The Parliamentary Transatlantic Forum

The NATO Parliamentary Assembly has held a Parliamentary Transatlantic Forum in the United States every year since 2001. The Forum is organized in co-operation with the Atlantic Council of the United States and the National Defense University. Its purpose is to enable members of the NATO Parliamentary Assembly to discuss transatlantic relations with a broad spectrum of American policy makers and shapers. Briefings and discussions are off the record in order to facilitate a candid and open exchange of views on topics ranging from defense capabilities, crisis management, peace support operations, and the war on terrorism to NATO’s new partnerships.

The 2005 Parliamentary Transatlantic Forum was held at National Defense University in Washington DC on December 5-6 and attended by over 70 parliamentarians from 19 NATO member states. Discussions focused on the status of the transatlantic alliance covering a range of topics from the role of NATO in Central Asia and the Gulf to post-conflict reconstruction, and from disasters' consequence management to the Alliance's transformation and future.

The Forum was opened by keynote presentations by Jim Steinberg, Director of Foreign Policy Studies at Brookings Institution, and Joshua Muravchik, Resident Scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, focusing on geopolitics in the 21st century from different US perspectives. The closing session featured General Richard B. Myers, Former Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, who spoke about the future of the Alliance.

Other contributing speakers included Dan Fata, US Assistant Secretary of Defense for NATO and Europe, Paul McHale, US Assistant Secretary of Defense for Homeland Defense, Ambassador Carlos Pascual, Reconstruction and Stabilization Coordinator at the U.S. Department of State, Lisa Bronson, former Deputy Undersecretary of Defense and currently at the National War College, and Ariel Cohen of the Heritage Foundation, as well as several other experts from the policy and academic community.