 Okay, I think we can get started. Thank you all very much for your attendance this afternoon. My name is Alex White. I'm Director General of the Institute of International and European Affairs. It's my pleasure to welcome you all to the building for what I'm sure is going to be a most interesting and informative discussion. As you know, the Institute has, we have a number of different work streams, different areas that we address and security and defense is one of those areas. As an independent body, we're one of our, we're very, very keen to promote discussion, to promote debate and I suppose in particular to foster an atmosphere of discussion that is informed by fact and informed by research and analysis and that is our role here in this building in relation to all of the areas that we address. It's my great pleasure as I say to welcome the audience but also in particular our guest speaker, Admiral Rob Barr, who will address you shortly. But my other role, pleasant role is to introduce the speakers. I'm not chairing this session. In case you thought it was, but popping up here, it's just to say hello, to welcome you all and in particular to welcome and to thank our chair of this afternoon's session, Major General Maureen O'Brien. Maureen O'Brien graduated from University College of Galway with a BSC and a HDIP before being awarded a cadetship in Oglina Heron in 1981. In 2021, Major General O'Brien was appointed to her current role as Deputy Military Advisor to the UN Undersecretary General for Peace Operations. She is Ireland's first female officer to reach the rank of Brigadier General. During her career, Major General O'Brien has amassed extensive overseas service, most recently as Deputy Force Commander in UNDOR in Syria and prior to that peacekeeping experience in Chad and in Lebanon. So we have a superb chair and we have a really interesting and important and very welcome guest. And I now take great pleasure in handing over proceedings on the floor to Maureen O'Brien. Thank you very much. And thank you. Breaking news though is that I have retired from the Irish Defence Forces and from the UN and feeling the better for us after 42 years. So you're all very welcome to what I believe is going to be a very interesting discussion. We are delighted to be joined today by Admiral Rob Bauer who has generously enough taken time out of his visit here to meet us today and to discuss things with us today. Admiral Bauer will speak to us for about 15 to 20 minutes and then we'll get an opportunity to ask questions and there'll be some answers hopefully as well. To those in the room who should wish to ask questions during this Q&A session, please raise your hand and a microphone will be brought towards you. To those on Zoom and we have quite a number of people on Zoom as well listening to this online, you should ask your questions as well through the Zoom and I will attend to them. And those questions will be asked after General Bauer has spoken. A reminder that today's presentation and questions and answers are both on the record. So please give your name and any affiliation you may have when posing the questions. And I would also ask you to be succinct in your questions to give an opportunity for Admiral Bauer to respond. I will now formally introduce Admiral Rob Bauer and hand over to him. Admiral Bauer from the Royal Netherlands Navy is the 33rd Chair of the Military Committee of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. As a military advisor to the Secretary General and the North Atlantic Council, Admiral Bauer is NATO's most senior military officer. Previously, Admiral Bauer has served as Chief of Defense of the Netherlands Armed Forces from 2017 to 2021. Admiral Bauer was commissioned as an officer in the Royal Netherlands Navy in 1984. I'll hand over the floor to you Admiral, please. Thank you. Thank you very much. Can you all hear me? Good. Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. Actually, what is happening outside is what we defend as an alliance. The fact that we have a vibrant democracy where people agree and disagree and that will lead to a discussion and then there is a decision on any topic in our society and that is good to see that happening. The tectonic plates of power are shifting. And as a result, we face the most dangerous world in decades with a record amount of violence and conflict. Russia's invasion of Ukraine has brought major war back to Europe. A few days ago, we commented the grim second anniversary of the war in Ukraine. Today is the 734th day of what the Russian leadership thought would be a three-day war. The situation on the battlefield is highly complex and there is intense fighting going on. But while Russia's most recent attacks have been devastating, they are not militarily effective. The victories they are claiming are coming at a great cost just like at Fika in Donetsk Oblast. Russia has claimed it, but it has no real strategic value. They have destroyed the infrastructure. The people are gone. It's a pile of rubble. Meanwhile, we are seeing substantial military successes on the Ukrainian side. Ukraine has prevailed as a sovereign, independent nation in Europe, which in itself is remarkable. They are closer to the Euro-Atlantic family than ever. And they have been inflicting heavy losses on Russia. More than 300,000 Russian casualties killed were wounded. Thousands of Russian tanks and armored vehicles and hundreds of planes have been destroyed. The Ukrainians have been able to liberate significant parts of their territory, pushing back the Russians from roughly 50% of what they occupied at the beginning of the war. Another gain is that the Ukrainians have been able to conduct deep strikes, destroying key Russian capabilities. The fact that Ukraine has been able, without a real name, to push back the Russian Black Sea Fleet and open up a grain corridor without consent with the Russians is another huge gain. This is in part due to the support of NATO allies and partners who have been stepping up with financial aid, arms, and capabilities. That is not charity. Supporting Ukraine is a direct investment in our own security. It is important to note that Russia's war was never about any real security threat coming from either Ukraine or NATO. This war is about Russia fearing something much more powerful than any physical weapon on earth, democracy. If people in Ukraine can have democratic rights, then people in Russia will soon crave them too. Make no mistake, the outcome of the war in Ukraine will determine the fate of the world, because Russia's ambitions lie far beyond Ukraine. And if Russia is allowed to win, then it sends a message to all authoritarian regimes that not only can you violate internationally recognized treaties with impunity, in fact, there is much to be gained from doing so. Therefore, we all have a responsibility to do everything we can to help Ukraine prevail and win this