for this is Okay, the attitude of the kongolese government. I mean, it's not easy for the uan to get a dialogue with this government going But it is also the eu member states themselves who make it complicated It is very clear for the kongolese government that belgium france The uk and a number of other countries are not on the same line in what they want to do in the kongol Have their own political process and those political processes those bilateral processes weigh much more than what the eu can bring to the table So eu countries in a way are undercutting The eu's collective role in in this country and it is not only in kongol that you see this that you see this problem So you still have and you will continue to have Ashton and her servers are not going to change this you will continue to have This kind of quabbling and this kind of lack of unity in the eu's external actions Yeah, we could perhaps in q&a talk a bit more on kongol and on those issues But there are a few other missions that I just want to mention that are also quite relevant and quite interesting And that also underscored the risk of earners averseness of the european union The mission in guineby south, for example um Which was launched in 2008 if i'm not mistaken um Got more or less operational in the course of 2009 But when political crisis struck guineby south, which was hardly a big surprise The eu immediately cut it cut its losses and left the country The mandate was cut short and the last eu official left guineby south in September of this year Much to the dismay in private of the un who is now taking over this whole ssr agenda But we have an eu that committed itself that Did write some legislation for the guineby south security services But as such did not have the staying power to to do something real in in guineby south Um, but of course if you look at eu official documents You will see that the guineby south mission was as all es eu foreign missions a huge success again because we wrote this legislation Um, and then there is somalia with the eu training mission for somali troops or the transitional government Which is um an important mission Much more important than the atalanta mission the fighting piracy for the coast of Of somalia this is actually trying to to to give this transitional government that we all say to to support some means to To to exist but sadly This mission is we we train so far we trained about 2000 Somali troops in Uganda Using mainly Ugandan trainers Supported by the eu But the troops that leave this camp end up in Mogadishu without any kind of support structure whatsoever So a large part of those have already found their way to al-jabab Where they have payment where they have a structure and where they Have a future which is not the case of this transitional government Again, the mission itself is seen as a success, but it is for the moment rather contra productive to train those troops at the EU peace mission is currently fighting in Mogadishu Again, this is not a strictly SSR mission. This is mainly capacity building Of a government in need of troops But there was a recent Chatham house conference where you can read the report is online. It's it's about a month ago Well some suggestions are made and that the eu should put in place an antenna in Mogadishu to to Take care of the second batch of troops that are going to be trained or that they are planned to be trained in the coming In the coming months So let's say these are a few comments that I wanted to make mainly focusing on on Africa And I'm looking forward to the debate. Thank you. Thanks very much and now Eva. Can I stay seated? Or It's up to you. Sure. It's easier. It's easier for the camera to see you if you're if you speak from the podium Okay, I know it's it's wonderful. It's our chance to be a star. Okay. It's just that it's fiddled across, you know, five different notebooks Anyways, well, first of all, thanks very much for the invitation And I've spent the past semester here in Washington over at size and I've attended quite a few of your meetings including the last report on security sector reforms It's kind of a pleasure to be able to contribute something to the debates myself and My work normally focuses on eu crisis management and the common security and defense policy including the sort of internal machinery of the eu And I've been looking in terms of the mission specifically on you paul afghanistan, which I followed pretty much From the moment of its inception and creation have visited several times to actually see how it's going so I've been asked to Make some comments on on how the eu and what the eu is doing in in afghanistan And so this this is what i'm hoping to do in the next 10 to 15 minutes And I would like to suggest that When we evaluate i'm going to sidestep the success or failure issue. I don't think that's the most perhaps helpful terminology, but if we For an evaluation of an eu mission any type of mission, whether that's in afghanistan or elsewhere I think there's three lenses we can Employ to do that one is the internal eu setup the coherence coordination Running Of of the deployment and implementation of the mission The second is how the eu interacts with partners in the field and in afghanistan, obviously that's the united states most of all And nato second and actually alex when you were Mentioning enlargement and the eu's impact of security on security sector reform there was sort of reminded that You know, don't forget the role of nato in that as well. I mean there was a real sort of lock step where these Now member states first started as nato members And kick started there A security sector reform efforts and then we're handed over to the use of an interesting parallel To how we might look at what's happening in afghanistan as well and the third Lens I would suggest is then to look at the sort of achievements an impact the eu had on a particular conflict Or a theater of operation. So so this is how I'll structure my my remarks so internally Well, first of all also a quick quick remark on security sector reform in general and security sector reform In afghanistan in particular. I think we we should be a little bit careful about What