Mr. President, Minister Ilves, Katharina, Virginia and Sarah, ladies and gentlemen, I am deeply moved by this occasion that brings us together here in Estonia, this country which Bob Frasure loved so much and for which he did so much. Today we combine sadness and remembrance and celebration.
I'm deeply honored to have been invited to deliver the first Frasure Memorial Lecture, honoring my friend, my associate, and as Chris Hill just said, a great diplomat and a great American. Bob Frasure's legacy is a rich one, and the Frasure Memorial Scholarship and the Frasure Fulbright award aptly commemorate Bob's many contributions to international peace and understanding.
Bob Frasure was a broadly educated man. He reveled in intellectual curiosity. And I know he would be proud to see his name associated with these prestigious awards. So to the scholars that have won the awards, and all future recipients, I wish you every success.
We celebrate Bob's life and career, his wry sense of humor and his commitment to excellence, his fierce pride and his love of his family, of Virginia, and Sarah, and Katharina. In Washington, in the State Department, where I've worked for so many years, and where my colleagues work now, he was much loved by his colleagues and is remembered deeply. His memory shines bright, and it comforts us to know -- and I assure you that this ceremony is well-known to every senior official in Washington, including the Secretary of State, the President and Vice President -- it comforts us all to know that he is also so well remembered here in Estonia.
His role in policy towards Estonia, as has already been mentioned by Katharina and President Meri, and Chris Hill and Nick Burns' comment, was vital. And I want to add to the record a few additional comments.
I want also to thank President Meri and Foreign Minister Ilves for making this event happen. I want to express my deep appreciation to Chris Hill, who worked so closely with Bob and me, and who made the effort to come here because of his love for Bob and for his family. And again to Katharina and to Virginia and Sarah for coming here and seeing old friends, so that they can see that Bob and they are not forgotten. And I hope that this will be the first of many trips.
Bob Frasure's career is associated with two corners of Europe: the northeast corner and the southeast corner. The Baltics, and the Balkans. But let us not forget that Bob was also an Africa expert. His second overseas tour was in Nigeria. In the 1980's, he was on the White House staff, the National Security Council staff, on Africa, working with Assistant Secretary of State Chet Crocker and Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Frank Wisner, who was the first person to bring Bob to my personal attention. Bob shaped a new policy in South Africa, Angola and Namibia. The work he did, the results of the work he did, can be seen in part in President Clinton's trip to Africa, which is continuing as we speak.
Bob first arrived here in Tallinn in the fall of 1991 as Charge d'affaires. The American Embassy was a room in the Palace Hotel. Bob's office was half of a couch in that room. Of course Bob was not starting completely from scratch when he came to Estonia because there had been a prior relationship and a special relationship for years. It is well known that Washington never recognized the Baltics' incorporation into the Soviet Union. And I think history will record that this courageous decision, not supported by many of our other allies, was critical in the events that followed. For all those years, the Embassy of Estonia, as well as Latvia and Lithuania, sat empty in Washington, preserved and protected for the day when your country could resume it.
But there was Bob in this room at the Palace Hotel, finally re-establishing the Embassy here in the building that once had housed it between the two wars. But after 1940, that building had become the head of the communist Youth League. And when the Embassy moved in, the building still housed Russian travel agents and a cafe. Bob proudly exhibited his great prize from the debris: the complete works of Lenin, and boasted that he was the only person in Tallinn still displaying the works of Lenin as a symbol.
He set out three objectives for U.S. policy towards Estonia. First, to work on getting the Russian troops out. Nick Burns' message that Chris Hill read describes Bob's seminal role in that event. Secondly, and very controversially still to this day, to help manage the troubled relationship between Estonians and ethnic Russians here in Estonia. And finally, to shape a U.S. assistance program that met Estonia's many needs.
In an era when shuttle diplomacy was fashionable, Bob mastered sauna diplomacy. He told me, President Meri, that you and he made many important agreements in the sauna and that, whenever you emerged, you had solved another problem.
Bob also proposed the idea of giving departing Russian soldiers a voucher so they could build housing for themselves and their families in Russia. This was an important incentive to get Russian soldiers out of Estonia. Typical of Bob's practical mind, this was a simple and innovative solution to what had appeared to be an intractable problem.
Bob recognized that ethnic relations between Estonians and Russians would be a key factor to the stability and well-being of the country and set out to address that issue. Perhaps his background in the south, his farm in Shenandoah, his roots in a part of the United States which had been bitterly divided a century earlier in the Civil War, contributed to his view that this issue should be addressed. Although he never said it, I always thought that there must have been some connection there.
