There’s a Girl Scouts song I learned in elementary school: “Make new friends, but keep the old. One is silver, and the other gold.” For America, our alliance with Europe is worth more than gold.
When the United States was attacked on September 11, 2001, European nations stood with us without hesitation. A headline in the French newspaper Le Monde proclaimed, “We are all Americans.” The day after the attack, NATO (the North Atlantic Treaty Organization) invoked Article V of the Washington Treaty for the first time in history, which stipulates that an attack on one ally is an attack on all of the allies. After decades of Americans standing alongside Europeans in places ranging from Utah Beach to Checkpoint Charlie to Kosovo, the Europeans were letting us know that they wanted to be right there beside us in our hour of need.
Unfortunately, from that high-water mark, the relationship deteriorated. Most of our European allies disagreed with the decision to invade Iraq. Many were put off by the “you’re either with us or against us” style of President George W. Bush’s Administration, exemplified by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld’s dismissive description of France and Germany as “Old Europe” at the height of the Iraq debate in early 2003. By 2009 positive views of America across Europe had eroded significantly, from 83 percent approval in the United Kingdom and 78 percent in Germany in 2000 to 53 and 31 percent, respectively, at the end of 2008. Clearly, the new Obama Administration had our work cut out for us.
Probably our greatest asset in turning the tide of European public opinion was “the Obama Effect.” Across the continent many Europeans were incredibly excited about our new President. As a candidate in July 2008, he had electrified an enormous crowd of nearly 200,000 people in Berlin. The day after the election a French newspaper headline proclaimed, “An American Dream.” In fact expectations ran so high that managing them and channeling all that positive energy into lasting progress became an early challenge.
Despite Bush-era strains, our bonds ran far deeper than any disagreements about particular policies. Our European allies remained America’s partners of first resort on nearly every challenge. And above all, this was an alliance of values, rooted in a deep commitment to liberty and democracy. The scars of two world wars and the Cold War were receding into history, but many Europeans were still mindful of the great sacrifices that Americans had made to keep them free. More than sixty thousand American soldiers lay buried in France alone.
The vision of Europe as whole, free, and at peace had been a goal of every U.S. administration since the end of the Cold War. At its heart was the notion that peoples and countries could move beyond old conflicts to chart a peaceful and prosperous future. I had seen how difficult this could be, how tightly the chains of history bound entire generations and societies. I once asked an official from southern Europe how things were going in her country. She started her answer by saying, “Since the Crusades . . .” That’s how deep memories ran in many parts of Europe and indeed around the world, as if the 20th and 21st centuries were just so much topsoil. Even as memory bound together neighbors and allies and saw them through difficult times, it also kept old hatreds alive and prevented people from turning their focus to the future. Yet the people of Western Europe had shown that it was possible to shake off the burdens of the past when they reconciled in the years after World War II. We saw it again after the fall of the Berlin Wall, when Central and Eastern Europe began the process of integration with each other and with the nations of the European Union.
By 2009 historic progress had been achieved across much of the continent, and in many ways we were closer than ever to the vision of a whole, free, peaceful Europe. But it was more fragile than many Americans may have realized. Along Europe’s periphery, southern European economies reeled from the financial crisis, the Balkans struggled still with the scars of war, democracy and human rights were under threat in too many former Soviet republics, and Russia under Putin had invaded Georgia, reawakening old fears. My predecessors had worked to build our alliances in Europe and to support the movement toward greater unity, freedom, and peace across the continent. Now it was my turn to pick up the baton and do everything I could to renew old ties and manage old conflicts.
Relations between nations are based on shared interests and values—but also on personalities. The personal element matters more in international affairs than many would expect, for good or ill. Think of the famous friendship between Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher that helped win the Cold War or the feud between Khrushchev and Mao that helped lose it. It was with this in mind that I began reaching out to key European leaders starting on my first full day at the State Department. Some I already knew and liked from my time as First Lady and Senator. Others would become new friends. But all of them would be our valuable partners in the work we hoped to do.
I began every call with a message of America’s reassurance and renewed commitment. David Miliband, the British Foreign Secretary, caused me to gulp and smile simultaneously when he said, “My goodness, your predecessors have left you with a world of problems. It’s a Herculean job, but I think you’re the right Hercules for this task.” I was flattered (as I was meant to be) but made clear that what I thought we needed was renewed partnership and common action, not a lone mythological hero.
David proved to be an invaluable partner. He was young, energetic, smart, creative, and attractive, with a ready smile. We found our views on how the world was changing remarkably similar. He believed in the importance of civil society and shared my concern for the growing numbers of out-of-work and disconnected young people in Europe, the United States, and around the world. In addition to becoming good professional colleagues, we developed a genuine friendship.
David’s boss was the embattled Labour Prime Minister Gordon Brown, Tony Blair’s successor. Gordon, an intelligent and dogged Scotsman, ended up presiding over the economic recession that hit Britain hard. He was dealt a bad hand, including the baggage of Tony’s unpopular support of Bush’s decision to invade Iraq. When he hosted the G-20 meeting in London in April 2009, I could see the strain he was under. He went on to lose the next election and was replaced by David Cameron, a Tory. President Obama and Cameron took to each other right off, starting with a private meeting before Cameron’s electoral victory. They had an easy rapport and enjoyed each other’s company. Cameron and I met together a number of times over the years, both with and without President Obama. He was intellectually curious and eager to exchange ideas about world events, from the unfolding Arab Spring to the crisis in Libya and the ongoing debate over economic austerity versus growth.
