Achilles Seminar on Transformation and the Transatlantic Relationship

On October 16-19, the Atlantic Council welcomed 36 young leaders to Washington for a four day seminar on transformation and the transatlantic relationship. The events began with a dinner in which the participants were joined by Ambassador Robert Hunter, President of the Atlantic Treaty Association, and Jim Townsend of the Atlantic Council. The students spent the next day in Washington, and met with Terry Pudas, Director of the Office of Force Transformation at the Department of Defense; Stuart Johnson of the National Defense University; William Caniano of the Senate Armed Services Committee; Ian Brzezinski, former deputy assistant secretary of defense for Europe; and Scott Tumpack of EADS International. The participants then traveled to Allied Command Transformation, the only North American representation of NATO, in Norfolk, Virginia. Briefings there began with a discussion with Lieutenant General Michel Maisonneuve, chief of staff at ACT. The students then heard presentations on strategic concepts with Commander Martin Teft of the Canadian Navy; “effects based approach to operations” with Lieutenant Colonel Ralf Hoffman of the German Army; and global partnerships with Commander Lee Abernethy. Participants also had the chance to tour the U.S.S. Kearsarge, an amphibious assault ship stationed in Norfolk. After briefings, participants separated into three working groups to come to a consensus on future global partnerships, as well as their role in relation to other aspects of transformation. Each group looked at the issue from a different angle, before all participants came back together to draft a brief statement. The findings were presented to the “NATO Secretary General”—the Council’s Jim Townsend—in Washington before the participants departed. Participants represented 20 nations form all over Europe and Central Asia, as well as North America, including Armenia, Lithuania, Spain, Belgium, France, Romania, Hungary, the U.K., Serbia, Georgia, Norway, Finland, Denmark, Canada, Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Azerbaijan, and the United States. Travel support was provided for all European participants through generous grants given by the U.S. Mission to NATO, NATO Public Diplomacy Division, and the Streit Council for a Union of Democracies.