He made a point of traveling regularly to the northeastern part of Estonia. Many Estonians were not enthusiastic at all about this interest that he took in the welfare of the Russian community here. But his activism turned into a major contribution towards getting the communities to live together. And as Katharina already mentioned, he played an important role in setting up and getting American funding for President Meri's round table on ethnic issues.
I should say a word to our friends here in Tallinn about his writing style, because you did not have the occasion, as we all did, to read his telegrams, but they were quite famous in Washington, because he combined the language of his West Virginia heritage with a compelling strategic and intellectual grasp. He liked to throw jokes into his telegrams. His jokes of duck-hunting with Milosevic and eating endless meals of lamb were well-read in Washington, and his cables were treasured.
From his success in Estonia, Bob was assigned back to the European bureau. And at Ambassador Frank Wisner's suggestion, I offered him the Deputy job. He had originally been assigned to another job of lesser importance. And I asked him to restructure American relations towards Central Europe and the Baltics. This he did with skill and enthusiasm. On the first day after I was sworn in, Bob already being in his office, we had a sweeping reorganization of the European Bureau, which took the Baltic countries forever out of something called the Office of Eastern European Affairs; we abolished the office; we put the Baltic countries in the same office as the Nordic countries; and began the process of reorienting American policy to treat the Baltics no longer as an area of Cold War confrontation, but as an arena of potential regional cooperation. This had important implications not only here, but in Helsinki, Stockholm, Copenhagen, and more recently, I'm pleased to say, Oslo. And it has led directly to the Northern Europe Initiative, which I will talk about a little more in a moment.
At the end of 1994, with Bosnia sliding into the abyss, Secretary Christopher, who was enormously impressed with Bob's combination of fierce patriotism, loyalty and tenacity, asked him to add Bosnia to his existing responsibilities. Bob undertook this difficult assignment without complaining, although he did not really want to do it. But his patriotism, his loyalty and his determination, his belief in America's role in addressing the world's problems, went to work immediately. And he shuttled tirelessly across the region, looking for a solution. In this effort he was often accompanied by a man who wanted to be here with us today but could not, with whom I spoke yesterday on the phone, Carl Bildt, the former Prime Minister of Sweden, and his and my European Union counterpart. Carl asked to be remembered today to Katharina and the family, to you President Meri, and to everyone in the audience, and to add his words of affection and appreciation for Bob to those of the American representatives here.
In August of 1995, we decided that I would phase into the shuttle, and Bob would accompany me on one last trip to the region. It was, of course, his last trip.
We will always miss him, and again, I am enormously honored that you have asked me to participate in this ceremony, and moved by your memory of him.
He talked so often of Estonia. As Katharina said, he would be thrilled to see the changes, because the changes are all improvements of an already impressive base. He and I often recalled our different experiences here, and with your permission, I would like to make a personal observation about my own association with your wonderful country, because this is my fourth trip here since 1989.
I first came here in January of 1989, with Congressman Les Aspin, who was then Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee. We came here by train from Moscow; we were accompanied by a man who we knew was a KGB person, although he had a different description. We came to see the government here in Tallinn. This trip made an enormous impression on me, because although we saw the government officials, we also found ourselves meeting in a small coffee house in the old tower with two people from the Estonian Heritage Society, who told us quite frankly that the preservation effort was also a movement of national independence. And we met with the Green Party, who told us that the Green Movement here was not like it was in the United States and Germany, it was designed not only to address real and legitimate environmental problems -- if my memory's correct, the issue at the time was the phosphate plant in the northeast -- but that it was going to lead to independence.
This was January of 1989, and Gorbachev had called Estonia a laboratory for perestroika. After our trip I went back to New York absolutely convinced that something unbelievable was happening in the smallest of the 15 republics of the Soviet Union. Something unstoppable was happening. I argued very strongly with Congressman Aspin about this, because it was hard to believe that what we were seeing was happening. The people talked openly to us, and defiantly, and it made an enormous impression on me. After that I wrote articles and made speeches saying that communism was not only going to die in Hungary and Czechoslovakia, but it was going to die in the Soviet Union.
My second trip here was two years later. Again I took the train, in 1991, this time accompanied by a Time magazine reporter called Strobe Talbott, who had specialized in the Soviet Union, who spoke Russian, and who had translated Nikita Kruschev's memoirs, but had never been to Estonia before. And the train arrived at about 7 o'clock in the morning, and the hotel didn't have a room for us yet, and the people who were supposed to meet us weren't there, so we started wandering around the streets. We went up to the hill where the cathedral and the Prime Minister's office are, and a young man came up to us and introduced himself in English, and we introduced ourselves, and he said he was a film maker, and could he show us his documentary film, because he wanted it shown on American public broadcasting. And I told President Meri this story already, because of his own background in the field, and we went into a dark studio in the middle of town and he showed us a documentary about the woman who had won the beauty contest in Saaremaa Island in 1939, and who had come to Tallinn for the national Miss Estonia contest, just in time for the great betrayal of the Hitler-Stalin pact. She recounted her entire life against the backdrop of what was happening. Again, we saw this extraordinary quality in Estonia, and again, it moved us very much, and we knew that communism was dead, and that Estonia was going to lead a revolution that would shake the world.
