Lieutenant General D. Félix Sanz Roldán, former secretary of state - director of the National Intelligence Center, in the Círculo Ecuestre: "Spain has to assert its role as a good ally within NATO"

On May 31, the Círculo Ecuestre received Lieutenant General Don Félix Sanz Roldán, former secretary of state - director of the National Intelligence Center (CNI).

After the welcome by Antonio Delgado, president of the Círculo Ecuestre, Dr. Lluís Donoso Bach, president of the Fundación España Salud and a member of the Hospital Clínic de Barcelona, moderated the discussion led by the lieutenant general whose title was Towards a new world order.

Sanz Roldán began his parliament by making a presentation on the consequences that have resulted in the world order we have today. After reviewing various historical milestones and emphasizing that "the Peace of Westphalia, in 1648, was the event that had the greatest relevance for the creation of current relations", the speaker made a full stop to give his opinion on the Russian invasion in Ukraine.

According to the lieutenant general, "the Russian invasion turned everything upside down and made it necessary to consider a new world order." It was at that very moment when, according to Sanz Roldán, "the Americans returned" and "Putin viewed NATO as weak and the EU mired in domestic issues without a defined security and defense model."

Sanz Roldán revealed to the members of the Círculo Ecuestre his hypothesis about the current geopolitical situation. For the experienced lieutenant general, former secretary of state - director of the National Intelligence Center (CNI), "the world will go towards a new bipolarity and almost towards multipolarization": "The new world order will be characterized by cooperation and possible multilateralism between The US and China", however, qualified that "not only China, with influence, and Russia, with power, are on the map, but there are other actors who can participate choosing their own interest", adding that "there will be digital kingdoms that don't know the borders". "What we have no doubt about is that geopolitics is preeminent before other relationships we have had." "Europe has a problem of technological development and has to decide in which segment it is", completed the speaker. 

In the lieutenant general's opinion, "today's NATO is a strong element, guarantor of national security and the Western world that every day has more resources." Asked about the role of Spain in this geopolitical situation, Sanz Roldán defended the role of the country: “Spain plays in the world order. We have to understand that we are magnificent allies and we have to assert ourselves before NATO", he affirmed, alleging that "Spain has been defending the airspace in Turkey for five years" and that "38% of all European soldiers fly the Spanish flag".

During question time, the speaker touched on various points of interest. He opined that, despite being one of the emerging economies of the BRICS countries, "India is still very far from being decisive" and that "Europe must make a decision not to be colonized by either of the two powers of 5G networks". Along the same lines, Sanz Roldán urged "to stop fearing a risk of collapse on the part of communications", since, in his opinion, "China wants to be friendly and influence decisions".

The protagonist of the event, promoted by the Círculo Ecuestre in collaboration with the Fundación España Salud, concluded his speech by saying that Russia could have influenced some destabilization at the European level as well as in the framework of the independence process and that "Ukraine is being very rigorous with the guidelines of the West”, referring to his discrepancy about the authorship of the country in the face of the recent drones that fell on Moscow.