The Delegates Lounge

The High North: Winter is Going

• The Delegates Lounge LLC • Season 1 • Episode 3

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What if the melting Arctic ice could reshape global power dynamics? Join us as we sit down with Norway's Foreign Minister, Espen Barth Eide, to discuss the emerging significance of the Arctic region in today's geopolitical landscape. From the creation of new sea routes to the evolving strategic challenges in the Arctic, Minister Eide offers an in-depth look at the interplay between environmental change and international diplomacy. J. Alex Tarquinio, our host in The Delegates Lounge, sat down with Norway’s foreign minister during the North Atlantic Treaty Organization's 75th Anniversary Summit in Washington. 

With the accession of Finland and Sweden into NATO, the Russian Federation is now the only Arctic state that’s not a member of NATO. But Moscow has more military bases within the Arctic Circle than the NATO members overall. For its part, China has declared itself a “near Arctic nation,” a claim that Norway’s foreign minister brushed aside.

Speakers:

J. Alex Tarquinio (host). @alextarquinio of @delegateslounge on X, formerly known as Twitter.
Espen Barth Eide, Norway’s Foreign Minister (guest). @EspenBarthEide of @NorwayMFA on X, formerly known as Twitter.

References:

Espen Barth Eide, during his first term as foreign minister, in the government of Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg, invited NATO members to the Arctic in 2013.

https://www.nato.int/docu/review/articles/2013/05/06/the-changing-arctic-how-involved-should-nato-be/index.html

Russia's military bases inside the Arctic Circle outnumber NATO’s, according to data compiled by the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) and Reuters.

https://www.reuters.com/graphics/ARCTIC-SECURITY/zgvobmblrpd/

The United States, Canada, and Finland announced the trilateral Icebreaker Collaboration Effort, or “ICE Pact."

https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2024/07/11/biden-harris-administration-announces-new-polar-partnership-ice-pact-alongside-finland-and-canada/

For more on the sanctions, refer to the U.S. Treasury and State Department press releases.

https://home.treasury.gov/news/press-releases/jy2546

https://www.state.gov/new-measures-to-degrade-russias-wartime-economy/


The United Nations published its latest sea-level rise report in August.

https://www.un.org/climatechange/reports/sea-level-rise

The conversation included a discussion about the influence of the Norwegian political thriller TV series set in the near future "Occupied."

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4192998/

Program Note:

The sharp-eared among you will have noted the bird calls. We received permission from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology’s Macaulay Library for the recording of the Ivory Gull, a Near Threatened Arctic bird.

Credit: Ivory Gull by Stewart D. MacDonald; Cornell Lab of Ornithology | Macaulay Library

Alex Tarquinio:

Welcome to the Delegates Lounge. Pull up a chair. I'm Alex Tarquinio, a journalist based at the United Nations here in New York City and your emcee for this podcast featuring some of the most influential minds in the world today. Settle in for some riveting tete-a-tete, available wherever you listen to podcasts. Welcome back. Typically, you'll find us near the Delegates' Lounge at the United Nations in New York City. That hubbub you're hearing was recorded in July near the Delegates' Lounge at the North Atlantic Treaty Organization's 75th Anniversary Summit in Washington DC.

Alex Tarquinio:

If you're just joining us, don't miss the episode called NATO's Turning Point, where we explore the challenges along NATO's eastern and southern boundaries in exclusive interviews with the Estonian Defense Minister and the Czech and Spanish Foreign Ministers. In this episode we'll head north with Norway's Foreign Minister, Espen Barth Eide. Jens Stoltenberg, when he was Norway's Prime Minister, appointed Minister Eide first as Defense Minister and then Foreign Minister. Last appointed Minister Eide first as defense minister and then foreign minister. Last year, minister Eide was appointed to his second term as foreign minister, this time in the government of Prime Minister . Throughout his time in office, minister Eide has been striving to raise awareness of the geostrategic risks in the high north. As Norwegians refer to the Arctic region. It was back in 2013 when, as foreign minister, he invited NATO ambassadors on an official visit to the Arctic. We met him on the sidelines of the NATO summit, where our conversation, naturally, was drawn to the global threats facing NATO and why cyber warfare is a growing challenge. He currently holds the biennial rotating chairmanship of the Arctic Council.