For Foreign Secretary, Cameron chose William Hague, a former leader of the Tory Party and an implacable political foe of Tony Blair in the late 1990s. Before the election, when he was still the Shadow Foreign Secretary, he came to see me in Washington. We both started off a bit cautiously with each other, but, much to my delight, I found him a thoughtful statesman with good sense and good humor. He also became a good friend. I was a fan of his biography of William Wilberforce, the chief advocate for ending slavery in 19th-century England. Hague brought to his job the understanding that diplomacy is slow and often boring but absolutely necessary. At a farewell dinner he hosted for me in 2013 at the British Embassy in Washington, his toast included the following gem: “It was a great former British Foreign Secretary and Prime Minister Lord Salisbury who said that diplomatic victories ‘are made up of a series of microscopic advantages: of a judicious suggestion here, of an opportune civility there, of a wise concession at one moment and a far-sighted persistence at another, of sleepless tact, immovable calmness, and patience that no folly, no provocation, no blunder can shake.’ ” That pretty well summed up my experience as America’s chief diplomat. It also reminded me that Hague was the David Beckham of toasting!
Across the English Channel I found other memorable partners. Bernard Kouchner, the French Foreign Minister, was a Socialist physician serving Nicolas Sarkozy, a Conservative President. Bernard had started Médecins Sans Frontières, or Doctors Without Borders, which provides medical care in disaster and conflict zones in some of the poorest places on earth. He was a key player after the devastating earthquake in Haiti in January 2010. I also worked closely with his successor, Alain Juppé, and later with Laurent Fabius, appointed by Sarkozy’s successor, François Hollande, who was elected in May 2012. Although from opposing political parties, Juppé and Fabius were both consummate professionals and enjoyable company.
Most leaders are quieter in person than they appear to be on the stage. Not Sarkozy. He was even more dramatic—and fun—in person. Sitting in a meeting with him was always an adventure. He’d jump up and gesture dramatically as he made his points, with his intrepid female interpreter struggling to keep up but usually managing to mimic him flawlessly, inflections and all. Sarkozy’s rapid-fire, almost stream-of-consciousness soliloquies covered the waterfront of foreign policy, sometimes making it challenging to get a word in edgewise, but I never tired of trying. He would gossip, casually describing other world leaders as crazy or infirm; one was a “drug-addled maniac”; another had a military “that didn’t know how to fight”; yet another came from a long line of “brutes.” Sarkozy was forever asking why all the diplomats who came to see him were so unforgivably old, gray, and male. We would laugh, debate, and argue, but most of the time we would end up agreeing on what needed to be done. Sarkozy was intent on reasserting France’s place as a top world power and eager to shoulder more of an international burden, which I saw in action in Libya. And despite his exuberance, he was always a gentleman. One chilly day in January 2010, as I was walking up the steps of the Élysée Palace in Paris to greet him, I stepped out of my shoe, leaving me barefoot in front of the press, who gleefully snapped pictures. He gracefully took my hand and helped me regain my footing. Later I sent him a copy of the photograph inscribed, “I may not be Cinderella but you’ll always be my Prince Charming.”
The most powerful leader in Europe, though, was a woman with a temperament nearly the opposite of Sarkozy’s: Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany. I first met Angela in 1994, during a visit with Bill to Berlin. She came from the former East Germany and was already serving as Minister of Women and Youth under Chancellor Helmut Kohl. When she was introduced to me, she was described as “a young woman who will go far”—words that proved prophetic. She and I stayed in touch over the years, even appearing together on a German television show in 2003. In 2005 she was elected Chancellor, the first woman leader of her country. For all of its vaunted progressivism on matters like health care and climate change, Europe can still feel like the world’s most venerable old boys’ club, and it was heartening to see Angela shaking things up.
My admiration for Angela grew during my term as Secretary of State. She was decisive, astute, and straightforward, and she always told me exactly what was on her mind. As an accomplished scientist, having studied physics and earned a doctorate with a dissertation on quantum chemistry, she was particularly knowledgeable on technical issues like climate change and nuclear power. She brought her curiosity about the world to every discussion, armed with questions about events, people, and ideas—a welcome change from some other world leaders who seemed to think they already knew everything worth knowing.
When the Chancellor visited Washington for a state visit in June 2011, I hosted a lunch for her at the State Department and toasted her warmly. In response she presented me with a framed German newspaper covering a recent visit I had made to Berlin. As soon as I saw it, I started to laugh. The front page featured a large photo of the two of us standing side-by-side, but with our heads cropped out. Two sets of hands clasped in front of two similar pantsuits in just the same way. The paper challenged its readers to guess which one was Angela Merkel and which one was me. I had to admit that it was hard to tell. The framed newspaper hung in my office for the remainder of my time as Secretary.
During the worst years of the global financial crisis, Angela’s leadership was put to the test. Europe was hit hard by the crash and faced unique challenges because of the single currency shared by many of its nations, the euro. The weakest economies—Greece, Spain, Portugal, Italy, and Ireland—faced staggering public debt, anemic growth, and high unemployment, but they did not have the monetary policy tools at their disposal that come from controlling your own currency. In exchange for emergency help, Germany, the strongest economy in the Eurozone, insisted that these countries take drastic measures to reduce spending and reform their budgets.