I tell you, no one in Washington could believe this. They kept saying, "it's only a million, a million and a half people." All you could say was "yes, but it's happening, and it's happening in Tallinn." So I come here today to tell you how much my trips here have meant to me.
My third trip here was with Vice President Gore. And as President Meri and Foreign Minister Ilves will remember, the square was filled with 10,000 people, calling for NATO membership, a subject I will return to in a moment, and celebrating their freedom. But I salute all of you for what you've done. It's hard to imagine, but I can say this quite confidently, having worked in the field of foreign policy for over three decades, and traveled in almost every part of the world, no country as small as yours has made as big an impact on the world over the last 50 years. It's not possible. First of all, there are very few countries as small as yours. And there's no country of your size or much bigger that has made this kind of impact. And I salute you. I know that you feel beleaguered and surrounded and insecure, and perhaps that's why you've achieved so much. But I salute you for it.
Now I'm accompanied here today by a friend of mine who is also currently the most important day to day policy-maker towards your part of the world, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Ronald Asmus. He has come here today not only as Deputy Assistant Secretary but to represent the Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, who wishes she could be here as well. I think you all know Ron. I first encountered him when he began to write very provocative articles some four or five years ago about the need for NATO to enlarge. This was at a point when the U.S. government had not yet made up its mind whether to do it or not. And Ron Asmus began writing very influential articles. I contacted him; I tried to lure him into the government, unsuccessfully. But then by one of those accidents of history, he was brought into the government by Strobe Talbott and Madeleine Albright, and now occupies the same job that Bob Frasure did when I was in the Bureau. He is a creative and unusual member of the State Department administration. He and I and our colleagues have had very good talks this morning with President Meri, the Prime Minister, the Foreign Minister, and other members of the government, and I am delighted he's here. He and I will have a press conference after this speech, and he will speak for the U.S. government and I will speak as a private citizen. But I want to stress that he is the main architect of the U.S. Baltic Charter.
I also want to note today a historic symmetry which I should have noted earlier. President Meri, my colleagues have pointed out to me that ten years ago today, you made a speech to the Creative Artists' Association which triggered some of the political ferment that followed. I hope they're right about the anniversary, because it only adds luster to the occasion, but I wanted to salute you for that.
I said earlier that I would talk about NATO. I know in this historic week where Foreign Minister Ilves, in his bow tie, was photographed with the rest of the foreign ministers of Europe, none of the rest of whom wore a bow tie, so it's easy to pick him out even in a very large photograph, you have started a historic process of joining the European Union. For some countries, this is a very new development. In a sense for Estonia, it's going back to your historic roots, of course. But I also know that NATO remains very much on your mind. So let me address the question of NATO membership before I close my remarks.
The aspirations of the Baltic nations to join NATO are of course totally legitimate and fully recognized by the United States. In the Baltic Charter, of which I spoke earlier, President Clinton welcomed those aspirations and pledged to support your efforts to become stronger candidates for NATO membership. Your aspirations to join NATO are not fundamentally different from the motives of other partners, by which I mean partners in the Partnership for Peace, or from the current members who decided to stay in NATO after the collapse of communism and the end of the Cold War.
You want to enjoy the same level of security as other countries in Europe. And, like other members of NATO, you recognize the special importance of a transatlantic link. At the same time, we recognize that the issue of Baltic security is perhaps the hardest piece of the NATO enlargement puzzle. It's a political and moral litmus test of our strategy to build a peaceful, democratic and undivided Europe. From the outset of the NATO enlargement debate, we have pledged to enlarge NATO in a fashion that would increase the security of all states in Europe, including those not included in the initial invitation to join NATO. For this reason the Baltic issue has occupied a special position in the European policy of the Clinton administration.