Alex Tarquinio:

In the popular imagination, the Arctic Circle is a frozen, no-man's land. If only the Arctic terrain is in fact, teeming with human intrigue. As the floating sea ice melts, global competition is heating up for the sea lanes and natural resources in the region. Nuclear-armed submarines have far fewer places to hide beneath the sea ice than they did during the Cold War, and the ground is literally shifting beneath the feet of its inhabitants. With the accession of Finland and Sweden into the security alliance, the Russian Federation is now the only Arctic state that's not a member of NATO, but Russia's military bases inside the Arctic Circle outnumber NATO's and it has a much larger fleet of icebreakers. During NATO's Washington summit, three Arctic nations the United States, canada and Finland announced the Trilateral Icebreaker Collaboration Effort, or ICEPACT, an agreement to bolster icebreaker ship production.

Alex Tarquinio:

Although melting sea ice in the Arctic Circle by raising sea levels could literally swamp Pacific island nations, as underlined in a recent UN report. Somewhat perversely, it is opening up new opportunities for global shipping and industry and consequently, great power competition, which has long been a facet of the high north. For its part, china has declared itself a near-Arctic nation, a claim that Norway's foreign minister brushed aside. Our conversation with him on the margins of the summit took place before the United States imposed new sanctions aimed at degrading Russia's wartime economy and military capabilities. Among the new sanctions announced in August and September, there were some imposed on companies and vessels doing business with Russia's $21 billion energy project called Arctic LNG-2, built to extract and ship supercooled liquefied natural gas, commonly called LNG. Shipping could become much faster and cheaper if, as widely predicted, climate change reduces Arctic sea ice to the point where tankers carrying LNG and much else could sail across the top of the world.

Alex Tarquinio:

For centuries, the high north has been a tantalizing dream that claimed the lives of explorers in search of the Northwest Passage. Those old sea tales still inspire wonder. They're even immortalized in the Oval Office where the president's desk was constructed from the oak timbers of the British Arctic exploration ship HMS Resolute. But climate change is swiftly turning those seafaring tales into a real-life scenario, one that may have fearsome consequences of its own.

Alex Tarquinio:

Thank you, mr Minister, for making time for us this morning. We know it's a very busy morning in the midst of NATO, right before your first big meeting. I wanted to ask you about the Arctic, something, as a Norwegian, you know a little bit about. Russia is obviously a huge neighbor of yours in the Arctic region. China has begun describing itself as a near Arctic country. First of all, I don't know, as a classic Arctic country, how you feel about that. You can comment on that, especially now, with climate change and the sea lanes may become more navigable. Is that something you're looking at both as an Arctic country and also as a member of NATO?

Espen Barth Eide:

So firstly, let's be clear the real Arctic countries are the USA, because of Alaska and Canada, of course, it's the Nordic Arctic countries and it's Russia.

Espen Barth Eide:

Those are the real Arctic countries and there's no way anybody else can become an Arctic country. But the Arctic Council which I currently chair, by the way, because it's a rotating presidency has always been op en to observer states, and in my former stint as foreign minister we invited in both China and India, but also Japan, south Korea and Singapore as observer states. So we welcome their interest in the Arctic and I said then and I think that is well said that we would rather have them in our club than to see them develop an alternative club dealing with Arctic questions. So we are not against China's interest in the Arctic, but we would very much like it to be on the terms that were established by the Arctic cooperation that we established with the real Arctic states, and that's our approach to this. And then I should say you know first, you know the difference between the Arctic and Antarctica, the so-called, first of all, obviously the one is in the north, the other is in the south.