we mean by security sector reform because I mean originally I think it's a it's a holistic concept I mean also looking at oversight and of course the security sector is more than just the police or the army But often eu mission or other missions focus on One sector in particular and we quick to you know, call that security sector reform But really we're just looking at one one aspect of it In afghanistan, I think Specifically the security sector reform has been made very difficult for for all actors involved not just on the Sort of missing governance dimension, but also because security sector reform back in 2002 was A fragmented institutionally with the lead nation model, you know with the u.s. Took on army reform Germany police italy justice Japan ddr in the uk narcotics and of course not all lead nations Extended the same sort of resources to their individual sectors. I mean, I'll save myself the jokes on certain Certain certain countries but but so you see that when when efforts were made to actually bring these different sectors together We were looking at very very different starting points in an escalating conflict situation that suddenly put a much larger emphasis on security rather than Merely institution building. So that's as a bit of a background on on On afghanistan and where the eu came in just to to to be a bit fair Now the eu as alex has has outlined is you know, some of several parts which have now sort of It's been an attempt to merge them through the lispin treaty But basically in afghanistan and elsewhere you have the european commission, which is mainly the financial arm of eu assistance development Development assistance underwriting certain crisis management operation For example paying police and justice salaries, etc. And then also an operation component Through europeal afghanistan in the case of afghanistan, but we've also heard From from congo. Now it's interesting to note the improvements through the lispin treaty because Up until earlier this year. You actually had three eu offices in kabo The eu police mission Which is housed next to the german police project office. So there you have the sort of member states coherence point that Hans made which hasn't quite been sorted out But then there was also a commission delegation and the office of the eu special representative So basically three addresses for afghan interlocutors to to talk to clearly not not not very coherent not very consolidated But as a result of the lispin treaty at least the commission And the eu special representative office have been merged in in one location And under one sort of line of command up to an academy ashton and I think that sort of Help consolidate the eu's presence In the field where they still work to be done is on the link between The field where things as usual You know get sorted out because they have to And and the masters in brussels, but also the interaction with other Interlocutors elsewhere and there you have When it comes to you pull afghanistan the challenge that The head of mission answers to the civilian planning and conduct capability in brussels Who who answers to the political insecurity committee the the ambassadors who Exercise strategic controls now the political arm of the eu the eu special representative Who is now also the head of delegation in the mandate is supposed to give political guidance But he's not really in the chain of command So you have in brussels a sort of bureaucratic competition of who's speaking for human who can impact mandate mission activities Etc and that continues to be A bit of a challenge even though They're not only two people in Kabul delivering Political and operational messages and that's the head of mission of you paul and the eu special representative. So in that sense We've seen a slight improvement Where we have not seen a large improvement is the the perennial issue of getting staff boots Policemen on the ground. I mean when you paul was founded in 2007 Member states were quick to realize that the mission ought to be a little bit bigger than than initially planned for and committed to 400 Policemen But in reality we're still just under 300 and that's you know three years after the launch of the mission So that's not such a A success story really even though I would argue the mission has become a lot more targeted than it was in the beginning I think from but that's an inherent problem with eu missions. I mean when member states promise a certain number of Of staff and personnel, you know, there's no penalties if they don't deliver them And it makes it difficult to plan for mission if you think you're getting 400, you know, obviously you sort of planning for different activities and programs then You know not knowing that actually what you're getting is is 200 and then sort of 50 extra ones trickling in Over time so so so that's still a real challenge And I think as the previous speaker noted if at the same time they use launching a mission in Kosovo Then you know if you have a chance as a police officer Whether you're going to the Balkans where you can fly home for the weekends or whether you're actually going to Afghanistan where Where things are not so safe then It's sort of a no-brainer for many so we've had a real staffing issue there Which which you Paul still still trying to to address now on the The transatlantic EU NATO relationship and EU US relationship. I think we've also seen some improvements, but there have been also significant challenges one Because of the institutional blockage in the EU NATO relationship at the Berlin plus agreement is only relevant for military operation In the absence of a formal agreement, you pull actually couldn't deploy in the regions or in the individual PRTs Provincially construction teams without bilateral agreements with the individual lead nations So for a long time You Paul staff was sort of stuck in Kabul Rather than being able to to go out in the provinces It's now been able to do that not uniformly But but just just as an illustration for how how sort of a missing EU NATO agreement to slow down The mission overall And in terms of the EU and the US cooperation, I think what's interesting with you pull Afghanistan