Question: Does your family have a strong political or diplomatic background?

Glyn Davies: My father was a diplomat from the late 1940's until the late 1970's and he had a very successful career. He was posted several times to Moscow and one of his tours coincided with the Cuban Missile Crisis. My earliest memories are of the fear and excitement of living in Moscow during that period. Thousands of Soviet citizens demonstrated angrily in front of our Embassy throughout the two-week crisis and we were all taken for long periods to a safehaven in the building. My father's job as Political Counsellor was to deliver President Kennedy's messages to the Soviet Foreign Ministry (it was before the "hotline" was established), so we rarely saw him.

Question: Many years ago you were an assistant to George Shultz - what was it like working for him?

Glyn Davies: I spent a year back in the mid 80's when I was a 'special assistant to the Secretary of State'. This was a fancy title, though actually the way it works is there are usually two or three junior foreign service officers who staff the Secretary's office and that was the job I had. I travelled with him, did the taskings for him within the State Department and to other agencies of the government. Shultz is a principled man, great to work with and for. What made my experience with him doubly fascinating was that it occurred during the period of Iran-Contra, which was one of those crystallising moments in recent U.S. history, when Washington was at daggers drawn within the government. Those of us at the State Department at the time like to think we played an important role by providing a reasonably complete, accurate record of what had been going on before the whole mess blew up. It was not our finest hour as a government, but at least the truth came out and the ship of state was able to right itself again.

Question: You were also on the National Security Council - there isn't much understanding in the UK of what that is?

Glyn Davies: You don't have an exact equivalent here. The NSC was established in 1947 to assist the President in the co-ordination of foreign and defence policy. It has a staff today of about 140 people who serve as the immediate foreign policy staff of the President. As with any organisation, the NSC reflects the President's management style, changing requirements, and personal relationships. Nonetheless, the role of the NSC remains the same - policy co-ordination. I served as Executive Secretary of the NSC for two years during the Clinton administration. My job was to ensure the operation functioned smoothly.

Question: You're now at the Embassy to the Court of St James's. How influential is this embassy to Washington?

Glyn Davies: Our Embassy plays an important role, not only in U.S. relations with the United Kingdom, but regionally and beyond. London is a gateway to Europe, the headquarters of a variety of international organisations, a centre of world commerce and finance, and the work of our diplomats here reflects that diversity. Additionally, the embassy's influence can be demonstrated by the number of U.S. government visitors to the UK every year. Over the last few years, we've averaged more than 10,000 official visitors annually to Embassy London, including the President and his staff, the Vice-President, Cabinet Secretaries, senators, congresspersons, and many others. It's probably the most visited American diplomatic mission in the world. Consequently, we have an interesting concierge function as well, which, in a way, enhances our influence, as we help design and conduct these visits and advise our Washington colleagues in their preparations.

Question: And with the size of the international media in London - this must be an important source of being your international eyes and ears?

Glyn Davies: Absolutely. London is perhaps the world's greatest media centre. The BBC, Reuters, the Economist have a global audience. All of the major U.S. print and broadcast media have operations here, as do their counterparts from Europe, Africa, Asia, the Middle East. Consequently, this is an invaluable location not only for finding out what is going on in the world, but a point from which to explain and advocate for U.S. positions and policies.

Question: With no Ambassador in place - as Charge d'Affaires - you are acting as caretaker - what does that involve?

Glyn Davies: The challenge, in essence, is to do two jobs as well as I can, without neglecting the substance of either. I was posted to London as the Deputy Chief of Mission and when Ambassador Lader departed a few months ago, I assumed the role of Charge d'Affaires. The day-to-day work of the embassy continues. Our representational responsibilities have been curtailed somewhat as there are some functions which only the Ambassador can perform. I'm enjoying the challenge, but I am also looking forward to the appointment of a new Ambassador.

Question: So why has there been such a delay in appointing the Ambassador?

