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Subject: Rumsfeld blasts Euro army [STOPNATO.ORG.UK]


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US launches attack on Euro army
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/et?ac=001851641145319&rtmo=3SH88xuM&atmo=99999999&pg=/et/01
/3/18/wdef18.html
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Sunday 18 March 2001
US launches attack on Euro army
By Joe Murphy, Political Editor

'Something special is at risk'
How the 1972 treaty hampers Bush's plans to protect America

TONY BLAIR'S claims that he has convinced the Americans to support the
European defence force are undermined dramatically today by Donald
Rumsfeld, the US Defence Secretary.

Donald Rumsfeld: 'I personally will be watching carefully to see how
things evolve'

In an interview with The Telegraph, Mr Rumsfeld warns that the plans
could "inject instability" into the Nato alliance and "put at risk
something that is very special". It is the first detailed public
statement on the subject by a senior American politician since Mr Blair
returned from Camp David last month claiming that President Bush had
agreed to support the European "army".

Mr Rumsfeld makes clear that the new Republican administration remains
deeply concerned about the project. Invited to confirm that he is
"relaxed" about the European Union's proposals, Mr Rumsfeld
conspicuously declines to do so.

Mr Rumsfeld says: "I personally will be watching carefully to see how
things evolve, because we have so much at stake with that [Nato]
alliance. We need to be vigilant to see that we don't do anything that
could inject an instability into the alliance."

In a sign of his frustration that the controversy refuses to die down,
Mr Blair, also interviewed The Sunday Telegraph, accuses the
Conservative Party of pouring "poison" into the ears of the Americans.

However, the Prime Minister makes the startling admission that some EU
countries involved in the defence initiative may intend "to destroy
Nato" - a reference that will be assumed to apply to France.

Mr Blair says: "Well, if we don't get involved in European defence, it
will happen without Britain. Then those people who really may have an
agenda to destroy Nato will have control of it." The re-emergence of the
transatlantic rift is a blow to Mr Blair who sought to alleviate Mr
Bush's concerns when they met at Camp David a month ago.

At the time, Mr Bush said: "He assured me that Nato is going to be the
primary way to keep the peace in Europe." The President's advisers have,
however, been alarmed by annexes to the Nice Treaty, signed last year,
which state that the European force will be "under the political control
and strategic direction of the EU" during operations.

Mr Rumsfeld, interviewed in Washington by the former Conservative MP,
Winston Churchill, was asked to confirm Mr Blair's view that the Bush
administration was now "relaxed" about the force. Instead of agreeing,
he replied: "I think the correct way to say it is that the President has
said what he has said about it, and he understands it."

Mr Rumsfeld says: "As in so many things in life, the devil is in the
detail. And the details haven't been worked out. The way the planning
mechanism is handled could make an enormous difference. But arranged in
a way that didn't really look out over the long term . . . then it could
put at risk something that's very special."

In the interview, Mr Blair says: "They [the Bush administration] have
had poison poured in their ear by the present Conservative Party going
over there and saying, this is all about ripping apart Nato, it's a
French plot to destabilise..."

Mr Blair says: "Every time I explain European defence to Americans they
understand it and end up supporting it. But this is all part of that
ghastly [Conservative] traffic that goes across there saying, 'Oh, you
know, the purpose of the New Labour Government is to pull Britain apart
from America'."

© Copyright Telegraph Group Limited 2001
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