war. The stakes could not be higher. Our freedom, our democracies, the rule of law, and the right for each sovereign nation to determine its own destiny hang in the balance. Both NATO and Ireland have a vested interest in upholding the international rules-based order. It underpins all our security. Moreover, in the case of Ireland, you cannot have neutrality if there is no rules-based international order that respects and guarantees this neutrality. It is not enough to hope for the best. We all need to prepare for the unexpected. In these challenging times, peace is not a given. We need only look at Ukraine, where the unthinkable did happen. Because whether we like it or not, war is a whole-of-society event as the people in Ukraine found out. Therefore, the prevention of war should also be a whole-of-society event. In many Allied nations on the Eastern flank, the Russian threat is felt very clearly. But in countries with a different geographical position, that has not happened yet. That is why over the last month a number of political and military leaders, myself included, have made the point that NATO and its allies should prepare for different kinds of scenarios. This has been criticized for being either paranoid, overly alarmist, pro-war or even for being escalatory. Now, let's get one thing clear. This is not about scaring people. This is about preparing people. This is about preparedness. We need to be far better prepared for a conflict scenario. Because preparedness will contribute to deterrence. And deterrence will help prevent conflict from reaching our borders. No matter how the war in Ukraine develops, the world will still have a Russia problem. For years, the NATO military authorities have been monitoring Russia's pattern of increasingly aggressive behavior. After the illegal annexation of Crimea, we recognized the need to improve our collective defense. And we started planning and adapting accordingly. Together, we have implemented the largest reinforcement of collective defense in a generation. Most recently, at the Vilnius Summit last July, NATO allies took this a step further by agreeing new defense plans. These are the most comprehensive defense plans NATO has had since the end of the Cold War. These plans were developed as modern, multi-domain, integrated defense plans against the two main threats our alliance is facing. Russia and terrorist groups. This is actually a family of plans, a series of interlinked plans. First, a strategic plan for the defense of our entire area of responsibility. Then, three regional plans. One for the North, the Atlantic, and European Arctic. One for the center, covering the Baltic region and Central Europe. And one for the south, covering the Mediterranean and the Black Sea. Then, strategic plans for individual military domains, air, land, maritime, special operations forces, cyber, and space and reinforcement. And four structural requirements, which set out the number and types of equipment and organizations that we require across all regions and all domains. Across domains, these requirements will be divvied up amongst the NATO allies. Therefore, across the board, allies are working to maximize the executability of our new defense plans. Through first, putting more troops on higher readiness. Second, capability building and development. Third, adaptation of NATO's command and control structures. Fourth, creating and sustaining more enablement being logistics, host nation support, maintenance, military mobility, replenishment, and prepositioning of stocks. And crucially, more collective defense exercises and training against these new plans. Additionally, allies have been stepping up their defense spending and investments in key capabilities in order to keep their citizens safe. Last year saw an unprecedented rise of 11% across European allies and Canada. In order to both strengthen our own defenses and keep supporting Ukraine, we need to take big steps in ramping up defense industry production. There have been positive new developments in this field. Since we agreed NATO's defense production action plan last July, the NATO support and procurement agency has agreed contracts for more than $10 billion worth of ammunition. And this includes the purchase of around 220,155 millimeter artillery shells worth $1.2 billion, a $5.5 billion contract for 1,000 Patriot missiles, and $4 billion for another round of 155 millimeter artillery, anti-tank-guided missiles, and tank ammunition. This is a significant boost for our transatlantic defense industry, but we need more factories, not more orders. This is the only way we can meet our own security needs while continuing to provide vital support to Ukraine. We also urgently need to improve the implementation of existing NATO standards and to work with industry to help shape global standards. This will then lead to more joint procurement, a stronger long-term demand signal, and hence an increase in production capacity. We cannot afford to only focus on one problem at a time or one region or even one domain. If we do that, we create vulnerabilities in our defensive shield that will end up hurting us all. Ladies and gentlemen, NATO is all about preparing for the worst case scenario. We have been doing just that for 75 years through constant adaptation and transformation. NATO has gone through unprecedented change at an unprecedented pace. Today, NATO is stronger, reddier, more able and more flexible than ever before. And together, we protect one billion people across our 31 very soon 32 allies. I say 32 because in just a few days we will finally be able to call Sweden our ally. As they join us, they will come and enrich the tapestry that is NATO. NATO's capacity to expect the unexpected is directly tied to its ability to see things from different perspectives, to apply new and different ways of working and to accumulate different threat perspectives. For this, our cooperation with partners is key. NATO needs partners, both from a political and military perspective. As long as you have partners, you have better solutions. So at a time when authoritarian regimes are desperately trying to portray an image of strength to the world, at a time where global security threats are multiplying and our values are under attack, we need like-minded partners like Ireland more than ever before. To help defend our shared values, our democracies and our freedoms. There is no such thing as regional security anymore. All security is interconnected. If European nations strengthen their own deterrence, their own national defenses and their own societal resilience, then as a collective European nations can stand stronger and taller and minimize the chance of an adversary ever attempting to start a conflict. The simple truth is that we are stronger together. And we have it within us to make sure we do what it takes to protect what we hold dear. And with that, I'm ready for any of your questions.