U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates met with Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk February 19 in Kraków, Poland. Earlier that day, Gates and Poland's Defense Minister Bogdan Klich signed a Memorandum of Understanding at the headquarters of the Second Mechanized Division on cooperation between Polish and U.S. Special Forces. Secretary Gates is heading the U.S. delegation to Kraków, where NATO holds its annual informal meeting of Defense Ministers on Thursday and Friday this week, February 19-20. The conference, chaired by Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, NATO Secretary General, and hosted by Poland’s Minister of Defense Bogdan Klich, will try to charter the best course for NATO in 2009. The ministers will also hold bilateral meetings. Secretary Gates offered his condolences for the recent Polish deaths in Afghanistan and Pakistan. “I extend my sympathies to the Polish people for the recent death of a Polish soldier in Afghanistan and on the gruesome murder of a Polish engineer from Kraków in Pakistan. These are both reminders of the challenges we face in that part of the world.” The United States believes that its NATO allies can make a significant, longer-term contribution in Afghanistan on the civilian side while U.S. forces work on strengthening the military side, says Secretary Gates. “Frankly, I hope that it may be easier for our allies to do that than significant troop increases, especially for the longer term,” Gates said before arriving in Kraków. Please click here to read the full account of Secretary Gates’ views on the changing nature of NATO.