Rephrasing famous 1963 utterance of President John F. Kenedy that Berlin is a global symbol of freedom, Karl A. Lamers said: “Today, 62 years later, I will elevate the cities of Vilnius, Tallinn and Riga to global symbol of freedom”.
Karl A. Lamers was speaking May 12th, 2026, at the ninth annual Dr. Lamers NATO Hearings at the MRU. This year the topic of the Hearings was: NATO before the Ankara Summit: with the Alliance's US pillar in doubt, is strengthening of the European pillar possible and what Europeans must and can do about that?
The keynote speaker of the discussion traditionally is Prof. h. c. Dr. Karl A. Lamers, a former long-time member of the Defence Committee of the Bundestag. He is the former President of the NATO Parliamentary Assembly, a renowned German lawmaker with decades of high-level experience in transatlantic security issues and an old friend of MRU.
In his keynote speech Karl A. Lamers reflected that nowadays NATO members are not talking about shared values anymore, as speed and unpredictability of ever-changing policy statements of American President Donald Trump is unprecedented. Though still seeing sense in staying ‘’diplomatic” with the volatile transatlantic partner, Karl A. Lamers nevertheless argues for urgent build-up of European defence capacities in order to be “ready to fight tonight”, and points at Germany’s massive rearmament plan as a right thing to do. At this point the keynote speaker also praised defense spending undertaken by Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia thus earning elevation to a global symbol of freedom.
First to talk after the keynote speaker was Dovilė Šakalienė, MP, former Lithuanian Defence Minister. She urged sober approach and focus on things that can be done by Europeans themselves in the new situation when defence burden is shifting from US to Europe. She also praised Lithuania’s ability to stay on track of consensual security policy thanks to the core group of “bureaucrats, politicians and patriots” who are still able to overcome divisions in Lithuanian politics in the context of global geopolitical uncertainty.
Karolis Aleksa, Lithuanian Defence Vice-Minister for defence planning and policy, advocated “less drama, more action” approach. He simply stated that for now America is indispensable for NATO and reality is very simple: without US NATO would face defeat in case conflict with Russia occur. The Vice-Minister implied that we need to look through anti-NATO rhetorics to see that on practical level Americans are fully committed to NATO, including defence of its Eastern flank.
Ingrida Šimonytė, MP, former Lithuanian Prime Minister, former Finance Minister, countered that rhetorics still matter and have consequences. Anti-NATO trash talk could tempt Russia into testing next red line. She also warned that Russia could prefer political conquest as a substitute for military aggression as building of the network of friends of Kremlin inside NATO seemingly bears fruit. While electoral defeat of Victor Orban in Hungary was a setback, Kremlin could find consolation that soon Bulgaria voted in an anti-European parliamentary majority. I. Šimonytė also critically commented Europeans for sometimes arrogantly treating Ukrainians as poor relations who need advice and help, but, in her view, possibly Europeans themselves need Ukraine more as they have a battle-tested army that is withstanding Russian military might for more than four years.
Vytautas Bruveris, renowned journalist and political commentator, said that from many visits to the Ukrainian frontline he knows that for Ukrainian combat troops the matter is existential and very simple: if we do not destroy them, they will destroy us. He also warned that rhetorics matter as they already destroyed trust between NATO allies; rhetorics matter as they are powered by realities of American politics which are that to take US out of NATO is an openly stated long-term goal of Donald Trump and his MAGA movement and it is dangerous to ignore the reality of their intention.
The moderator of the Hearings traditionally was MRU Assoc. Prof. Dr. Virgis Valentinavičius from the Institute of Communication.
The Hearings were attended by a significant number of Ambassadors or representatives of the embassies of foreign countries based in Vilnius. In the audience there were numerous students and faculty of the MRU, as well as leaders of the management of the MRU.
Among the public there were students who are taking part in the academic essay competition, sponsored by Lamers Peace Foundation. The Foundation is funding the Peace Prize Competition, including provision of prize money: 1000 Euros for the winner, 600 Euros for the second place and 400 euros for the third place. More about the year 2026 Peace Prize Competition please read here.
Compiled by Prof. Dr. Virgis Valentinavičius, Communication Institute, MRU.