And I don't think that's necessarily the case with other mission Is that you pull Afghanistan came about in no small part due to us Pressures or suggestions for the EU to use its crisis management tools in Afghanistan So that's different from the Balkans where the EU internally felt the need to do something in Afghanistan You have a sort of different scenarios So but despite this sort of us pressure once the mission was launched. I think there was a sense of Yeah, well disappointment and perhaps also annoyance that the EU couldn't do more couldn't launch a bigger mission And wasn't really interested in doing the sort of security relevant Training that the US at that time had already Adopted and of course, don't forget that there was sort of a huge resource gap between EU And and US commitments to police reform So so apart from the sort of focus on basic training on the part of the US and the sort of focus on Mid and high level reform and sort of reform of the minister interior You also had a significant discrepancy in the sort of money the US and the EU Had to spend Now that again over the course of three years I think we've seen a real change in in attitude And in increasing mutual understanding of what the EU is and is not capable of And on the part of the US You know why what the EU is doing nevertheless provides value added. So over the past three years you had to sort of You know in meetings I've had in Kabul, but also Brussels sort of Misunderstanding a bit sort of An attitude that I mean why aren't they doing more and why aren't they not doing what we think is important To sort of realization that the sort of long-term civilian approach that the EU's adopted That goes beyond the Life cycle of the conflict itself but sort of hopes to build sustainable policing, arrangements, transparency In the ministries is actually On its own in itself A good a good thing Meanwhile also you poll has adjusted its operational mandate to include Civilian training which initially wasn't wasn't really the case. So you see a sort of convergence In approaches or sort of a more of an effort to sort of fit you poll into the the broader EU and and NATO efforts Going back to the sort of internal cohesion Issue and and the money again so the different operating budgets Because the commission is the one that Pays for all of this. I mean Civilian missions are played out of the police budgets the commission budget. Sorry You poll doesn't actually have its own operating mandate Budget that that stays with the commission. So you also have a situation where you poll at on its own as a mission doesn't have much to offer by way of You know inducing Their local counterparts to behave a certain way or not. So this this issue of conditionality that we mentioned Beforehand comes into play there as well, but the commission again is making efforts to To make money available For for the mission as well in order for for you poll to have a sort of operating budget as well So so that's for the for the transatlantic dimension, which I would argue again. It's it's getting Better I think expectations have been adjusted to what the respective partners can actually be doing together jointly separately But when we come to the achievement of the mission itself Yeah, okay. Well, we're everyone reads the paper. It's not not looking terribly good But I think this is something that came up in the previous two Presentations as well. I mean the approach that you takes it's With exception, of course, so with which has a An executive or partly executive mandate EU missions are Monitoring mentoring and advising missions. I mean personal is not there to actually make the rest themselves or force government to adopt a certain Way of doing things so You poll like every other EU mission is dependent on the host government To actually move reforms forward and I think that's also one of the Positive aspects of how you poll has developed Because the the last afghan minister of the interior actually made Made a plan or sort of outline of what he wanted you poll to accomplish which helped the mission in term Sort of adjusted mandate and and the focus of its work accordingly So but again, but without that counterpart in the ministry, you know, you can launch a mission worth 2000 people If the advice doesn't Stick then You you're sort of not going to get very far So so because that relationship has has improved between the ministry And you poll I think we can look at sort of more achievements a better achievements And and a more positive Bottom line I think this increasingly Constructive transatlantic relationship is also an achievement or you could count it as an achievement. I think here also Individual personalities have gone some way to To to move you poll in the u.s Mission and NATO mission closer together. I mean initially you had really weak leadership on the part of you poll Lack of understanding on the part of the u.s. And NATO and that's sort of Also because of the sort of people that were on the ground Got got fixed a little bit And just to To conclude. I mean, I don't think we should Measure you poll against the state of the afghan security sector On the whole. I mean there's much to be done that you poll on its own I mean it really be unrealistic to expect To expect it to to do that But if you just look at the sort of smaller Instances of the individual ministries The focus on the link between police and justice reform But also the sort of long-term civilian training. I think we ought to give few polls some credit despite all the The the criticism that that was rightfully made and as an extension I think also eu civilian crisis management as a whole because I think afghanistan sort of signifies the most Well, one of the most challenging missions the u has engaged in both in terms of international interactions and also the conflict cycle Thank you. Thank you very much. I want to Express appreciation to the panel for three really excellent presentations Great analysis Considerable honesty and some provocative thoughts on I want to invite the audience now to To raise questions. We have microphones on either side I'd ask those of you that want to raise questions to come to