00:00Dr. Gardner, I have to tell you I take great offense.
00:04Respectful people, honorable people can disagree on policy.
00:07To question Democrats' commitment and patriotism is unacceptable.
00:11I love my country, and I know my colleagues do.
00:14I am committed to the country, like Rear Admiral Montgomery, Ambassador Smith, our colleagues
00:19here.
00:20We take an oath to defend the Constitution, and we do that with seriousness and integrity.
00:26So I take great offense.
00:28We live in a great country.
00:29We are a beacon to the world.
00:31I am the father of a Navy veteran, like Admiral Montgomery.
00:35He was a surface warfare officer, and we can disagree.
00:39We don't need to disperse each other's commitment to our country.
00:44Admiral Montgomery, in your opening remarks, you stated, I'm going to quote you here, I
00:49firmly believe that NATO can serve as a bulwark that brings transatlantic alliance through the
00:55challenges posed by a rapacious authoritarian state, Russia, and the China-led axis of aggressors
01:00that supports and enables Russia.
01:02I think we agree on that.
01:03My question for you, is it can or is it must?
01:07Must NATO be at that forefront?
01:08Yeah.
01:09In my written, I said can, and in my oral, I said must, because I believe it's must.
01:13I mean, look.
01:14There is no substitute for us.
01:16I agree with Niall and his characterization of French President Macron's initiatives here.
01:23They're going to go nowhere.
01:26It needs to be us.
01:27It needs to be NATO.
01:29Myself, Chairman Self, others have served with NATO over 40, 50 years.
01:35It makes – we are the bulwark of democracy in Europe, and we are the only thing that is
01:40strong enough to defeat them together.
01:42Europe has to spend more.
01:43We have to spend more.
01:45We're going to go below 3 percent in real GDP – defense spending in GDP, not the numbers
01:50that we get from some disarmament agency in Scandinavia.
01:54We're going to go below 3 percent over the next two to three years.
01:58We need to get ours up.
01:59They need to get theirs up.
02:00It's the only way we can defend ourselves.
02:01And I think it was Ambassador Smith you talked about it.
02:04We need to do that in a coordinated way.
02:07We need to have a strategy, and a strategy follows a vision of the role of NATO, what role
02:13it plays today, but also into the future.
02:17What do you see as the role for NATO looking to the future?
02:20MS.
02:21Well, I would like to see Russia – I mean, I would like to see the Alliance complete
02:25that strategy on Russia.
02:27I think existing in a world where the Allies can't agree on a Russia strategy doesn't
02:33bode well for the future and this huge surge in spending.
02:36But from a more technical perspective, I think NATO can help drive co-production.
02:41We've heard a couple of great examples today.
02:44I often point to the case of Spain, Romania, Germany, and the Netherlands coming together
02:50with Raytheon to build the Gem-T missiles for the Patriots.
02:55Those types of co-production efforts are the way of the future.
02:59And NATO can help that happen, but not if the Alliance is hemorrhaging trust and Europeans
03:05feel like they want to back away from us.
03:07So the U.S. has to recommit.
03:09This summit is going to be very important in terms of the signals the Trump administration
03:14is going to send.
03:15And it should, in my mind, allow the Alliance to move forward both with the Russia strategy
03:20and allow it to push forward on those joint ventures that I just mentioned.
03:24MR.
03:25I couldn't agree more.
03:26You answered, actually, my follow-up question, which is that U.S. role.
03:32What is the impact of messages coming from the administration, the going one way on Monday
03:39and a different way on Tuesday and a complete reversal on Wednesday?
03:43What's the impact of getting to the strategy and the vision we need to achieve?
03:46MS.
03:47Let me give you just one example of where we are with public attitudes in Europe.
03:51In Denmark, they have created this app on your phone so that you can go through the store
03:57and find U.S. products so that you can avoid them.
04:00That's where we are right now.
04:01In Denmark.
04:02MR.
04:03I attended a wedding in Canada last weekend, the weekend before last.
04:06MS.
04:07It's not good.
04:08It's not good.
04:09MR.
04:10We went in to buy a bottle of wine.
04:11There is no American alcohol in the liquor stores, and we're seeing that.
04:14Rural Montgomery, I want to give you the last word here.
04:18What is the impact of the inconsistency from the U.S. if we're going to achieve the
04:21strategy you talk about if NATO must lead the way?
04:24MR.
04:25Look, as a military planner, I ran our plans in U.S. European Command and our operations
04:29in U.S. Pacific Command during my career, and the one thing that any military planner
04:34or operator wants is consistency.
04:36We need to have consistent, stable resources, operational plans, and direction from senior
04:42leadership.
04:43In the end, the President makes the direction, and we need to flex to it, but consistency is
04:48always a preferred condition.
04:50MR.
04:52And with that, I yield back.
04:53MR.
04:54I thank the witnesses for their valuable testimony, the members for their questions.
04:58The members of the subcommittee may have some additional questions for the witnesses.
05:02I will ask you to respond to those in writing.
05:04I will certainly have one.
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