The crisis posed a difficult policy dilemma. If these weak economies failed to get out from under their debts, the entire Eurozone might collapse, which would throw the world and our own economy into turmoil. Yet I also worried that too much austerity in Europe would slow growth even further, making it harder for them and the rest of the world to climb out of the hole. In the United States, President Obama responded to the recession by pushing an aggressive investment program through Congress to get growth going again, while working to reduce the national debt over the long term. It was reasonable to suggest that Europe should take similar steps rather than just cutting spending, which would contract the economy even more.
I spent a lot of time talking to European leaders about these challenges, including Merkel. One could agree or not with her fiscal and monetary policies, but it was impossible not to be impressed with her steely determination. As I observed in 2012, she was “carrying Europe on her shoulders.”
The strongest link in the transatlantic chain was NATO, the military alliance that included Canada as well as our European partners. (Many Americans may take our relationship with Canada for granted, but our northern neighbor is an indispensable partner in nearly everything we do around the world.) Beginning at the start of the Cold War, NATO succeeded in containing the Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact nations for four decades. After the end of the Cold War, the Alliance prepared for new threats to the security of the transatlantic community. Virtually all of the former Soviet republics, other than Russia itself, felt vulnerable without some security guarantees from the West, given their fear that Russia might someday revert to aggressive, expansionist behavior. Led by the United States, NATO decided to open the door to any of the countries to the East. The Alliance also established a network of partnerships with many former Soviet republics and a consultative council with Russia itself. As the Clinton Administration made clear at the time, NATO, while dealing with new challenges, would still retain what was called a “hedge” capacity should a future Russia once again threaten its neighbors.
While NATO forces were fighting to bring peace to Kosovo, Bill and I celebrated its fiftieth anniversary with a summit of its leaders in April 1999, hosting the largest gathering of heads of state ever to meet in Washington. The meeting marked great optimism about the future for Europe and NATO. Václav Havel, the first post–Cold War President of the Czech Republic and a fierce and compelling democracy advocate, remarked, “This is the first summit of the Alliance that is attended by representatives of . . . countries that were members of the Warsaw Pact no more than ten years ago. . . . Let us hope that we are thus entering a world in which the fates of nations are not decided by powerful foreign dictators but by the nations themselves.” If not, he might have added, let us be prepared to defend the freedom we have gained.
In 2004, seven more former Eastern bloc nations joined, expanding NATO’s reach even farther. Two more, Albania and Croatia, did so on April 1, 2009, bringing the total membership to twenty-eight. Others, including Ukraine, Bosnia, Moldova, and Georgia, were exploring the possibilities of future European Union and NATO membership.
In the wake of Russia’s illegal annexation of Crimea in early 2014, some have argued that NATO expansion either caused or exacerbated Russia’s aggression. I disagree with that argument, but the most convincing voices refuting it are those European leaders and people who express their gratitude for NATO membership. It gives them greater confidence about their future in light of the ambitions of Russia’s President, Vladimir Putin. They understand that Putin’s claim that NATO’s open door is a threat to Russia reflects his refusal to accept the idea that Russia’s relations with the West could be based on partnership and mutual interests, as Boris Yeltsin and Mikhail Gorbachev believed. Those who give credence to Putin’s position should ponder how much more serious the crisis would be—and how much more difficult it would be to contain further Russian aggression if Eastern and Central European nations were not now NATO allies. The NATO door should remain open, and we should be clear and tough-minded in dealing with Russia.
By the time President Obama took office, NATO had become a democratic community of nearly a billion people stretching from the Baltics in the East to Alaska in the West. At my first visit to NATO’s Brussels headquarters in March 2009, the hallways resounded with excitement about the “return” of American engagement. I shared the feeling and spent many hours with the NATO Foreign Ministers and NATO’s Secretary-General, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, the former Prime Minister of Denmark, the kind of experienced and skillful leader that the Alliance needed.
Sometimes there were growing pains, not all of them serious. Bulgaria, for example, which joined NATO in 2004, was a faithful partner in Afghanistan and other missions. Yet when I visited its capital, Sofia, in February 2012, Prime Minister Boyko Borisov was clearly nervous about our meeting. I knew we had serious matters to discuss and hoped nothing was wrong. After all, we were allies now. “Madam Secretary, I was very worried when I saw television footage of you getting off the plane,” he began. “I was briefed by my chief of staff that when your hair is pulled back, it means you’re in a bad mood.” My hair was in fact pulled back at that very moment (perhaps invoking bad memories of KGB agents and Communist Party apparatchiks). I looked at the mostly bald Prime Minister, smiled, and said, “It just takes me a little longer to do my hair than it takes you.” He laughed, and with that out of the way, we went on to have a productive meeting.
The long war in Afghanistan had taxed NATO’s capacities and exposed gaps in its preparedness. Some allies were slashing their defense budgets, leaving others (mostly the United States) to pick up the slack. Everyone was suffering from the economic crisis. There were voices on both sides of the Atlantic asking whether NATO was still relevant twenty years after the end of the Cold War.
I thought NATO remained essential for meeting the evolving threats of the 21st century. America can’t and shouldn’t do everything by ourselves; that’s why building partnerships around common interests and goals was so important. NATO was still by far our most capable partner, especially since its members voted to act “out of area” for the first time in Bosnia in 1995, a recognition that our collective security could be threatened beyond direct attacks on NATO countries themselves. And NATO allies sacrificed their blood and treasure in Afghanistan, a commitment we should never forget.
