28 February 2002
NATO Supreme Commander Emphasizes Stability in Enlargement
(He says future expansion can be managed) (3220)
The overarching objective of opening up the NATO Alliance to new
members is to enhance the stability in Europe as a whole, says U.S.
Air Force General Joseph Ralston, Supreme Allied Commander Europe.
That is more important than expanding NATO's military influence or
capabilities or altering the nature of its basic defense posture,
Ralston said February 28 in testimony before the Senate Armed Services
Committee. Ralston, who is also the commander-in-chief of the U.S.
European Command, said the effective integration of Poland, Hungary,
and the Czech Republic indicates that further expansion can be
successfully managed.
"While being cognizant of the dollar cost of enlargement, we should
keep in mind the potential costs of delaying enlargement," he said.
"NATO remains relevant and viable in the post-September 11th world,
and the aspirant nations offer limited but improving military
capabilities and infrastructure to the Alliance."
Ralston said the European Command (EUCOM) has been tasked by President
Bush and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld to provide an assessment of
each aspirant's current military posture, but it is "premature at this
point to publicly release relative comparisons or rankings."
He said EUCOM is using four criteria to examine the nine aspirant
nations seeking to join the security alliance:
-- strategy and force structure,
-- defensive capabilities,
-- legal and legislative issues, and
-- security procedures.
(Note: In the text, billion equals 1,000 million. GDP means gross
domestic product. NCO stands for non-commissioned officer.)
Following is the text of Ralston's prepared remarks:
(begin text)
STATEMENT OF GENERAL JOSEPH W. RALSTON
U.S. AIR FORCE COMMANDER-IN-CHIEFUNITED STATES EUROPEAN COMMAND
NATO ENLARGEMENT
SENATE ARMED SERVICES COMMITTEE
February 28, 2002
The North Atlantic Treaty established an alliance that has endured
over half a century. During its first forty years, NATO manifested the
political will and military capability to deter Soviet expansionism,
and that deterrence worked. It provided for the rearmament of Germany
within a framework acceptable to her wartime foes. It solidly linked,
through forward presence and nuclear deterrence, the United States to
the security of Western Europe. The stable security environment,
combined with the Marshall Plan, facilitated a rapid economic recovery
and the subsequent growth of Western Europe into our largest trading
partner. Meanwhile, the Soviet Union, its planned economy overtaken by
the vibrant markets of the Alliance, crumbled and collapsed.
Without a common foe, some commentators argued, NATO would lose its
reason for existence, yet the member nations chose to continue their
alliance, and to transform and adapt it to new circumstances. Massive,
static conventional defenses were reduced and made more mobile.
Numerous newly independent nations looked to NATO as a source of
stability in an uncertain, new world order, and as a bastion of
democratic experience. These countries were linked to NATO through the
North Atlantic Cooperation Council, followed by the establishment of
the Partnership for Peace program (PfP) and the Euro-Atlantic
Partnership Council.
The end of the Cold War bipolar order unleashed nationalist, ethnic,
and religious tensions resulting in widespread outbreaks of violence.
NATO's relevance in the face of these new threats was reaffirmed by
its stabilization of ethnic conflict in the Balkans. The operational
employment of NATO forces to solve a major European security problem
in the Balkans, outside of NATO's perimeter, confirmed the enduring
value of the Alliance. The inclusion of Partner nations in Balkan
operations underscores the payoff of PfP, both in the reform of former
communist militaries and in the relief of the manpower burden on NATO.
An unexpected dimension of NATO's security guarantee, and its
relevance to U.S. security, came to worldwide attention after
September 11th. America's NATO allies agreed to invoke Article 5 of
the North Atlantic Treaty, considering the attack on New York and
Washington as an attack against them all. A dramatic manifestation of
this support is the deployment of part of NATO's Airborne Early
Warning and Control Force to patrol America's skies. Additionally,
NATO's standing naval forces are patrolling the Mediterranean to
prevent terrorist movement and thereby impede the ability of terrorist
groups to organize and orchestrate operations against the U.S. or our
European allies.
Thousands of allied troops are supporting Operation ENDURING FREEDOM
in the CENTCOM [U.S. Central Command] Theater. Allies, and Partners as
well, have granted access to their airspace and facilities. Less
visible but equally important is the enhanced information sharing
occasioned by the invocation of Article 5, which has provided numerous
leads in the global war on terrorism. In sum, the Alliance continues
to play an enormously valuable role for the United States.
NATO began with 12 members, adding Greece and Turkey in 1952, Germany
in 1955, Spain in 1982, and Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic in
1999. Article 10 of the North Atlantic Treaty provides for the
accession of further European states. To be invited, members must
unanimously agree that a candidate would adhere to the principles of
the Treaty and contribute to the security of the North Atlantic area.