Espen Barth Eide:

Bu t it's another big difference because the Antarctica is a landmass with ice on it, whereas the Arctic is a sea that is frozen, w hich means the laws of the UNCLOS, the law of the Seas Convention, applies to the Arctic. So we have a set of rules and now, because, sadly enough, the ice is melting be cause of climate change, its character as an ocean becomes clearer to us, because it was seen as the ultima mundula, like the extreme, the end of the world, but actually it's the shortest route over to Asia. So, you know, in the future we probably do see much more sailing, you know, the East Asian economies to Europe, maybe even to the East Coast of America. That goes the Arctic route rather than, you know, through the Panama Canal or through the Suez Canal or around the Cape. So in that sense it becomes more geopolitically important.

Espen Barth Eide:

And the second thing we observe as an Arctic nation is that global warming happens much faster in the Arctic. There are actually parts of Norway and the Spitsbergen Islands where you see an acceleration of global warming up to four times faster, meaning that the speed of global warming is four times higher than the global average and, of course, from a very cold starting point, that it means, for instance, a very practical example, that when we built houses on permafrost, on stable, cold earth, you didn't need to do any foundations because it was always, you know, it was flat and stable and good, and now it's beginning to thaw and that means the buildings start to break down. Small problems so far, but in Russia we are seeing this is on a much bigger scale. The entire roads, railways, cities are breaking down were built on permafrost. Some of that in Alaska. You see some of that in Canada as well as in Norway.

Espen Barth Eide:

So we are witnessing climate change and then you say well, who cares if you're not in the Arctic? Well, this is everybody's problem because the Arctic is also the refrigerator of the world, so large water masses come up, for instance, from the Mexican Gulf and go via Norway and circle around the Arctic to cool down again and it kind of keeps the system cool. But now we're observing that we are changing from an Arctic to a more Atlantic climate and that will have severe consequences on the world. So we, as Arctic states, which are including America, we need to tell the world about what we're seeing in our immediate home.

Alex Tarquinio:

So locally in the Arctic. For the real Arctic countries that you mentioned, it's a local threat and possibly even the future opens up some opportunities. You may have increased navigation of the sea lanes, you may have areas that become habitable or open to industry that are not now. But are there also additional security threats in the Arctic, both conventional warfare submarines and unconventional warfare? I'm thinking particularly about, for example, drone warfare and jamming of GPS If there's more access in the Arctic, and is this again a threat that NATO is looking at and also in your position on the Arctic Council?

Espen Barth Eide:

When Jens Stoltenberg was the Prime Minister of Norway and my current Prime Minister, Jonas Gahr Støre, and myself in myself in my defence and foreign affairs roles, we were all working way back then to raise the awareness in NATO of the Arctic, to get more NATO recognition of these Arctic challenges and opportunities, as you say, and I think we achieved that. So it's much higher on the agenda now. And one kind of connotation we see now which reminds us of the Cold War is that Russia's second-strike capability, the nuclear weapons that they want to protect for the extreme case of a full-scale nuclear war, are submarine-based, out of Kola, which is just in my backyard, it's just very close to our northern easternmost town of Kirkenes you can look into Kola, you can very easily follow what's happening and these submarines traditionally tried to hide under the ice, right, because that was the least probable place you would find a submarine a sort of way up north under massive ice. Now the ice is melting, so that also, you know, affects also these operations. There's also, by the way, american submarines that have been using this tactic.

Espen Barth Eide:

So, you know, as geopolitical competition is back, you know we used to worry about, you know, types like Osama bin Laden or Taliban and so on, which were problematic enough, but states, a dversary states are a much bigger problem because of the havoc that can be created by a state. It's immensely bigger than the havoc that can be created by the most ingenious terrorist. So it is a much deeper type of security concern and because of the importance for Russia of their nuclear submarines our neighborhood is relevant for NATO. This is not only because of NATO allies, because it's relevant for everybody, because it's relevant in our nuclear postures, which you know, and we didn't speak much about that for 30 years because we thought these were things we read about in the history books and looked at films about Oppenheimer and so on. But nuclear weapons are still part of our everyday life.

