Former Chancellor Helmut Kohl’s memorial service on July 1, 2017 was held in multiple cities, including at the European Parliament in Strasbourg. Speakers included former U.S. President Bill Clinton who developed close ties with Helmut Kohl during the 1990s. “I loved him,” he said in his eulogy. “I loved this guy because his appetite went far beyond food, because he wanted to create a world in which no-one dominated, a world in which cooperation was better than conflict, in which diverse groups make better decisions than individual actors […]. The 21st century in Europe […] really began on his watch.”

Clinton and Kohl shared similar views in the areas of military and international relations and security. Both believed that a strong European Union and an enlarged NATO were key to a post- Cold War European order. Both supported NATO expansion hoping that Germany would be bordered by NATO members in the East. Both endorsed Russia’s President Boris Yeltsin hoping he’d commit to democracy and the establishment of market structures in Russia. And both believed that a united Germany had to be part of NATO’s military out-of-area engagement in Bosnia, the first deployment of German forces outside of its own country since the end of the Second World War.