In 2011 we were able to show what a relevant 21st-century NATO looks like as the Alliance took the lead in the military intervention to protect civilians in Libya, working in concert for the first time with the Arab League and its member nations. Fourteen allies and four Arab partners contributed naval and air forces to the mission. Contrary to the views of some critics, this proved to be a successful joint operation. The United States provided unique capabilities but our allies—not us—flew 75 percent of the sorties and were responsible for striking 90 percent of the more than six thousand targets destroyed in Libya. That was a nearly exact reversal of the distribution of labor a decade before, during NATO’s intervention in Kosovo, when the United States was responsible for 90 percent of the bombing of air defenses and military targets. And though Britain and France led the way with their capable militaries, the effort extended beyond them. Italy dedicated seven air bases to hosting hundreds of allied jets. Belgian, Canadian, Danish, Dutch, and Norwegian planes, as well as jets from the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Qatar, and Jordan, all contributed to the more than twenty-six thousand sorties. The Greek, Spanish, Turkish, and Romanian navies helped enforce the arms embargo at sea. It was a true team effort, just as NATO was intended to be.
If NATO is one of the most successful military alliances in history, the European Union (EU) is one of the most successful political and economic organizations. In a remarkably short period of time, countries that had fought two world wars in the 20th century agreed to make decisions by consensus and elect representatives to a shared Parliament. Despite the EU’s unwieldy bureaucracy, it is nothing short of miraculous that it exists and persists.
The EU’s many contributions to peace and prosperity within and beyond its borders were honored with a Nobel Peace Prize in 2012. Individually and collectively our European partners accomplish so much around the world. Norway is second to none in supporting global public health projects. Ireland, a land once ravaged by famine, leads the way on ending hunger. The Netherlands sets the standard for working on poverty and sustainable development. The Baltic states, Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania, provide invaluable support and expertise to pro-democracy activists around the world. The Danes, Swedes, and Finns are champions on climate change. The list could go on and on.
I wanted to expand our partnership with the EU, especially on energy and economics. Early on in President Obama’s first term, I urged the EU to start the U.S.-EU Energy Council to coordinate transatlantic efforts to help vulnerable countries, particularly in Eastern and Central Europe, develop their own energy resources, where possible, and reduce dependency on Russian gas. The U.S. and EU also began discussing a comprehensive economic agreement that would harmonize regulations, increase trade, and spur growth on both sides of the Atlantic.
None of our relationships in Europe needed more tending than Turkey, a country of more than 70 million people, overwhelmingly Muslim, with one foot in Europe and one in Southwest Asia. Modern Turkey, established by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk out of the disintegration of the Ottoman Empire after World War I, was intended to be a secular democracy oriented toward the West. It joined NATO in 1952 and was a reliable ally throughout the Cold War, sending troops to fight alongside ours in Korea and hosting U.S. forces for decades. Yet the Turkish military, which saw itself as the guarantor of Atatürk’s vision, intervened a number of times over the years to topple governments it saw as too Islamist, too left-wing, or too weak. Maybe that was good for the Cold War, but it delayed democratic progress.
Unfortunately the Bush years took a toll on our relations, and by 2007 approval of the United States had collapsed to just 9 percent in Turkey, the lowest in any of the forty-seven countries surveyed by the Pew Research Center’s Global Attitudes Project that year.
Meanwhile, Turkey’s economy was booming, with one of the fastest growth rates in the world. As the rest of Europe staggered under the financial crisis and the Middle East stagnated, Turkey emerged as a regional powerhouse. Like Indonesia, Turkey was testing whether democracy, modernity, women’s rights, secularism, and Islam could all coexist, and people across the Middle East were watching. It was strongly in the interest of the United States that this experiment succeed and that relations between our countries get back on firmer footing.
I visited Turkey as part of my first trip to Europe as Secretary. In addition to meetings with top Turkish officials, including Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and President Abdullah Gül, I reached out directly to the Turkish people, as I tried to do everywhere. This was particularly important in countries where governments wanted to work with us but large segments of the population were generally distrustful or anti-American. By taking my case directly to the people, via the mass media, I was trying to influence attitudes, which, in turn, could give governments greater political cover to cooperate with us.
A popular television talk show called Haydi Gel Bizimle Ol, or Come and Join Us, invited me to appear as a guest. Similar in format to The View, it appealed to a wide cross-section of Turkish society, especially women. The hosts, a diverse collection of women, asked me about serious policy issues as well as more personal questions. The discussion was warm, funny, and wide-ranging.
“When was the last time you fell in love and felt like a simple person with a simple life?” one of them wanted to know. This wasn’t normal fodder for a Secretary of State, but it was exactly the kind of topic that might help me connect to viewers. I talked about meeting my husband in law school, falling in love, and building a life together, and also about the challenge of raising a family in the public eye. “I think that my favorite times are when my husband and my daughter and I are together and we do simple things,” I said. “I mean, we go to the movies, we talk and play games together, card games and board games. We go for long walks. I try to do that every chance I can with my husband. And my daughter is busy with her own life now, but when she can, she joins us. So it’s not easy, but I work really hard to find those quiet times when the spotlights aren’t on and when you can just be yourself and be with people that you enjoy and love. And those are the best times in life.”