Alex Tarquinio:

That was the 20th century threat and obviously continues. But what about some of the 21st century threats? I'm thinking, for example, the potential combination of the increasing changes in drone warfare, ai and some of the other things we've seen recently the jamming of GPS Does NATO have any conversation now about? Does it need to change, for example, its doctrine in dealing with those 21st century threats?

Espen Barth Eide:

Absolutely, and you're absolutely right and you know these threats are. These threats are additional. It's not that fighter planes and frigates are not threatening in the longer term, they are still. And on top of that you have all these new challenges and also no control by advanced states with advanced technology, and you know AI can be a massively effective tool for manipulation.

Espen Barth Eide:

You know, deepfake is a great asset to identify stuff for science and research fantastic. It's also a very dangerous tool in evil hands because it can be used to target people for massive manipulation. I think I know that people in this country are very trying to follow very closely what kind of foreign manipulation can happen in the upcoming presidential election, for instance, because you can target people in much more credible ways than even a few years ago with AI and we know that Russia is using this. We see it in our own plans. This is happening. We see all the types of hybrid threats. On cyber, I would say that I think I can postulate that every future war will be a cyber war and then it might also be a kinetic war. It might also use the fighter planes and the brigades and the armies but it will definitely be a cyber war because no adversary is dumb enough or

Espen Barth Eide:

stupid enough to try to use cyber because we are so connected. At least in my part of Europe, nobody uses money, I mean fiscal money. I don't know how aNorwegian auction coin looks any longer. I know they've changed, but I've never seen them because everything is electronic. So of course th at depends. That requires that our systems work. You know that there's electricity and internet and satellites and all these things have OHM and and you know if you want to create trouble in an advanced society, you would start by taking down some of these systems. Which is unfortunately too easy to do and which is a lot of discussion now is how do you identify threats? How do you protect yourself against threats? How do you become redundant? Meaning that you have more cables so that there's one working if one is taken down. And how do you have resilience, meaning you can quickly re-establish connections?

Alex Tarquinio:

Well, what you're talking about is, for example, one EMP pulse could take down much of the system that we're familiar with, but it's almost a bit like the old nuclear threat in that the deterrence is that both sides can do it and no one wants to do it because they don't want it done to them.

Espen Barth Eide:

So far, that has worked reasonably well, which is why all the key players here have offensive capabilities that go beyond their defensive capabilities and they know about each other, meaning that I can create more trouble on your side if you create trouble on my side and you can defend yourself about. So you know, let's better stay out of it.

Espen Barth Eide:

So you know there is this element of the terrorist that is in a sense a little bit like nuclear deterrence. You know the cost of you attacking me is higher for you than you will bear and of course that requires that takes us to the incredibly important issue of attribution, because if you can attack without being identified, without this attribution you know the deterrence effect is gone. So to really identify you know who did it. It will be very important to follow this, and here again, I think not revealing any secrets, but we are probably better at attribution than we tend to say publicly, because you know if you attribute openly, people will expect you to actually do something as well. So sometimes the reason you know means that you don't necessarily want to share that, you know before you're revealing it.

Alex Tarquinio:

So governments may know more than they let on, and in fact they expend a lot of energy protecting secrets, but sometimes they actually want adversaries to know some of that information. I think is what you're going to say for the deterrence effect.

