Dateline: Delta flights to Berlin from Indy through JFK, 7-8 November 2005; then in Berlin Hilton, 8 November 2005
Heading to a NATO conference.
Not my first NATO gig, but first one in Europe.
First time in Germany since the early 1990s, when the Balkans genocide was raging just a couple of doors down the hall.
Different, more distant challenges now for NATO. Must mean the Core is growing.
Hoped to do this mega-blog plus a Director's Commentary on flight over, but I needed some sleep too, so I take the Ambien and get what I can.
I am awakened about an hour out of Berlin (Bear-lin, as they like to pronounce it) and I get somewhat into the first chapter Director's Commentary, but I run out of time before we land. Picked up at airport by German troops, along with a Joint Forces Command general who does lessons learned for the Chairman. I discuss including his office's work in my upcoming effort for Esquire. He thinks his group would have a lot to tell me.
Not bad for the van ride in!
Now in my Hilton Berlin room, I need to get my day going. So I will shower up, work the clothes and then head down to conference to check it out a bit. Then lunch with a Vice Admiral, a Major General, a Brigadier General and a Rear Admiral . I have no idea which are U.S. and which are German/NATO, but I guess I'll find out.
After lunch I get guided tour of Berlin, to include some shopping.
Then back for reception tonight at Aquarium at Berlin Zoo (should be cool).
Tomorrow is breakfast with same Read Admiral I have lunch with today, then 45 minutes of presentation and 30 of Q&A to the NATO conference. Then some local media, and then the journey continues.
Here's the daily catch:
■ Global trade talks: the calm before the shturm■ France's connect-or-die moment (part duh!)
■ India and North Korea: compare and contrast content controls
■ Sudan's continuing horrors: Left's definition of "empire made easy"?
■ Oil scarcity will be about investment, not reserves, in coming years
■ SysAdmin in the U.S. gets privatized and professionalized
■ Sequencing is everything in SysAdmin work; delay being the greatest enemy of success
■ The big contrast with Vietnam: lack of meddling incentives for outsiders
■ Good news on grad students coming to the U.S.
■ Don't it turn my red states bluuuuuuue?