the microphones When you get there and you ask your question, please identify yourself by name and agency all this is being done because all this is being recorded and Folks watching on The internet want to hear what you have to say In the while people are moving to the microphones. I want to ask you a question um I want to continue this debate that was going on earlier between anmarie slaughter and hans With anmarie arguing the conventional wisdom That she said her husband came up with which was that the us does the best job with a military and the eu does the best job on the civilian side And hans was arguing that and he necessarily so Um, so i'm going to ask hans to lead and then ask the two other panelists to comment on whether or not The eu in fact does have a clear advantage on the civilian side or whether the us You know might not have some strengths that aren't immediately obvious So let's see start with you Okay, thank you. Um Actually what I reacted strongly on was that the us is a military power and the eu is civilian power And I said the eu is civilian. Yes, but the power that's something else Um, and we are certainly not a military power that I also want to make clear No, the eu likes to sell itself and likes to see itself It's important for our self image as an institution And it is the mainstay of the eu's capabilities to have to build civilian capabilities in post-conflict reconstruction and crisis management But still as is clear, I think also from evas presentation mine and then that of alex The the but I'll let them of course speak for themselves, but The road ahead is still very long And are we moving forward in in a certain way yes And the european external election service Should in turn provide better coherence better coordination But we should have willingness of the key member states to really engage in working under the european flag and stop Playing or all or small nitty-gritty politics in those countries or those areas that we consider of interest If ever the eu wants to be a political actor to which the kongolese governments and the afghan government and other governments in the world are going to To listen to advice and we're going to have some influence and we have to work together And that's also one of the lessons of the the financial and other crises, but you see that the eu's at this point is having a serious problem of Finding it finding its identity finding its its place in the world as as a political union And then that's something that's going to take at least another decade to settle So no yep more civilian than military absolutely, but the power it certainly is not It should become once I hope Eva what you yeah, thanks I think I'm going to take a slightly different I think it's not per se that the us is a military power and we are just Better at civilian reconstruction or crisis management or security sector reform whatever you want to call it It's just we've done it longer I mean we have by now if you just look at csdp a ten year track record of Of doing these sort of missions with all the Wards and all But we can look at a sort of a key of what needs to be done. What I find interesting looking at what the Yeah, okay, but we are what we're missing the missing dimension that that That we don't have to deal with is the role of the military either as an Interfering agency or condoning agency or blocking agency or whatever And and we don't also have the the role of congress that may or may not Fund activity so the EU in a way is in a better position to to decide on these things because we we know what budget we have and and that there's less of a sort of overlay on the part of the military in the in the case of the the united states So I don't I wouldn't see As darkly what I find really interesting looking at the US side of things and your efforts to sort of build a civilian capabilities is that You know the issues you're running into are very similar to what what we've been facing and what we are still facing And that's finding the right personnel training it deploying it in time to the right to the right missions paying for them I'm Getting bureaucracies to release that staff so that they can go abroad so I think they'll we'll probably see a lot a lot of similarities and Once once your efforts get get underway a bit more, but I wouldn't necessarily say That you know the sort of mars venus dichotomy necessarily Holds here because I mean I think what we've also heard this morning is the sort of threats that we're facing are increasingly calling for civilian responses, but the military playing and An auxiliary role, but you know we need development and and civilian capabilities more so than Okay, thanks very much. I'll I'll ask you to ask your question and then we'll ask Alex who knows everything about everything to respond about Hello, I'm Elaine Sorreo. I'm a franklin fellow at the department of state and Thank you very much for this wonderful presentation I I actually have a question that relates directly just to some of what you were just answering But it's but I'd like a little more specifics everyone has already spoken About the the dynamics of the eu there being all diverse A very rich as you have said Mr A little bit very rich experience and yet there's very little Cohesion and coordination And it's not it's not for lack of the experience. It's just for lack of pulling it all together So that you could have an effective result For all the efforts that are being made and the expense for that's being made, you know, we will we It's no denying that everyone is putting forth a lot The question is are you getting the results for your efforts? And How do you seek in a very concrete way some very specifics of what can be done besides saying Well, they need to coordinate better We recognize that what what specifically could be done to accomplish the coordination There are specific guidelines Do you have any specific thoughts and that would be for everyone really on how to accomplish it In other words, what would be the action plan for getting it done versus saying it needs to be done. Thank you. Thank you Alex you start sure Just I think You know, I think you start off by summarizing kind