Espen Barth Eide:

I think I was very I mean, I was positively surprised by the open use of what were traditionally secret intelligence by the excellent US services. I mean, they more or less pinpointed exactly what Russia would do and exactly which more or less, which day they would do it, and they were accurate and this was traditionally something you told, you know your president and the defense foreign minister and three people in the general staff. Now you know this became public knowledge and I think, well, it didn't deter, but it also showed that it helped prepare. It helped Ukraine to prepare and I think it also, I think it had a certain effect also on the Russians that we had not we, but our allies, the US in particular, had these

Alex Tarquinio:

How to evaluate economic sanctions two and a half years later after the full-scale evasion. That was something that the Allies expended a lot of time and energy into, and there's now some thought that Russia's found workarounds. It's importing so-called do we use? Technology from China. It's found ways to do that. It's selling its oil on, perhaps at a lower price, but to China, india and others. Are the economic sanctions working as intended? They just take more time, or does NATO and the other allies need to look at a way to perhaps reconfigure it? How does economic sanctions in the future.

Espen Barth Eide:

Honest answer, is yes and no. It definitely has an effect on Russia, particularly because even in this globalized world, there are certain technologies that are going to be into the West and which Russia has been using, including actually when you, you know, with some years back, including in the military technology and in aircraft production and so on. So blocking out that has an effect on Russia, which means it works. Then again, we're living in a world which is very different from the one we had 30 years ago. So we have other advanced economies like China, also India, who also produces technologies that are more advanced than what Russia has at home. Remember, china is generally a much more advanced country than Russia is. Yes, there are a lot of people. So the per capita I don't know exactly if their GDP per person is higher, but the technology level is higher, which means Chinese exports of dual use and also general advanced civil capacities compensate to a certain extent for Western sanctions more than what would have been the case 30 years ago, when you did not have such an advanced China.

Espen Barth Eide:

But that's not an argument against sanctions, it's actually just that you need to know that they will then seek elsewhere, but it's still really worthwhile to do it, and I think the Russian elites, so the business leaders and so on, they really feel it and there might be some long-term effect on internally Russia that they'll cut off from any of these value streams.

Espen Barth Eide:

And you know, even China's had a formidable economic development and breathtaking in many ways. They've been many times to China and you know you can almost see from visit to visit how fast it grows. But their growth was very much dependent on being part of a global economy. So you know, if we are now seeing more Home shoring and Friend shoring and industrial policy in the EU and in the US with the Inflation Reduction act and so on, that also creates a world that is more difficult for China to continue to grow in. So China in a sense has to make a choice at some point. Will it hang in there with an increasingly failing Russia, which is only one-tenth of its population, one-tenth of its economy, or will it continue to integrate into a prosperous global economy where European and American economies are their partners? So if I were China I would think that was a rather easy choice.

Alex Tarquinio:

Tomorrow you are having your first meeting of the morning with your guests from the Asia-Pacific Japan, South Korea, Australia, New Zealand, Pacific, Japan, South Korea, Australia, New Zealand. Could you talk a little bit about that, Because you've just mentioned the core focus on NATO's original purpose to protect Europe during the Cold War but has it become a more complex and global purpose today?

Espen Barth Eide:

So those countries that are closest to us in culture, in politics, in economy, in a way of life in our global world are exactly the countries you mentioned. You know, adding to the European and the North Americans, it is exactly Japan, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand which are the Asia-Pacific partners, and those countries face some of the similar challenges. We see the rise of China. I have many times in this city of Washington said that China is rising, not only in America's world but also in Europe's world, and we need to be focused on that.

Espen Barth Eide:

We need to be focused on the challenges from growing China, but also from what's happening in North Korea, which is also quite concerning so, although this is not NATO territory and will not become NAT O territory, it's a natural partnership to strengthen in these days because we, in our part of the world, we see Russia growing and in their part of the world we see China. They are not the same which is very important.

Espen Barth Eide:

We don't want to make China into a new Russia, so with China. We don't want to make China into a new Russia, so with China, we work on a much higher level than we do with Russia, and we would like to keep it that way. But we also need to be clear on those issues where China is the systemic adversary. And then we need to also be fair on our principles.

