NATO fanatic as Swiss ambassador – we have come a long way!

by Dr iur. Marianne Wüthrich

It is unbelievable: The Federal Council actually sent a die-hard NATO fanatic as ambassador to NATO in Brussels. “Switzerland is not a member of NATO. What are you even doing there?” asks the interviewer in the “Neue Zürcher Zeitung”. A legitimate question. Ambassador Jacques Pitteloud states quite bluntly what he is doing there: “My job is to report to the Federal Council on NATO’s assessment of the global situation, its direction, what it expects from Switzerland, and what possible meaningful forms of cooperation might be.”¹
Do we need to remind the Federal Council what the essential task of a Swiss ambassador is? He must explain the neutral Swiss position and adhere to it himself. Jacques Pitteloud, on the other hand, openly advocates for Switzerland’s integration into NATO: “We should practice more with NATO” – “Interoperability is the order of the day.” His well-known phrase, that NATO membership is “politically unthinkable,” means in plain language: Pitteloud and his like-minded colleagues would love to see our country join NATO, but they fear the people would vote no.

Massive denigration
of the neutrality initiative

Pitteloud’s intervention in an ongoing voting process by defaming the Neutrality Initiative and its supporters is an absolute scandal. He calls them “neutrality absolutists who only want to look out for themselves, without cooperation or solidarity, no matter what happens in the world.”
Quite the opposite is true: The initiative precisely wants Switzerland to demonstrate its solidarity with peoples oppressed by war and conflict. Not by ever more closely aligning itself with a military alliance, but rather by re-engaging with peace and pursuing a policy of neutrality worthy of the name. In this spirit, paragraph 4 of the Neutrality Initiative states: “Switzerland uses its perpetual neutrality to prevent and resolve conflicts and is available as a mediator.”
We citizens demand that the Federal Council appoint ambassadors who feel a sense of solidarity with our country and its identity as a state and who will help restore the severely damaged credibility of Swiss neutrality in the world. •

¹ Tribelhorn, Marc, and Fumagalli, Antonio. “ ‘Wenn uns ein Aggressor testet, sind wir leider verloren’, sagt der schillerndste Diplomat der Schweiz”. (“‘If an aggressor tests us, we are unfortunately lost,’ says Switzerland’s most flamboyant diplomat”.) In: Neue Zürcher Zeitung of 28 March 2025

Ambassador Edward McMullen explains the value of Swiss neutrality

mw. It is beyond “embarrassing” that a foreign diplomat has to explain to us why Swiss neutrality is essential for our country and for the world. Edward McMullen served as the United States Ambassador to Switzerland from 2017 to 2021 and remains in contact with President Donald Trump. He also intends to support Switzerland in Washington in the dispute over the high tariffs Trump has announced on imports of Swiss goods.
In an interview with Weltwoche, the former US ambassador points out that, for example, the prisoner exchange between the US and Iran in 2019 “would not have been possible without the neutral protecting power of Switzerland.” (Switzerland has represented US interests in Iran as a protecting power since 1980.)
Edward McMullen impressively acknowledges the special nature of Swiss neutrality: “Switzerland plays a unique role in the world – which is crucial for a small state. Neutrality gives Switzerland uniqueness; it sets it apart from the rest of the world, even from the few countries that are neutral today. This is not a weakness, but an enormous strength in the eyes of those who conduct foreign policy.” McMullen deplores that Switzerland abandoned its neutrality by adopting the sanctions against Russia under pressure from the Biden administration. He argues that Switzerland would have been the ideal place for peace negotiations between Russia and Ukraine. “But by interfering and, frankly, undermining neutrality, Switzerland becomes just another country among many others and is no longer a partner for such a (peace) summit.”
Ambassador McMullen, like many of us Swiss, puts his hope in the will of the people to preserve Switzerland’s perpetual armed neutrality: He points to the polls that show “most Swiss people want to remain neutral and maintain their neutrality. […] The fight is by no means lost as long as the majority in Switzerland understands the value of neutrality and wants to maintain it.”

Source: Biner, David and Gehriger, Urs. “Trump kennt die Schweiz”. (Trump knows Switzerland.) In: Weltwoche No 14 of 2 April 2025

(Translation Current Concerns)