of the the the mixed picture In terms of Bob's first question between what the eu's advantages and sort of challenges are that you do have this This real diversity of experience that the eu has done has put a lot in place in terms of being able to mobilize civilian capacity and done it But you do have these problems in that it's 27 different countries and and the decision making process is is complex And you've got different institutions and they're still working through How to do that? I mean the u.s. Actually has a has a real advantage here in that the u.s. Does have a more cohesive kind of political system and still still some challenges that that We heard about this morning But you do have a chief of mission that can kind of play the political part Whereas the eu is still struggling between these different countries So You know, so so how do you try to deal with it on on the eu side? The lisbon treaty and it has a number of very specific provisions actually is is really a lot of it is really focused on On that specific issue It creates the external action service that brings together People from both the council and from the commission It calls for for more coordination on the planning and deployment of the missions One of the interesting innovations is that it creates a the EU ambassador position Who's now the sort of supposed to be I think the combined head of delegation Would be nominated from a member state which would kind of increase The their ability to sort of bring the member states relationships to bear On on the on the relationship with the country. So there are a number of innovations there I mean, I think that you know the the bottom line is that the The key is is to really integrate these two structures together the council and the commission At the planning at the deployment at the reporting stage And and create more unified chains of command And I think that's been the real real challenge that you have these two different structures and how do you bring them together? That's what the That's what they're grappling right now with the lisbon treaty And then the second piece is is on the grounds and on the ground There's a number of things you can do including trying to have a unified chain of command at the field level Which is exactly what the u.s. Is trying to do with bringing everything under the the chief of mission authority But there's also lots of more, you know, really kind of nitty gritty things like, you know coming up with with strategies and benchmarks and Evaluation mechanisms and all those things that really go into the at the detailed level But I would argue are critical. So I think there are a bunch of different levels here Let's take a question over here and then Hans can reply to everything that's been said go ahead Thank you very much. Lawrence smallman rand part of me wants to respond the idea of america as a military power in europe as a civilian power Your accent's giving you away But perhaps it doesn't actually because um Let's be provocative then To what extent the liberal sensitivities of europe Affect its ability to be effective in for example, africa and of course what i'm talking about are the post imperial guilt complexes and aspirations for Mirror image societies around the world that we wish to aspire to equality for women in afghanistan or anywhere else Whilst they're all being killed because there's a counterinsurgency. So what's hampering the eu or is there a better way of doing something? Thanks very much. Good question hans Thank you very much for this You asked for it Time for lunch Five minutes um, let me start with the first and I think they're they're both Basically the same the same answer as as regards the eu They're the the main question is a strategic and political question Does the eu as a political and strategic entity exists? Is there an eu interest in the world? In in in a certain sense. Yes, but in a practical sense. No How should we enhance it? Well It is a very very long process in the cold war. It was easy. We had western europe and there was a soviet union and Blah blah so we had to stick together now We have eastern europe and we still for example are not capable As an eu to define a position towards turkey Should turkey become a member of the eu or not? Basically, we decided not Or the french decided not And so it's not going to happen so We are not even able to establish a strategic position To our closest neighbors the same goes with russia. We have this kind of a strategic dialogue or what have you strategic partnership There's a few partnership and not very not very much of strategy in all of it And with africa it's the same thing. We have a very complex relationship with africa In which a number of european member states have Direct engagements the others are not at all interested. They know it's this continent where you have a lot of immigrants And we have to stop the immigrants. So let's reinforce the borders And and protect ourselves But there's no real strategic vision and you just have to look at the outcome of the eu africa summit Of a few weeks ago. There were six heads of government of the eu present There were about half of the african heads of state present which is less than you had on the franco african summit in nis A year ago So there is relatively little investment in this there is Little vision in this And again very little strategy in large part because we are internally in europe Um Finding commonalities finding a vision finding why this europe has to be this force in the world at least that's my personal view and the The financial crisis underscored these issues very very clearly Look at the cohesion of the euro and the messages that were given to The member states that had serious financial problems. Um the first The reaction was let's kick them out of the euro Which of course worsened the problems In the countries in question considerably. So even if if if on those issues we cannot find the the cohesion that we need How should we do it on on other issues? um Now to become a bit more technical. I think the the fact that Commission and council at least will have one person in charge at Country level with an eu ambassador Basically