Alex Tarquinio:

I also wanted to ask you about what NATO calls burden sharing. You're obviously well above the 2% that was said years ago, as the vast majority of the allies now, but Estonia has actually called for that minimum bar to be raised. Is this realistic? Because obviously that would involve some sacrifices at home. The population would have to understand that money has to come from somewhere. It may affect priorities at home. Should NATO raise that minimum bar or set a trajectory for all countries to go well beyond the 2%?

Espen Barth Eide:

First, I have to say I am very impressed by Estonia and the other Baltic states, and Lithuania and Latvia as well, who are neighbors who have you know who were against their own will, of course involved in the Soviet Union. So remember, only 30 years ago or 35 years ago, they were still part of the Soviet Union. Although they used to be part of the Soviet Union, they are now among the most advanced Western economies in my world, of the world, extremely successful transitions into high-tech, modern economies. So kudos to them.

Espen Barth Eide:

I think that, for now, what we should focus on is to say that all allies should reach 2% and 2% should be the base, should be the minimum. Not you go to 2 and then you stop, but you should be at least 2 and feel go above. Norway, for instance, is about 2. We are aiming towards 3 nationally, but we have not spoken out for saying that we should raise the bar for NATO across. Let's first get the allies there. And remember, for some economies it's a little. You know. For instance, when Greece was in a financial crisis, GDP fell. That meant that their percentage went far up. And that doesn't necessarily mean that they spend more defense.

Espen Barth Eide:

So it's a complicated figure, but it should be said that American leaders, from Obama through Trump, through Biden, have all said you need to pay more. There was a nuance in style between Obama and Trump I think it's fair to say but the message was basically the same and Europe listened and this is an important message to American listeners. Europe listened to all, to the Democratic and the Republican leaders, and Europe listens and this is an important lesson to American listeners. Europe listens to all, to the democratic and the republican leaders, and there have been massive investments. And I was also former defense minister, as you mentioned, and I you know. Money helps, but you also need to be smart, because you know a lot of money and a dumb policy just means waste, so you also have to make defense plans. That means that you invest in the new stuff that you need more of, rather than maintaining all things that you don't really need, and that's also more serious now than it used to be.

Alex Tarquinio:

Well, the 75th anniversary obviously has an element of nostalgia, which we saw last night. President Biden gave the Presidential Medal of Freedom to NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg. About a decade ago, a little more as the Prime Minister of Norway, Jens Stoltenberg appointed you first as Defense Minister and then, in your first term, Foreign Minister. So could you have imagined where NATO would be today, the types of threats it would be at and also the types of commitment from the expanding membership of the NATO allies?

Espen Barth Eide:

That's an excellent question, and actually partly yes, although things got worse than we expected. But Norway, in those times when I was first as Defense minister and then Foreign minister of Jens Stoltenberg when he was prime minister of Norway we were actually sounding the alarm bell in NATO somewhat. Nato at the time, 15 years ago, was very much about out-of-area operations. It was about the Afghanistans of this world, not so much about Article 5. And don't get me wrong it was absolutely correct that we did our best to try to stabilize Afghanistan, but it took all the attention of the alliance. Even if we had heard President Putin in Munich I was personally in Munich listening to his famous speech in 2007. We saw the invasion of Georgia the next year. So we were actually leading the pack in NATO among a group of some old and many of the new members at the time saying NATO has to get its focus back on its core business Article 5, and the defense of the North Atlantic territory.

Espen Barth Eide:

And the argument was, of course, we're seeing a different Russia now I mean at the time we're talking 10 to 15 years ago a different Russia than the Russia we imagined in the 1990s where we thought was, you know, on the way to becoming something more like us.

Espen Barth Eide:

So in that sense, I did actually imagine a more complicated world, and I have that on record because I wrote about it, I spoke about it and this period was also Norwegian policy. That said, of course, with the invasion of Crimea, the occupation of Crimea and then later the full-scale invasion in all of Ukraine and the attempt to topple the Zelensky government, that was a very harsh development. So when I became foreign minister again exactly to the date, 10 years after I left the post last time I really could see a very changed world where geopolitical competition between states are back, we are less now about the so-called new threats of terrorism and asymmetry and we're back in a world where states can fight states and that's why we need alliances. So today, on the 75th anniversary, in many ways we are back where we started. We need to defend the collective security of the Euro-Atlantic area, meaning the United States, Canada and all European allies together, and the best way of doing that is to remain allies, and remain strong and committed allies.