The audience in the room warmly applauded, and the feedback collected afterward by our embassy staff was encouraging. For many Turks who had become distrustful of America and its leaders, it apparently was a pleasant surprise to see the U.S. Secretary of State as a normal person with cares and concerns similar to their own. Maybe as a result they’d be more receptive to what I had to say about the future of U.S.-Turkish relations.
One man in particular held the key to the future of Turkey and of our relationship: Prime Minister Erdoğan. (In the Turkish system, the President is largely a ceremonial post and the Prime Minister actually runs the government.) I first met him when he was Mayor of Istanbul in the 1990s. He was an ambitious, forceful, devout, and effective politician. Turks first elected his Islamist Party in 2002 and reelected them in 2007 and 2011. Prime Minister Erdoğan viewed all three elections as mandates for sweeping change. His government aggressively went after alleged coup plotters in the military and managed to gain a tighter grip on power than any of its civilian predecessors. (The term Islamist generally refers to people and parties who support a guiding role for Islam in politics and government. It covers a wide spectrum, from those who think Islamic values should inform public policy decisions to those who think all laws should be judged or even formulated by Islamic authorities to conform to Islamic law. Not all Islamists are alike. In some cases, Islamist leaders and organizations have been hostile to democracy, including some who have supported radical, extremist, and terrorist ideology and actions. But around the world, there are political parties with religious affiliations—Hindu, Christian, Jewish, Muslim—that respect the rules of democratic politics, and it is in America’s interest to encourage all religiously based political parties and leaders to embrace inclusive democracy and reject violence. Any suggestion that faithful Muslims or people of any faith cannot thrive in a democracy is insulting, dangerous, and wrong. They do it in our own country every day.)
Some of the changes under Erdoğan’s leadership were positive. Motivated by the requirements of potential EU membership (which up to now has remained out of reach), Turkey abolished state security courts, reformed the penal code, expanded the right to legal counsel, and eased restrictions on teaching and broadcasting in Kurdish. Erdoğan also announced an intention to pursue a “Zero Problems with Neighbors” foreign policy. The initiative to resolve old regional conflicts and take a more active role in the Middle East was advocated by Ahmet Davutoğlu, one of Erdoğan’s advisors who later became Foreign Minister. Zero Problems sounded good, and in many cases it was constructive. But it also made Turkey overeager to accept an inadequate diplomatic agreement with its neighbor, Iran, that would have done little to address the international community’s concerns about Tehran’s nuclear program.
Despite positive developments under Erdoğan, there was growing cause for concern, even alarm, about his government’s treatment of political opponents and journalists. Decreasing room for public dissent raised questions about the direction Erdoğan was taking the country and his commitment to democracy. Opponents were suspicious that his ultimate goal was to turn Turkey into an Islamic state with no room for dissent, and some of his actions gave support to that fear. His government jailed journalists at a troubling rate in his second and third terms and cracked down hard on protesters for questioning certain decrees. Corruption remained a massive problem, and the government was not able to keep up with the rapidly rising expectations of its increasingly worldly and middle-class citizens.
Religious and cultural issues were particularly sensitive in a country where Islam and secularism had lived in uneasy balance and different faith traditions sometimes felt squeezed. Over the years I had gotten to know the Patriarch of the Greek Orthodox Church, His All Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, and I respected his sincere commitment to interfaith dialogue and religious freedom. Patriarch Bartholomew viewed Erdoğan as a constructive partner, but the Church was still waiting for the government to return seized Church property and allow the long-shuttered Halki Seminary to reopen. I supported the Patriarch’s goal and made a number of runs at getting Halki reopened, which sadly hasn’t happened yet.
When Erdoğan talked about giving women students the right to wear head scarves at university, some saw it as a step forward for religious freedom and a woman’s right to choose her own course. Others saw it as a blow to secularism, a sign of creeping theocracy that would ultimately curtail women’s rights. It speaks to the deep contradictions in 21st-century Turkey that both views may be correct. Erdoğan himself was very proud of his own accomplished daughters, who wore veils, and he asked my advice about one of them pursuing graduate studies in the United States.
I spent hours talking with Erdoğan, often accompanied only by Davutoğlu, who served as our interpreter. Davutoğlu is an exuberant academic turned diplomat and politician, and his writings about how Turkey could regain a position of global importance dovetailed with Erdoğan’s own thoughts. He brought passion and erudition to his position, and we developed a productive and friendly working relationship that, though strained numerous times, never ruptured.
In my four years as Secretary, Turkey proved to be an important and at times frustrating partner. Sometimes we agreed (working closely together on Afghanistan, counterterrorism, Syria, and other issues), and other times we did not (Iran’s nuclear program).
Time and attention from both President Obama and me helped stabilize our relationship, but external events, especially heightened tensions with Israel, presented new challenges. And Turkey’s internal dynamics continued to roil. Large protests against Erdoğan’s increasingly heavy-handed rule erupted in 2013, followed by a wide-ranging corruption investigation that ensnared a number of his senior Ministers. As of this writing, despite his increasing authoritarianism, Erdoğan’s support in more conservative areas of Turkey remains strong. Turkey’s future direction is uncertain. But what is certain is that Turkey will continue to play a significant role in both the Middle East and Europe. And our relationship will remain of vital importance to the United States.
