Merkel delights U.S. with NATO primacy pledge

MUNICH, Germany, Feb 5 (Reuters) - German Chancellor Angela Merkel has delighted Washington with her commitment to NATO "primacy", which will embolden U.S. officials in their push to revamp the 47-year-old military alliance.

Merkel asserted at a weekend security conference that NATO should have primacy in coordinating European and U.S. policy on major strategic issues from international peacekeeping to Iran's nuclear ambitions.

While the speech left open many questions on the alliance's future, there was an audible sigh of relief from U.S. listeners who a year ago were horrified by predecessor Gerhard Schroeder's suggestion that NATO was no longer a major strategic player.

"The tone, tenor and substance of what you had to say is very different from what we heard before," former U.S. defence secretary William Cohen told Merkel, welcoming her keynote speech at an annual event for defence decision-makers in Munich.

Former U.S. national security adviser Brent Scowcroft said Merkel had made clear to everyone that Germany stood firmly behind NATO.

"Schroeder posed the question of NATO negatively, suggesting it was no longer the place for political dialogue," he told Reuters. "Merkel stated very clearly at the outset that NATO was primary and that is a big difference."

Such assurances are important to Washington because of fears there that European allies will lose interest in NATO and switch military resources to fledgling EU defence structures.

COMPLEMENT NATO

Merkel, 51, said EU capacities must complement NATO rather than compete with it -- a notion many European leaders pay lip service to, but one which the Munich audience found credible coming from the new German chancellor.

"You don't feel as if she's just giving a speech, she's saying exactly what she feels," said U.S. Senator Joseph Lieberman, a Democrat from Connecticut.

Merkel's speech was the latest in a series of steps she has taken since taking over from Schroeder in November to move Germany closer to the United States.

In past years, the Munich conference had been a focal point for policy differences between Berlin and Washington, notably over the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, which the Schroeder government opposed.

Merkel insisted it was time the NATO alliance developed "a dense network" of security ties with non-members, notably in Asia, to combat global terrorism.

She also called on the alliance to go outside its borders and support regional bodies such as the African Union, whose shortcomings have been highlighted by the Darfur conflict.

Both proposals were destined to win applause from the United States, which has been pushing for similar reforms at NATO headquarters in Brussels.

They will go down less well is Paris, which is leading resistance to the U.S. push for NATO to expand past its existing boundaries and take on more missions such as its peacekeeping operation in Afghanistan.

France questions whether NATO should have any presence in Africa, and is upset at the cost of the airbridge NATO set up this winter to supply aid to victims of the Pakistan earthquake, its first major humanitarian aid mission outside its borders.

France will raise those concerns at a meeting of NATO defence ministers in Italy this week, launching what could be a years-long tug-of-war over the future direction of the alliance.