um Might help the fact that's uh the rotating Presidencies at the field. So in that country level will will stop and this will be a permanent presidency by the eu ambassador Will help as well to to to reinforce some cohesion and some dynamic At uh at at at the national level But it will depend very much on the strategic direction and cohesion that comes out of brussels if we are going to do something with this And for the moment this is very Very haphazard that there's no No real driver behind this At the point at this point. So again, I'm not really I'm optimistic. I might be a bit cynical at that some stage on this Thanks, I think we'll take a question and then we'll let either respond to everything Hi, my name is jonathan morganstein and i'm with department of defense and And to some degree you actually we're just touching on this In describing I forget which ones of you mentioned previous missions Involved in guinebissau, congo, samalia, and My question was how much of an assessment process Has did these decisions go through Before the decisions were made in the context of considering What would be the impact in the long term of Sending these missions in terms of Kind of shoring up the rule of law human rights and all those concerns in these countries and considering It sounded to me like you were just kind of saying Not much or not much kind of long-term coherent and strategic considerations And understanding that you've been talking mostly about the eu as an institution Maybe another question would be in terms of some of the other major states individually in europe What kind of processes you if you could speak to that that they've gone through in similar just national efforts and Just in case you're inclined to I I understand afghanistan is a completely different issue So my question is more related to to kind of africa and and countries other than afghanistan because obviously unique circumstances thanks I want to Just build on what you said. I don't really think we can exclude afghanistan I was part of a us eu dialogue for a year on afghanistan and we've met in brussels Where the food is really much better than other places in the world and the american set on one side of the table The european set on the other and the european said we're in afghanistan because article You know such as the nato treaty and we're there because we're good allies of yours And we said no you you should be there because of all these intrinsic reasons why we're there and they said no No, you don't understand. We're there because we're article five, you know, so We'll start with you. You take it back to afghanistan Okay, I want to talk about afghanistan for the last question promise But I think this assessment process and long-term impact is is interesting It also goes back to this short-term crisis intervention versus long-term structural Change of the cstp mission, which I you know, if you look at the missions actually most of them are long-term gear towards long-term Structural change and you know, it's sort of I think crisis mission is perhaps a bit of a a misnomer You know the capabilities for some lessons learned and sort of assessments across the missions is still in construction I think So far we've sort of done one and then you know did the other but without sort of much You know much much handover continuity and I think the only end state I can really think of in terms of strategic goals for missions is in the Balkans where it's membership You know how we transition from the crisis mission to commission To membership like we did in in in Macedonia Is now an open question given that we have two hard cases left Bosnia and Kosovo once not the whole state and the other one sort of deadlocked so we so there's a broader political question there, but I wanted to come back to the what what what to do Your question and I think there's sort of a bottom-up-and-top-down approach that would have to take place jointly for For things to shift a little bit. I mean bottom up we could think of You know developing coming common training standards making sure that there is a sort of European model of Crisis missions civilian reconstruction. That's actually in the works, but much more needs to be done to really Make 27 member states police and justice and whatever staff Merged them into sort of a European Structure joint planning. I think is important sort of merging the sort of threat assessment intelligence sharing You know all that sort of pre-mission stuff Together would I think create a sort of cohesion and socialization also to make a EU coherence more More likely and then on the top of course the Lisbon changes. Hopefully will Once the systems up and running which probably will take another Well, well the QDD. I wasn't released right away, you know, so yeah another year perhaps And should should sort of bring cohesion between the financial and the political arm of the EU Just because Catherine Ashton is double-headed as secretary general hyper-presentative but also vice-president of the commission with the Foreign portfolios Yeah You know, you know, it's No, I think I think the two possible the two possible outcomes, I think the changes we see now, you know Ashton's post and also these sort of bottom-up things are arise out of The perceived need for more coherence and also on the part of member states for Wish for the EU to play a bigger role in the world. I mean all the negative comments aside I think that's what all EU member states in principle can agree on now how the financial crisis will come in It's an interesting question because at the same time as you said we we see increasing lack of solidarity So and whether the financial crisis will lead to more sort of common action or whether it'll mean that everybody's sort of protecting their own turf And how that'll trickle Down or up sideways to to form policy remains to be seen But I think at the I wouldn't conflate the two for now. I think the financial crisis May or may not not have a positive Effect on on the EU's cohesion. I mean the way it looks right now. It's I wouldn't be too hopeful because just the political discourse is getting Points in the other direction, but perhaps what's