A Zero Problems foreign policy was an ambitious goal, especially because Turkey was entangled in a number of long-running disputes with its neighbors. There was the bitter standoff with Greece over the Mediterranean island nation of Cyprus that had dragged on for decades. There was also the emotionally charged conflict with Armenia, a small, landlocked former Soviet republic in the Caucasus to Turkey’s east. These were both examples of how old enmities could hold back new progress.
Turkey and Armenia never established official diplomatic relations when Armenia emerged as an independent nation after the breakup of the Soviet Union. Tensions were further heightened by Armenia’s war in the early 1990s with Turkey’s ally Azerbaijan over a contested strip of land called Nagorno-Karabakh. That dispute still occasionally flares into hostilities between soldiers on both sides of the border.
Disputes such as Turkey-Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh are sometimes called “frozen conflicts” because they have been going on for years with little hope of resolution. When I looked at all the challenges we faced in Europe and around the world, it was tempting to just ignore these trouble spots as insoluble. But they each had broader strategic consequences. For example, conflict in the Caucasus posed problems for our plans for piping Central Asian natural gas to European markets to lessen their dependence on Russian energy. Collectively these conflicts represented obstacles to the Europe we were trying to help build. I thought Turkey’s Zero Problems strategy might create an opening to negotiate—and perhaps even resolve—some of these frozen conflicts, so I asked my Assistant Secretary for European and Eurasian Affairs Phil Gordon to see what we could do.
Throughout 2009 we worked closely with European partners, including Switzerland, France, Russia, and the EU, to support negotiations between Turkey and Armenia, which we hoped would lead to establishing formal diplomatic relations and opening the border to trade. I spoke on the phone with officials from both countries nearly thirty times in my first several months on the job and conferred in person with Davutoğlu and the Armenian Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian.
Hard-liners in both countries were implacably opposed to compromise and put considerable pressure on each government not to make a deal. Yet over the spring and summer, thanks largely to the efforts of the Swiss, the terms of an agreement that would jointly open the border were coming into focus. Plans were made for a formal signing ceremony in Switzerland in October, after which the agreement would be submitted to both countries’ Parliaments for ratification. As the date approached, we stepped up our encouragement, including a call from President Obama to the President of Armenia. Everything seemed to be falling into place.
On October 9, I flew to Zurich to witness the accord signing alongside the Foreign Ministers of France, Russia, and Switzerland and the EU High Representative. The next afternoon I left my hotel and headed to the University of Zurich for the ceremony. But there was a problem. Nalbandian, the Armenian Minister, was balking. He was worried about what Davutoğlu planned to say at the signing and suddenly was refusing to leave the hotel. It seemed as if months of careful negotiations might fall apart. My motorcade turned around and raced back to Zurich’s Dolder Grand Hotel. While I waited in the car, Phil Gordon went upstairs along with the lead Swiss negotiator to find Nalbandian and take him to the signing ceremony. But he wouldn’t budge. Phil came back downstairs to report and joined me in the car, which was now parked behind the hotel. I started working the phones. On one cell I dialed Nalbandian, and I got Davutoğlu on a second line. We went back and forth for an hour, trying to bridge the gap and coax Nalbandian out of his room. “This is too important, this has to be seen through, we have come too far,” I told them.
Finally I went upstairs to talk to Nalbandian in person. What if we simply canceled the speaking portion of the event? Sign the document, make no statements, and leave. Both sides agreed, and Nalbandian at last emerged. We walked downstairs, and he got in my sedan to drive to the university. It took another hour and a half of hand-holding and arm-twisting at the site to get them to actually walk onstage. We were three hours late, but at least we were there. We held the expedited signing ceremony, and then, with a huge sense of relief, everyone left as fast as they could. To date, neither country has ratified the protocols, and the process remains stalled; however, at a December 2013 conference, the Turkish and Armenian Foreign Ministers met for two hours to discuss how to move forward, and I still hope for a breakthrough.
On my way to the airport after the signing, President Obama called to offer his congratulations. It hadn’t been pretty, but we’d taken a step forward for a sensitive region. Later the New York Times described my efforts that afternoon as “down-to-the-wire, limousine diplomacy.” My car wasn’t a limousine, but apart from that, it was an apt description.
The Balkan wars of the 1990s provide a searing reminder that old hatreds in Europe can erupt into new and devastating violence.
When I visited Bosnia in October 2010 as part of a three-day trip through the Balkans, I was both pleased by the progress I saw and sobered by how much there still was to do. Children could now go to school in safety and parents could go to work, but there weren’t enough good jobs, and economic hardship and discontent simmered. The virulent ethnic and religious hatreds that fueled the wars had cooled, but dangerous currents of sectarianism and nationalism persisted. The country was a federation of two republics, one dominated by Bosnian Muslims and Croats, the other dominated by Bosnian Serbs. The Bosnian Serbs thwarted all attempts to remove roadblocks to growth and good governance, in the stubborn hope that they could one day become a part of Serbia or even an independent country. The promise of greater stability and opportunity represented by integration into the EU or NATO remained out of reach.
