Back to Gideon RachmanThis is Nato’s 60th anniversary and the alliance is engaged in a proper war in Afghanistan. So you might expect the mood here in Strasbourg to be a mixture of the sombre and the celebratory. Instead, diplomats and bureaucrats are fussing about their usual concerns - protocol and security.
Nato officials are aghast that their secretary-general, Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, has had to beg for an invite to tonight’s official banquet. Apparently the French originally intended to exclude him, arguing that the meeting should be heads-of-state only. Scheffer had to jump through all sorts of humiliating hoops to make it to his own organisation’s birthday party. Also Carla Bruni has been a bit lazy about looking after her fellow spouses. By tradition, since the summit is taking place in France, Mrs Sarko should have acted as chief animatrice. But Nato people claim that that she has barely lifted a finger.
The most interesting story is the controversy over who is likely to be the next Nato secretary-general. Apparently it may not, after all, be Anders Fogh Rasmussen, the Danish PM. The Turkish opposition to him is real, because he was prime minister at the time of the Danish cartoons row. Nato officials first reaction was that the Turks might not be being serious; or that they were just being awkward and could be talked round. But that thinking is changing. One senior official whispers that the Turks might have a point after all. Denmark’s embassy in Pakistan was burnt to the ground during the cartoons’ row - and Rasmussen was attacked for allegedly haughty behaviour. With Nato so heavily involved in that part of the world, people are beginning to think he might not be the most tactful appointment.
Some might regard that line of reasoning as cowardly, others would see it as pragmatic. Whatever, the search is on for new candidates. Jonas Store, the Norwegian foreign minister, is the new name doing the rounds.
Strasbourg itself is a bit of a ghost town. At least Central London was still running during the G-20. But this city has essentially been shut down. Every now and then you can see a motorcade sweeping by, from behind a crash barrier. But other than that, all is silence.
Obama just did a town hall meeting in which he said - as sternly as he ever does - that it was about time that the Europeans stopped making excuses and pulled their weight in Afghanistan. Best of luck, there.
This blog covers a variety of topics from US foreign policy to European politics and the Middle East - and whatever else happens to be in the news or catch my attention. I joined the FT as chief foreign affairs commentator in 2006, after a 15-year career at The Economist which included stints as a correspondent in Brussels, Bangkok and Washington. I write a weekly column on foreign affairs, which appears in the paper on Tuesdays. Occasionally my FT colleagues contribute posts to this blog.
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