happening on the ministerial levels Might might be different on the Guild complex and What the EU what's happening in the EU? I mean, I think yeah, I mean it's on the military Dimension years 27 member states with different strategic cultures and you know only two of them actually Like to send the military forces abroad And that hasn't really changed Significantly since over the past decades in these crisis missions, but I think and I think that'll remain that way I mean, I think it you know, I'm not delusional enough to think that That the EU could merge over overnight into a military Power or power that's as comfortable with sending troops abroad as as the US is But I think it's also a fair question to ask what it what is it. We actually want to do. I mean You know an intervention in Afghanistan the way you Not you but the US has Has committed to or are we looking at sort of short-term operation the way our military operations so far have been? so I think the purpose question Has to be asked as well Thank you from where I'm sitting. I'm watching the rooftops across the street fill up with snow So If it's all right with everybody, let's do the following We'll take the two questions from the the people that are standing We'll ask the panel to respond To everything that's been said and make closing remarks and then We'll call it a day. So start we're here Victoria Staddle lieutenant commander in the United States Navy. I just got back from Afghanistan a couple months ago And I really have a very quick more comment In the sense that I want to tell you that I work with you pull extremely closely and they were fantastic and I know that It's it can be easily seen as a pessimistic bit and coming from the NATO training mission I can most certainly make a lot of criticism criticisms about our own institution from being on the inside But from an outsider looking in working with you pull you bring Um Expertise that we just don't have and once egos are able to be put aside on the table on both sides I think we can really get a lot of work done and what you pull brings that we as um U. S military force and also a NATO force is that the long-term vision of you pull And uh, it was a little bit challenging of course at times to deal with different timelines But the command and staff college and other programs that are going on Afghanistan would absolutely have not have happened if it wasn't for you pull and in truth I I think a real issue is that They're literally across the other side of town and that's an issue because we as far as hans mentioned with risk aversion Is there the military there's an issue of Just getting across town as frequently as I wish we were in in order for us to work more coherently But they were fantastic and uh, we're doing a lot more than we ever could in afghanistan because of you pull Please Jeff Stacey from the state department and just echo the the us humility and Which bob you started us with and the candor of this panel is just really really welcome and and impressive And um, I work at scrs as you heard in the last thing with the qt yard It's going to be this new bureau on crisis stabilization operations And hopefully a new mandate and we're young in this field and just getting going so csdp is Eva said has been going on a much much longer, but you know the un has been doing this Mostly from a peacekeeping perspective, but not entirely a lot longer than even than the eu and none of us Have figured out how to do this really well ddr, which ssr is really Overlaps with ddr these things are so incredibly difficult No one that i'm aware of anywhere has figured out how to do this effectively There's not a single shining program that an NGO or a government or an international organization can point to you and say This is how to do this So we're all desperate for answers one thing that um We're trying and it'd be great to see individual experts and think tanks Talk talk more about and and sort of point the way forward in your own perspectives is this new international stabilization and peacebuilding initiative ispi or ispi Basically is an effort to get all the civilian players governments and international organizations together To work initially on lessons learned training and roster recruitment and management, but eventually planning logistics and field coordination ultimately the goal is to Learn how to become field interoperable And yet it's it's governments and all the politics and personalities are involved and it's it takes a long time To get this going we could use pointer suggestions um one thing that we're wondering about is um Is is perhaps something that we haven't tried yet? Do we grab the experts in terms of the different sectors of local capacity building? Transition to local ownership. We all want the same things. Do we find our top experts in undp? In csdp, uh, whatever agency this government bring them together lock them in a room until they don't come out I mean i'm i'm not entirely joking We're looking for answers so anything you have for us would be great Thanks very much. Let's go Have the panel present in the original order. We'll have haunts. Well, that's let's you want to start first? All right, you start then we'll go down. Okay, um Just I wanted to make one comment picking up on some of the earlier discussion and then and then React to the last question, which I think is a good good sort of way to end and then continue the rest of the conversation um And the first point is that the and the this issue of coordination and and the identity of the eu and different member states I mean that the fact that you've got all these different member states makes it difficult to get on the same page On the other hand, it is one of the advantages of the eu is that you have France the uk germany other states that have very strong bilateral relationships with certain countries And when they're able to use that effectively it it it could have a real political impact I think it's interesting that the in the lisbon treaty They've decided to have eu ambassadors from member states to really build on those relationships And I think one of the questions Is is how to figure out, you know, what role the the eu