Glyn Davies: Actually, the delay is not unusual; the process is running very smoothly by U.S. standards. Every ambassador, both political appointees and members of our career diplomatic service, serve as personal representatives of the President. Whenever a new President is inaugurated, it is the President's prerogative to select these representatives and several thousand other senior U.S. Government officials. These positions require nomination by the President and, because of our separation of powers, confirmation by the U.S. Senate. There is a series of established bureaucratic and legislative steps that must be followed. Ambassadorial appointments, for example, are reviewed by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and then are voted upon by the Senate as a whole. In this case, I'm hopeful that we will have an Ambassador to the Court of St. James's within a month. As Ambassador Lader stepped down at the end of February, this would be record time.

Question: Until the new Ambassador arrives - you're sitting in the hot seat - what are the top priorities for the Ambassador to the Court of St James?

Glyn Davies: In a way, the array of issues with which the embassy deals enables an Ambassador to focus his or her efforts carefully. Look at our last two Ambassadors, for example. William Crowe was a career naval officer and formerly the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. By inclination and training, he closely followed defence and security issues. Ambassador Lader came to government service after a successful career in business. The commercial and economic ties between the United States and the United Kingdom are the closest of any two nations in the world. He worked hard to both deepen and broaden those ties still more, with great success.

Question: So there is plenty of scope for them to build their own role?

Glyn Davies: Clearly. There are many things one can usefully do which will have a positive impact.

Question: What image do the people of the US have of Britain following the foot and mouth crisis?

Glyn Davies: Well it's an image going through changes. The tragic images of vast pyres of carcasses broadcast around the world undoubtedly had an impact. The tourist dollar is relatively elastic, but I believe the solid-core of Anglophiles would be relatively unaffected by this. Time will tell the true story, but I expect that American tourism to Britain will soon return to normal levels.

Question: The UK and the U.S. are strong economic allies - do you anticipate that the U.S. economic downturn will have a significant effect on the UK?

Glyn Davies: I don't think so. I think for one thing, most recently the numbers have looked better so this will be less of a downturn than initially anticipated. It is true that we are joined at the hip economically so economic shocks on either side have an effect on the other. But it is my sense that given how strong the UK economy has been, Britain is going to come through this. Especially as the latest news in the States is that this isn't going to be as bad as expected.

Question: Do you think the UK's relationship with the U.S. could be affected by the development of the European Rapid Reaction Force?

Glyn Davies: Our view is that NATO - the world's most successful military alliance, having won the Cold War without firing a shot - is an organisation that every one wants to keep up and running successfully. The Rapid Reaction Force is something EU member states want to keep up their military spending and to be able to deal with security problems the EU deems are important where NATO, as a whole, is not actually engaged; that is fine with us. We want the Rapid Reaction Force to work, and to work as closely as possible with NATO. So the one gentle proviso we place on this is that it should complement and work well with NATO and not against it.

Question: Don't you believe that the U.S. risks alienating its friends in the UK and Europe with the introduction of missile defence?

Glyn Davies: The U.S. is not interested in deploying defences that would separate us from our friends and allies. President Bush has made clear his commitment to close and substantive consultations with the UK and our friends and allies around the world. The President has initiated a major and multifaceted national security strategy review. The examination of our missile defence policy is taking place within that context. As this strategic review proceeds - and in order to formulate sound decisions - we want and value allied input. But we want our friends to understand that we are not pursuing a limited missile defence just for the sake of defending the U.S. from the increasing threat of long-range missile attack from rogue states. We are looking at the variety of ways to counter the proliferation of missile technologies -- and we want our allies and friends, including Russia or other states, to be part of this strategic re-thinking, because we are all threatened by proliferation.

Question: What about the risk that missile defence would pose to Russia and the arms control agreements, such as the ABM treaty, which have proven their worth for so long?

Glyn Davies: The 1972 ABM Treaty reflects the thinking of the Cold War. Its central thesis is that stability and, therefore, our security is best guaranteed if our population is defenceless against the threat of nuclear annihilation.

This concept defined our adversarial relationship with the Soviet Union. Today, the Soviet Union is gone. Continuing to base our relationship with Russia on the ABM treaty would be to perpetuate Cold War suspicions and distrust. We need a healthier foundation for our political relations. We seek to work with Russia in a way that reflects a new, co-operative relationship based on openness, mutual confidence, and real co-operation to deal with the new opportunities and threats we all see in this new century.