Alex Tarquinio:

Okay, I wanted to end on a somewhat fun question. In my house we binge-watched your I believe it was 2015, thriller series, Occupation. For listeners who haven't seen it it's a great watch. It is a thriller where Russia invades Norway to take control of the extensive oil assets which your country obviously has.

Espen Barth Eide:

Actually, the point is that there was a green government that said let's stop doing oil and let's invest in thorium nuclear energy instead. And the Russians didn't like that and they came in to keep up the oil flow.

Alex Tarquinio:

I don't know what was planned before the invasion of Crimea, but it actually came out about a year or so after Russia seized Crimea and it became popular here. Actually, I think after the full scale invasion. But that being said, I wonder how it was perceived in Norway at the time when it came out, if it was growing awareness of threats in your neighborhood, if it changed attitudes perhaps I mean, you're a longtime NATO member but if it changed attitudes in Norway and perhaps more broadly in Scandinavia at the time. Obviously, Sweden and Finland were not in NATO. It's popular fiction, but did it have an impact on perceptions in terms of NATO and defense in Northern Europe?

Espen Barth Eide:

I don't know, I haven't done a study of that, but I mean it's an idea. I think it's practical to look it up on whatever service you have. I'm not sure about that. But of course, you are right it came in parallel to a kind of awakening, to a slow awakening in my country and in many other countries, that this long peace could be over, even in NATO. I'll tell you that even in NATO meetings 15 years ago it was controversial to suggest that there would be a war in Europe, which is kind of weird because if it's a defense alliance, at least we can talk about that as a possibility. And if we talk about it maybe it's become less likely.

Espen Barth Eide:

But we were so focused on this outer area of the new asymmetric threats that we kind of overlooked things, and that's why we tried to help to bring that back. And now it's very safely back. The commands are back in place, the situational awareness, the intelligence sharing, is now where it should be. But yes, I think, western audiences, we have experienced entire generations of constant growth. Yes, there have been inequality and unfair distribution and so on, but in general our companies have just kept growing and we de-industrialized many of us because we basically moved the extraction of raw materials and industrial production to other parts of the world and we became service economies, basically, and things looked swell and the only issue was domestic distribution of this, which is serious and important enough.

Espen Barth Eide:

Now I think we're rediscovering that we are in a real world of geopolitical tension. We need to do more at home, we need to stick together and I think it's a very important moment. I would say if we did not establish NATO 75 years ago, we should rush into the Convention Centre and do it now, because we really need to stick together. There's nothing better than having allies. That's important for small countries in the European North that's mine but it's also important for the United States of America. I think you Americans are much safer in a world where you have close allies in Europe and in Asia.

Alex Tarquinio:

Mr Minister, that is a great note to end on. Thank you so much for making time for us.

Frank Radford:

And that's it from the Delegates' Lounge. We'd like to thank our esteemed guests, who've graciously allowed us to share their hard-earned insights into what really matters. And then there's you, our listeners, who we hope are sufficiently edified to clamour for more of the same. Do drop in for a weekly episode on Thursday, or from time to time if we're on the road, for special events, in which case there'll be a bonus episode. Subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts and if you like what you've heard, please take a moment to rate or review the show, as it helps others who share your abiding interest in world affairs to find their way to the Delegates Lounge. You can connect with us on many popular social media platforms or reach out to us directly at infothedelicatesloungecom. We're a small team so we can't respond to every message, but we will read them. Our show this week was written and produced by the host and by yours truly executive producer, frank Radford. Until next time, keep calm and curious.