The US chief and the president of the European Fee have constructed a “robust bond” in recent times, sources say
US President Joe Biden’s most popular alternative for the subsequent secretary normal of NATO is European Fee President Ursula von der Leyen, in accordance with The Telegraph newspaper.
Biden and von der Leyen have constructed “a robust bond” up to now few years over points comparable to China, Ukraine and local weather change, the British outlet reported on Tuesday, citing NATO sources.
In response to one of many paper’s interlocutors, the White Home appreciated that the European Fee president just lately most popular to “depend on Washington for intelligence” as a substitute of trusting European companies, which had didn’t correctly consider Russia’s navy operation in Ukraine.
The report additionally advised that von der Leyen would seemingly have the ability to get the backing of France’s Emmanuel Macron, one other key participant in NATO, resulting from her fluency within the French language.
On Tuesday, NATO’s incumbent Secretary Common Jens Stoltenberg confirmed that his tenure, which was resulting from end in late September, had been extended for one more 12 months. The Norwegian has headed the US-led navy alliance since 2014, together with his time period having been prolonged 4 occasions.
The announcement got here after NATO members once more didn’t agree on a substitute for Stoltenberg. In response to media studies, the candidacy of British Protection Secretary Ben Wallace was blocked final month by the US and France, who reportedly need an official from the EU to get the job.
The Each day Mail reported earlier this week that Biden was against Wallace, seemingly as a result of he served as a British soldier in Northern Eire throughout the interval of sectarian violence often known as ‘The Troubles’. The US chief “wears his southern Irish roots on his sleeve” and “he’s hardly significantly pro-British both,” sources informed the paper.
Von der Leyen had beforehand stated that, regardless of being honored to seek out herself among the many potential candidates, she wasn’t significantly within the NATO position. Nonetheless, in accordance with The Telegraph, the US doubts that she would have the ability to proceed main the European Fee after subsequent 12 months’s European Parliament elections.
“It brings the NATO job into the discussions over Europe’s different high jobs,” one of many sources stated.
The Telegraph identified that one of many hurdles for von der Leyen turning into secretary normal of the navy bloc may very well be her “poor dealing with” of the German Protection Ministry, which she headed between 2013 and 2019. The paper recalled a report from 2015, which claimed that German troopers had needed to substitute heavy machine weapons with broomsticks throughout NATO drills with a view to cover their lack of apparatus.
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