Question: Won't the introduction of missile defence encourage a greater proliferation of nuclear weapons?

Glyn Davies: The threats we face today are fundamentally different from those of the past. In particular, we are confronted with a more diverse, less predictable, and more risk-prone group of states that are aggressively seeking to develop or acquire weapons of mass destruction and longer-range missiles as a means of their delivery.

Deterring these new threats is different from deterrence of the past. For deterrence of contemporary threats, offences and defences must work together. Missile defences will, we believe, play an important role in tomorrow's deterrence posture.

An important purpose of missile defence is also to enable us to diminish our almost exclusive reliance on offensive weapons for deterrence. We want to reduce our nuclear arsenal to the lowest level consistent with the need to defend ourselves. This is important to our effort to make the world a safer place with fewer nuclear weapons.

Question: One fly in the ointment between the UK and the U.S. is Open Skies - what's the problem?

Glyn Davies: You get different versions of the problem from Washington and London. The United States believe it is high time that the UK moved onto a more modern, competitive aviation system. Currently, we have a bilateral U.S.-UK aviation agreement in place that was negotiated in the 1970s. Since then, international aviation has marched along towards liberalisation, with great economic benefit to passenger and cargo airlines as well as those passengers and exporters who depend on them. But the U.S.-UK agreement - which limits which airlines can fly, their routes, how often they fly, and how much they charge - remains in place.

Our particular sticking point is that British Airways want to have an alliance with American Airlines and they want anti-trust immunity, which would require an Open Skies agreement to ensure that other airlines are able to compete with BA/AA alliance. So every time we move forward with negotiations and it appears as if there is light at the end of the tunnel, BA's talks have broken down and HMG has walked away from negotiations over Open Skies. Which is too bad as this really hurts the consumer. A business traveller can fly to America from the Netherlands for half to two-thirds of the UK price because of the monopolistic structure that operates at Heathrow. Whether or not we negotiate an Open Skies agreement should not be held hostage to a private commercial arrangement.

Question: British Airways is a privatised company so what can the British Government do about this?

Glyn Davies: To some extent British Airways has been treated preferentially by the British Government, the way we did years ago with Pan Am. The problem with doing this is that you tend to stifle competition, you create an artificial construct. We did no favours to Pan Am by trying to protect it. BA is, indeed, one of the greatest airlines in the world and all Britons should be proud of it. But it has had some real challenges recently and part of this is because it is not fully accustomed to facing up to the fresh air of competition. BA may be reluctant to let go of that last vestige of Government protection. Our message to the British Government is - let's go to the next stage of competition and BA will probably be the stronger for it. And your economy as a whole will benefit - because business people will be able to fly more cheaply in and out of Heathrow, all passengers will have greater choice among carriers, and exporters will be able to send their highly-valued products by air more quickly and cheaply.

Question: And are you offering equal parity for UK airline landing slots in the US?

Glyn Davies: British officials say that the reason we can't come to an agreement over Open Skies is that the United States do not offer the UK the same rights, but there are some fundamental differences here. For example, the British want cabotage rights in the United States --- the rights to take passengers from Chicago to Florida, for example. But Britain cannot give us similar rights within the UK, because they prohibited from doing so under EU law.

More importantly, UK officials argue that UK carriers should get cabotage rights in the U.S. because, with an Open Skies agreement, our carriers will have the right to fly between the UK and other member states. In reality, the UK can only give our carriers the right to leave Britain - it's up to each individual EU member state to decide whether or not we can land. Britain cannot give this to us, because they do not have the authority under EU law to grant open sky rights for all Europe. To the extent that we have those rights with other EU states, we have painstakingly negotiated for them. We should not have to pay the UK for something we have done ourselves.

Another issue is ownership and control. The UK argues that we should increase the legally allowed share of foreign ownership of airlines from 25 per cent to 49 per cent. But the key issue for airlines is control. And neither the UK nor other EU member states allow foreign control of airlines. It's important to note that we have successfully negotiated open skies agreements with 52 other countries and 11 EU member states and none of these countries have raised these points.