In Sarajevo I participated in an open discussion with students and civil society leaders at the historic National Theater, which had escaped serious damage in the war. One young man rose to speak about his visit to the United States as part of an exchange program sponsored by the State Department and hosted by American colleges and universities. He called it “easily one of the best experiences” of his life and implored me to keep supporting and expanding academic exchanges. When I asked him to elaborate on why he thought it was so important, he said, “The main thing that we learned was to choose tolerance over intolerance, to work with each other to respect everyone equally. . . . We had participants from Kosovo and from Serbia at the same time, and they didn’t care about the issues that their countries are going through because they realized . . . we are friends, we can have a dialogue, we can interact together; it’s not a problem if you really want to do it.” I loved the simple phrase “choose tolerance over intolerance.” It captured perfectly the transition the people of the Balkans were still making. It was the only way to heal their—or any—old wounds.
Next it was on to Kosovo. In the 1990s, Kosovo was part of Serbia, and its majority–ethnic Albanian population faced brutal attacks and forced expulsion by Milošević’s forces. In 1999, a U.S.-led NATO air campaign bombed Serbian troops and cities, including Belgrade, to stop the ethnic cleansing. In 2008, Kosovo declared its independence and was recognized as a new nation by much of the international community. But Serbia refused to recognize Kosovo’s independence and continued to exert significant influence in the northern border region, where many ethnic Serbs lived. The majority of hospitals, schools, and even courts there continued to be run and financed from Belgrade, and Serbian security forces provided protection, all of which undermined Kosovo’s sovereignty, exacerbated the country’s internal divisions, and strained relations between the two neighbors. The tense situation was getting in the way of the economic and social progress both countries needed to make on their own, including moving toward EU membership. But old histories and hatreds were proving difficult to transcend. One goal of my visit was to nudge both sides toward a resolution.
When I arrived in Pristina, Kosovo’s capital, enthusiastic crowds waving American flags lined the road from the airport, cheering as our motorcade passed, often with children sitting on adults’ shoulders so they could see. By the time we reached the plaza in town, which features a monumental statue of Bill, the crowds were so dense our motorcade had to stop. I was glad it did; I wanted to say hello. So I jumped out and started shaking hands and hugging and being hugged. Across the plaza was an adorable little clothing boutique with a familiar name: Hillary. I couldn’t resist a quick visit. The shopkeeper said they named the store after me “so that Bill wouldn’t be lonely in the square.”
A few months later, in March 2011, representatives from Kosovo and Serbia sat down together in Brussels under the auspices of the European Union. It was the first time they had ever talked directly and at length with each other in this way. American diplomats were present for every meeting, urging both sides to make the compromises that could lead to normalized relations and open the door to eventual EU membership. That was possible only if the border issues were resolved. The talks continued for eighteen months. Negotiators reached modest agreements on freedom of movement, customs, and border management. While Serbia still wouldn’t recognize Kosovo’s independence, it dropped its objections to Kosovo’s participating in regional conferences. At the same time, I was urging NATO to continue its military mission in Kosovo, where around five thousand peace-supporting troops from thirty-one countries have remained since June 1999.
The main issues remained unresolved when a new nationalist government was elected in Serbia in the spring of 2012. Cathy Ashton, the EU’s top foreign policy official (its first High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy), and I decided to travel together to both countries to see if we could break the impasse and speed a final settlement.
Cathy was an invaluable partner on this and many other issues. In Britain she had served as leader of the House of Lords and Lord President of the Council under Prime Minister Gordon Brown. Then, following a year as the European Commissioner of Trade, she was selected for the EU foreign affairs position—a bit of a surprise because, like me, she was not a traditional career diplomat, but she turned out to be an effective and creative partner. Down-to-earth (especially for a Baroness, I would kid her), she was easy to get along with, and we worked closely together not only on European issues but also on Iran and the Middle East. We’d also catch each other’s attention in a large meeting when one of our male colleagues unintentionally, even unconsciously, slipped in a sexist remark, and we slowly roll our eyes together.
In October 2012, we made the rounds in the Balkans together. We urged each country to advance concrete measures to normalize relations. Kosovar Prime Minister Hashim Thaçi told us, “Today Kosovo is still not the Kosovo of our dreams. We are persistently working for a European Kosovo, for a Euro-Atlantic Kosovo. We are conscious that we need to do more.” Cathy and I also met with representatives of the ethnic Serbian minority at a Serbian Orthodox church in Pristina, which had been torched during anti-Serb riots in 2004. They worried about their future in an independent Kosovo. They were grateful for recent efforts by the government to be more inclusive and to offer jobs to ethnic Serbs. That was the kind of grassroots reconciliation that we wanted to promote. Kosovo’s impressive female Muslim President, Atifete Jahjaga, was our ally in pushing for change and reconciliation inside her country. As Cathy put it, this diplomacy was not just about normalizing relations between countries; it was about “normalizing life so that the people who live in the north can go about their daily lives feeling part of a community.”
In April 2013, thanks to Cathy’s continued hard work building on the foundation we had laid together, Kosovo’s Prime Minister Thaçi and Serbia’s Prime Minister Ivica Dačić reached a landmark agreement to resolve the disputes along their border, move toward normalization, and open the door to EU membership. Kosovo agreed to give more autonomy to local Serbian communities in the north, and Serbia agreed to pull back its forces. Both sides pledged not to interfere in the other’s quest for greater European integration. If they proceed to implement the agreements, the people of Kosovo and Serbia finally have a chance to build the peaceful, prosperous future they deserve.