When I was Assistant Secretary of State for European and Canadian Affairs, not only did we create this new office I mentioned earlier, but we made very clear that we never considered it part of the Soviet Union by keeping it in the European Bureau, while putting the twelve republics other than these three into a separate office. We followed up with the Baltic Action Plan, which provided the first overall program for U.S. assistance in strengthening political and economic reform. Over the last year, the Clinton administration took three steps that significantly strengthened Baltic security. First, at Madrid in July, they successfully fought for a clear NATO commitment to keeping the door open for future members. That was critical to the Baltics, and let me assure you, it was not universally approved and indeed, even as we speak, there are members of the United States Senate who would like to put amendments on the treaties for Hungary, Poland and the Czech Republic that would prevent any new members from being considered for a specific period of time. I am assured that these amendments will be defeated, as they must. They would be a direct threat to your security, because they would leave you in limbo. But President Clinton is not going to permit them. In addition, the Madrid Communique specifically talked about the positive accomplishments of your countries.
Secondly, last fall, the United States launched the Northern Europe Initiative that Ron Asmus has been so central in formulating. It had three goals. One: to foster Baltic integration into Europe and transatlantic institutions. Two, to work together with the Nordic countries, Poland and Germany to expand regional cooperation. And three, to promote cooperation with Russia in the region in order to overcome old Cold War dividing lines.
Third, in January of this year, we signed the Charter of Partnership. Its basic political message is inclusion: the Baltic states are part of the vision, part of the process, part of the geography. The Charter also sent a clear political signal that the Baltic states will not be discriminated against because of history, or geography, in their quest to join European and transatlantic institutions.
As the President said in his remarks in the East Room of the White House, at the signing ceremony, "this underscores America's commitment to help create the conditions under which the Baltic states will one day be able to walk through the open door and join NATO." At the same time, we must be frank that the Charter does not offer a back door security guarantee. That's not the way our Constitution or our system work. Nor does it commit the United States to Baltic membership in NATO. We can't do that. It takes every nation of NATO to agree to each new member. And the negotiators of the Charter were careful to draw a distinction between supporting your efforts to help yourselves become the strongest possible for membership, and any kind of political commitment to certain membership. Those decisions can only be taken by NATO as a whole.
The Charter explicitly states that the Baltic countries, like all other members of the Partnership for Peace, or all other applicants for NATO membership, will have to meet the high standards NATO has set for new members. It also states the obvious. That is, that all NATO members must be convinced that your inclusion serves the overall strategic interests of the alliance and the security of Europe. Our commitment to the open door in NATO is unshakable. Our top priority is to maintain NATO as a strong and effective military alliance. That is after all what you want to join, not some kind of watered-down organizations.
Our message to the Baltic states can be summarized as follows: you have to run this race for yourselves, no one can run it for you or give you special treatment. But we, the United States, will ensure a level playing field. We will work with you to help prepare for it. And, as President Clinton and others have said, we want you to cross the finish line.
For the time being, our efforts are focused on helping you become the strongest possible candidates and creating an environment that would facilitate your eventual inclusion into NATO. It would be a mistake to put the actual issue of the membership of any other countries, and I'm speaking here not just about the Baltics but all of the other countries that hope to join, on the agenda now. It would be premature. The Senate has not yet ratified Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic. And a premature effort which failed would significantly cloud the long-term future. So this issue must be approached with two things in mind: an absolute understanding of what your country wants, and America has heard your message, and a certain understanding that it must be approached with the greatest of care and precision. Please don't misunderstand me. I'm not trying to discourage you, I'm trying to be realistic and candid, with a country for whom I have the highest respect.
I remain optimistic, as I look into the future. For three reasons. First, we've surmounted more difficult challenges in the past, and God knows, Estonia has. The U.S. stood by you in the Cold War when few believed your independence would be again within reach. And we're also standing with you now in your quest to become members of NATO. Secondly, time is on your side. Only one look back, and you can see how much has already been accomplished. You must consider ways to pursue a policy of small steps. Do not define partial success as failure. You are making steady progress in a critical area, really two critical areas: Western attitudes towards you, and Russian attitudes towards you. We have given you, to use the European Union's jargon, a perspective of membership in European and transatlantic institutions. I urge you to stay on track, and make the tough decisions.
Finally, let me conclude this comment on NATO by noting that I believe the positive impact of the Charter and other steps taken by the U.S. and its allies, as well as the EU decisions at the Amsterdam summit, have already had a remarkable and positive effect on Baltic security. A year ago, one sensed a mood of anxiety and pessimism in the Baltic states regarding the future. People talked openly about the dangers of a new Yalta, that NATO enlargement would leave the Baltic countries in some sort of grey zone. Today, I sense, and I'm told by our Embassy officials here and by the Estonian officials I've talked to, I sense a new sense of confidence in the region and in the country--partly related to the EU, partly related to your own economy, and partly related to a realization that Madrid was not an all-or-nothing roulette toss for the countries that were not invited in.
Today people are not talking about whether, but rather when and how Estonia and other Baltic countries can join the institutions of the West. This, I think, shows how far you have come in such a very short time.
Thank you very much.