Question: Continuing on the aviation vein - Boeing versus Airbus. Boeing accuses Airbus of receiving too much help from European governments - receiving too much subsidy but Europeans claim that Boeing receives the same treatment from the US Government so it's just a case of tit for tat isn't it?

Glyn Davies: The Europeans make this claim but the facts don't bear this out. If you look at the direct subsidies that have been promised to Airbus, particularly for the development of the super-jumbo, and you try and make a comparison with the Defence and Military contracts the US government has with Boeing, there is an imbalance there.

For one thing, Airbus members get at least as much in defence contracts as Boeing does. On top of that, the government here and other Airbus governments have written cheques to the tune of hundreds of millions of pounds directly to the Airbus consortium to support development of civil aircraft. Repayment is based on royalties, not on commercial terms.

The best example of the difference I can give you is when Boeing went to build the 747. The EU claims this program was based on a subsidised military contract for a jumbo transport plane, but it was not. Boeing actually lost the competition to build a large military transport plane. For the 747, a different project, they put their company on the line and they went to private investors and said we've got this commercially viable proposal --- give us your money to develop it and we will put the company up as collateral. It was a huge risk but they took that risk themselves. If the Airbus super-jumbo is as commercially viable as the Airbus Consortium insists then the company should put its money where its mouth is and take the risk, but don't rely on Government money to see you through.

Question: But the British Government would say that we support Airbus because it's important that there are two players in this market rather than just one?

Glyn Davies: There are two players in this market already. Two years ago, Airbus sold more commercial aircraft than Boeing. Airbus is a good company, they make good aircraft, they have a good track record and their aircraft are sold around the world. So why stay dependent on subsidies from European governments?

Question: So what's your message to the British Government?

Glyn Davies: Let Airbus be Airbus. Let Airbus compete with Boeing without these subsidies. Airbus is ready for it. If you don't cut them free you will do Airbus a disservice. In the long run, Airbus will not flourish if it continues to depend on this intravenous drip of government subsidy. Airbus is a mature company now. It's too big to stay in its nest; let it take wing on its own.

Question: George W Bush's refusal of Kyoto and the manner of his refusal was not well received in the UK and Europe - will the US message on the environment improve in the future ?

Glyn Davies: Kyoto was not a viable option for the U.S. Government long before George Bush was elected. The U.S. Senate voted in 1997 against Kyoto by 95 to 0, barring the ratification of the Protocol in the U.S. as long as it exempts developing countries and causes serious harm to the U.S. economy. A key issue was that the most populous developing nations --- nations with huge potential to become super-polluters in the future - were not involved in Kyoto and, in fact, refused to be involved. All that George Bush did was acknowledge U.S. concerns over Kyoto. From the point of view that we all agreed on a baseline ten years ago, the U.S. has rapidly grown over that period fueling economic growth and job creation world wide, and so the baseline has changed; that must be considered.

It is also worth noting that over that same ten-year period, a period of unparalleled economic growth, greenhouse gas emissions per unit of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in the U.S. have risen at a significantly lower rate than was historically the case. In fact, the carbon intensity of the U.S. economy - that is the amount of carbon dioxide emitted per unit of GDP - declined by 15 per cent over the course of the 1990s.

We want to work with the rest of the international community to come up with a realistic environmental agreement that incorporates third world countries. But we know Kyoto isn't that agreement.

Question: Have you successfully persuaded the British Government over your approach to the environment?

Glyn Davies: We still have a job ahead of us. The UK government is a great friend and is willing to listen to us. Our real job is to put this case over to the rest of Europe where there is a lot of anger over the US's refusal of Kyoto. We've got a lot of work to do. We are optimistic that, working constructively with our friends and allies through international processes we can develop technologies, market-based incentives, and other innovative approaches to address global climate change.

Question: But you've had positive dialogue with the UK Government over this?

Glyn Davies: Yes, dialogue is under way.