it is a special honor to be introduced by my dear friend, chuck hegel, who has contributed enormously to the nine the next -- to the united states senate and the united states national committee -- national security. i continued to benefit from his wise counsel. the new nato secretary general has made the formulation of a new strategic concept one of his first priorities in office. he has passed a distinguished group of experts to lead that effort. i am grateful for the opportunity to offer my thoughts on the state of the alliance. since 1991, it's axiomatic to begin discussions on the future of nato by affirming that the alliance is at a crossroads or facing a crisis. even before 1991, this was a common refrain. at a conference in brussels in 1979 commemorating nato's first to 30 years, one person presented a paper with two slogans. the situation has never been so serious. nato rocks but does not sink. even as statements of alarm have been characteristic of alliance discussions since its inception, nato has achieved impressive longevity. it has been a fundamental component of the bas

he said his two great intellectual guides were hegel and edmund burke. so when sam recommends that erican conservatives should be more burkean. i say we shoullook at the way woodrow wilson falkenberg, no source a all. birk proved to be no work against ever-expanding liberalism. i think the second sign might be the idea that david brooks advanced in which they briefly refers to in his book which is that behold, barac obama has some affinity for burke. or so david brooks rorted. it easy to accuse hegel andfound berg, i'm loong for to a future memoir from obama what he gives a burkean to tunes and union views. well, the sort of stiff foremothers of history of progress have receded into literally anymore what was thought of 100 years ago but the sentimental ridue i argue lingers on. and the underlying attitude of history as an intelligible process has become so embedded in the furnishing of the liberal mind that its pedigree is no longer be called. it explains why liberalism presumes the illegitimacy of conservative orthodoxy without having to argue the matt

i want to thank general hegel to get us started. also, if you look throughout this room, the level of people attending it underscores the support of people give to the mission but the confidence they have in you. you are seeing president obama tomorrow. i think he very much lives by the lincoln quotation, the occasion is piled high with difficulty, and we must rise to the occasion. you have told that this entire session. you have told us about the need for change, but given us concrete ideas about how to start implementing its. thank you very much. -- about how to start implementing it. thank you very much. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2009] >> only at that point he says will they consider what are the proper numbers of troops and resources to meet the new strategy. >> what is the general asking for? >> the crequest has not been made public. he may be asking for more than 40,000 american soldiers and marines. he proposes various options that would be lower