institutions play not only in terms of building Their own capacity, but in terms of facilitating The strengths and weaknesses of the of the member states And I think building on that there's there there's a lot of room there for Greater cooperation across the Atlantic with the us because you know, the us can can also bring its strengths and Weaknesses to bear and figure out where we complement each other both on the level of individual member states and Relative to the us I'm you know interested to hear about the international stabilization peace building initiative I think those are the kinds of things that really advocate for Um, Eva mentioned things like developing common training training standards and common concepts I mean, those are the things that I think we really need to to start hashing out There's there's been so much of this getting out to the field and people just rely on what they know And and the the result is ad hoc, but there's a real opportunity. I think now As we start to grapple with okay, what are the standards? What are the directions? What are the the training that we need? for People from from from the us from different member states from the eu to start Hashing these things out common training standards common concepts for for what kind of work to do Actual ways to processes for doing strategic planning for for working on on governance Common indicators and measurement tools and so forth And there's a lot of knowledge out there and experience And I think those are the kinds of things that that experts in that kind of form should be should be working on And and again drawing from the different strengths not only of the eu as an institution But the member states in the u.s. And figuring out how to how to bring all that together. So I think there's a there's a rich and Difficult agenda ahead, but hopefully this We're going in that direction Thanks hunt. Thank you To to to build on on alexis points to which I agree 100 percent um initiatives initiatives like isp and others should also Reinforce what we all know, but what we can't sell politically is that this is incredibly complicated And that this takes huge amounts of time and resources, but especially time If you have to present results in two years time or in three years time In processes that will take 10 15 years and in which you will have setbacks and in which you will But you need from the initial Concept of when you plan an operation or when you plan a program you you need to calculate all those drawbacks and and and small returns of Fortune and so forth in in your in your initial plan Which for the moment this is almost impossible to do because again you have to deliver within For the EU it has at a certain point been six months for for you. What what can you do in six months? You can fly in people and then They're already packing their bags to to get out so you you need through these initiatives and through Better collaboration at an international level to build enough of a consensus that you need this long-term investment and that you make it politically viable for governments and for international institutions to get on board of those Although I think this is almost a mission impossible But the EU and I what you said about Afghanistan. Yes, it's it's in Congo It's true as well the EU and and then the US we have huge human capabilities to to act in the field and Great people are out there and doing their work and sadly we we have some political issues left and right But they make interesting programs and projects possible And I want to add one thing on what Eva said the unity of action in the Balkans at a certain point There was a unity of action in the Great Lakes as well We had four missions building on each other and Combined with that a huge investment by the European Commission in in Congo for the election in 2006 Sadly it all evaporated In 2007 And now we're going to probably make the same mistake again by pumping hundreds of millions of Euros in a new electoral phase that is not going to have the slightest impact whatsoever for the Congolese And how to deal with this kind of situations how to work with those governments to be more responsive to civilian protection and to At least some form of progress that is what we're all having to deal with I think Um, so I wouldn't mind to be locked in the room for Thank you Thank you and Eva last minute. Okay. Well, thanks for for those final two comments and I think You know, I mean having having worked on this for For so long. I mean, I think one of the most positive aspects of these conversations today but also over the past six months except the sort of sense of Competition and mutual exclusivity of of transatlantic, but also us oc u efforts has sort of given way to a more pragmatic Approach and that means who can do what needs to be done and how do we do it? And I think Um, that that makes that least for me is is a is a really positive positive thing I mean what what you just said on you Paul. I mean, I think it shows how And I think the sort of dismissive attitude at the top sort of trickled down also on the staff level when it's actually not Not necessarily warranted and I'm glad that this has disappeared a little bit and from the EU side, I think when we started our CSDP missions. I mean our first concern was to you know Move the oc out of the way so that we could you know take over governance in the Balkans and and sort of Be anything but the UN but I think now all the civilian Crisis actors are sort of comfortable enough in their identity. Let's say to to actually start looking at Doing things together. So I think Jeffrey's Intervention was very Yes, but I hope we'll You know get to do more of this in the future. I hope that's where it's headed and where it's also going to stay Okay, I want to thank the panel for Some wonderful presentations and some really interesting comments Um as you leave the building I I think you'll realize as the song says that it's beginning to look a lot like Christmas I want to wish you all a very happy holiday and I ask you to keep an eye on the usap website We will have the next meeting of the ssr working group in february. So um with that. Thanks a lot and