Joe Biden's presidency is a chance to reshape NATO to face looming threats, the alliance's boss said today.
Secretary-general Jens Stoltenberg said Donald Trump's White House successor offered a “unique” opportunity to reform the 72-year-old group.
Former Norwegian Prime Minister Mr Stoltenberg told the Chatham House foreign affairs think tank: “The new Biden administration provides a unique opportunity to re-energise, to revitalise, to rebuild NATO.”
Mr Biden, 78, was Barack Obama's vice-president for eight years and previously played a leading foreign affairs role on Capitol Hill.
His predecessor as US President, Mr Trump, refused to commit to NATO's Article V principle of mutual self-defence – that an attack on one member nation was an assault on all.
And he caused chaos at the 2018 summit in Brussels with an unprecedented rant at allies over defence spending.
But he was eventually praised for forcing European countries to pump more money into their Armed Forces after signalling he could pull the US out of the alliance unless other members stumped up more cash.
NATO leaders expect more stability from the White House under its news Premier.
Mr Stoltenberg said: “I have spoken with President Biden twice since his election and he has expressed strongly his personal commitment to NATO.
“I have worked with him in his previous capacities and I know that President Biden is a strong personal supporter of the transatlantic bond and he knows NATO very well.”
Highlighting how the alliance is still vital more than seven decades after it was formed, Mr Stoltenberg said “peace has been preserved and freedom maintained” since its creation in 1949.
But stressing the “world has changed and become much more unpredictable than when I was growing up”, Mr Stoltenberg said 21 Century threats were “blurred”.
Contrasting NATO's Cold War standoff with Russia with the current climate, he added: “We don't just face one clear challenge but multiple, complex challenges from pandemics to info-demics, from climate change to disruptive technologies.
“The lines between peace and war, civilian and military, state and non-state are increasingly blurred.”