My final trip as Secretary of State in December 2012 brought me again to Northern Ireland, a place where people have worked hard and suffered much to leave their past conflicts behind. They would be the first to tell you, from both sides of their Catholic-Protestant sectarian divide, that their work is far from over and that their biggest challenge is stimulating enough economic activity to create inclusive prosperity that benefits each community. Still, at a luncheon in Belfast, happily surrounded by old friends and acquaintances, we reminisced about how far we’d come together.
When Bill was first elected President, the Troubles in Northern Ireland had been raging for decades. Most Protestants wanted to remain part of the United Kingdom, while most Catholics wanted to join with the Republic of Ireland to the south, and long years of violence had left both sides embittered and dug in. Northern Ireland was an island within an island. Street by street, the old touchstones of identity loomed large—which church a family went to, which school the children attended, which soccer jersey they wore, which street they walked down, at which hour of the day, with which friends. Everybody noticed everything. And that was on a normal day.
In 1995, Bill appointed former Senator George Mitchell as Special Envoy for Northern Ireland. Bill became the first U.S. President to visit Northern Ireland when he and I traveled to Belfast later that year, and turned on the lights of Belfast’s Christmas tree in front of a vast crowd.
I returned to Northern Ireland nearly every year for the rest of the decade and stayed actively involved as a Senator in the years that followed. In 1998 I helped organize the Vital Voices Conference of women in Belfast who were pressing for a peace agreement. Their whispers of “Enough!” had become a rallying cry that could no longer be ignored. As I spoke from the podium, I looked up and saw Gerry Adams, Martin McGuinness, and other leaders of Sinn Féin, the political wing of the Irish Republican Army, sitting in the front row of the balcony. Behind them I saw leading Unionists who refused to talk with Sinn Féin. The fact that they were both there—at a women’s conference for peace—exemplified their openness to compromise.
The Good Friday Agreement, which was signed that year and put Northern Ireland on the path toward peace, was a triumph of diplomacy, especially for Bill and George Mitchell, who did so much to bring the parties together. Most of all, though, it was a testament to the courage of the people of Northern Ireland. It felt like one of those moments when “hope and history rhyme,” in the words of the great Irish poet Seamus Heaney. Implementation would be bumpy, but peace began to bring benefits. Unemployment fell, home values rose, and the number of American companies investing in Northern Ireland increased.
By the time I returned as Secretary of State in 2009, the global financial crisis had taken a heavy toll on the celebrated “Celtic Tiger.” Roadblocks and barbed wire were gone from the streets, but the process of disarmament and “devolution,” which was supposed to grant increasing autonomy to Northern Ireland, was in danger of stalling. Many Catholics and Protestants still lived segregated lives, in separate neighborhoods, some still divided by actual walls—which had the Orwellian name “peace walls.”
In March 2009, two British soldiers were killed in County Antrim and a policeman was killed in County Armagh. Rather than sparking violence, the murders had the opposite effect. Catholics and Protestants marched together in vigils, attended interfaith services, and declared with one voice their refusal to go back to the old ways. The killings could have been the start of a backward slide. Instead they proved how far Northern Ireland had come. On a visit in October 2009 and in frequent phone calls to Northern Ireland’s First Minister Peter Robinson, Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness, and other leaders, I urged them to continue disarmament by paramilitary groups and take the final steps of devolution, especially on putting the vital areas of policing and justice under the control of the Northern Irish government.
Addressing a full session of the Northern Ireland Assembly, I reminded them, “There have been many moments in Northern Ireland’s peace journey when progress seemed difficult, when every route forward was blocked, and there seemed to be nowhere to go. But you have always found a way to do what you believed was right for the people of Northern Ireland.” Because of this perseverance, “Northern Ireland stands as an example to the world of how even the staunchest adversaries can overcome differences to work together for the common and greater good. So I encourage you to move forward now with that same spirit of unstoppable grit and resolve. And I pledge that the United States will be behind you all the way, as you work toward peace and stability that lasts.”
Just weeks after my visit, a car bomb seriously injured another policeman, and it again seemed as if the carefully stitched fabric of peace might unravel. But once again it held. In February 2010, the parties reached a new deal on policing powers, called the Hillsborough Agreement. Progress toward a lasting peace was back on track, despite the best efforts of extremists on both sides to derail the process. In June 2012, we saw the most remarkable sign of change yet: Queen Elizabeth visited Northern Ireland and shook hands with Martin McGuinness. It was a gesture that would have been unimaginable just a few years before.
In December 2012, seventeen years since my first visit to Belfast, I was back there and I ran into an old friend, Sharon Haughey. In 1995, when she was just fourteen years old, she sent Bill a deeply moving letter about the future she dreamed of for herself and for Northern Ireland. He read an excerpt at the Christmas tree lighting in Belfast. “Both sides have been hurt. Both sides will have to forgive,” she wrote. When Sharon got a little older, she worked as an intern in my Senate office, helping serve New York, with its large and proud Irish American community. She learned a lot in Washington, and when she went home she ran for office and was elected Lord Mayor of Armagh. When she showed up at that lunch in 2012, she was wearing her ceremonial chain of office and told me she had plans to be married later that month. I thought about the family Sharon would start and about all the children growing up in Northern Ireland after the Good Friday Agreement. They had a chance at lives uncolored by the pain of the Troubles. I hoped they would never turn back and that their peace and progress would be an inspiration for the rest of Europe and the world.