The record of the three newest members bears on the desirability of
further enlargement.
At the time of the 1999 accession, an interagency review estimated 10
years would be required for full integration. The integration
processes that we would expect to be accomplished in the first three
years have been largely successful; the new members are fully engaged
in the NATO defense planning process, manning the majority of their
NATO staff positions, and are committed to making progress toward
providing the forces and resources that NATO is asking of them.
Despite the progress to date, we are learning that some long-term
efforts, such as development of a non-commissioned officer (NCO) corps
or major weapons systems acquisitions, will take longer, perhaps even
a generation, before completion.
The defense budgets for each of the new members have remained strong
since accession despite domestic economic challenges. For example, the
Czech Ministry of Defense was the only ministry to be spared cuts
during their recent two year-long recession, and Poland's six-year
defense plan guarantees defense spending at 1.95 percent of GDP.
According to the Secretary of Defense's 2001 report on allied burden
sharing, the Czech Republic, Poland, and Hungary, respectively, are
ranked 6th, 8th, and 11th in terms of defense spending as a percentage
of GDP in relationship to the other NATO members. While all three
defense budgets will continue to face pressure from competing
ministries, clearly the three new members have demonstrated the will
to support national defense.
The Czech Republic, Poland, and Hungary, thanks to their similar
backgrounds, have proven to be excellent mentors to the current round
of NATO aspirants. They are working to extend peace and security
eastward. The Poles are particularly active with military-to-military
contacts with Lithuania. The Czechs are active with the Slovaks and
Lithuanians, and plan to contribute an artillery battalion to the
2,500-strong Slovak-Polish-Czech Peacekeeping Brigade, expecting to be
ready for duty by 2005.
All three nations have made substantial contributions to ongoing
operations, particularly in the Balkans. They supported Operation
ALLIED FORCE by providing bases, airfields, and transit rights for
NATO troops and aircraft. Their combined Stabilization Force
(SFOR)/Kosovo Force (KFOR) troop contribution has historically
averaged nearly 2,000 troops. In response to NATO's April 2000 call
for additional reserve forces, the Poles quickly sent an additional
700 troops. This planned 60-day KFOR rotation lasted more than five
months. More recently, the Czechs contributed an additional 120-man
contingent to support Operation ESSENTIAL HARVEST in Macedonia.
The three new members are making hard choices about where to spend
their limited defense dollars, while maintaining the momentum they
have established. We are watching their progress closely, and find
significant challenges lie in areas such as developing a viable NCO
corps, implementing an integrated planning, budgeting, and procurement
process, and modernizing their inventory of Soviet-era equipment.
Meeting these challenges will require significant monetary investment.
Equally important, but not as costly, is continued exposure to Western
schools and training, which will help them adapt to Western style
thinking, leadership, and especially decision-making.
Elected officials in all three countries face competing priorities for
resources while their social systems and economies are still in
transition. They must carefully prioritize, focus on their long-term
goals, and avoid short-term expedient solutions. The key to success is
sustained national will; only that can ensure the new member nations
continue to progress in NATO integration.
With each round of enlargement, the issues of cost, defensibility, and
military capability are justifiably debated. As reported by the
Congressional Budget Office, the addition of Poland, Hungary, and the
Czech Republic to NATO reduced the U.S. share of the civil budget from
23.3 percent to 22.5 percent, and the military budget from 28.0
percent to 26.2 percent. The U.S. share of the NATO Security
Investment Program (NSIP) budget fell from 28.3 percent to 25.2
percent. The allies share the common costs of the 1999 enlargement,
which NATO has estimated at $1.5 billion over 10 years, through the
military budget and the NSIP. Of those costs, $1.3 billion is for
infrastructure improvements that are to be paid by the NSIP. The U.S.
share of that cost would be approximately $400 million -- or roughly
one-fourth over 10 years. The payoff resides partly in having
airfields and logistics facilities able to support NATO and U.S.
operations and exercises. Readiness also improves given the greater
freedom of maneuver allowed our forces exercising in these countries.
An additional, discretionary cost borne by the United States is the
financing of purchases of U.S. equipment and training through Security
Assistance. The President's request for FY 03 Foreign Military
Financing (FMF) and International Military Education and Training
(IMET) combined for the new members is just under $41 million. These
Department of State grant funds support important Department of
Defense initiatives to improve new member defense capabilities and
enhance interoperability with U.S. forces, while providing U.S. access
to new member militaries, governments, and bases. Thus, this sum could
be seen as an investment, especially since the FMF funds return to the
American defense industry in the form of equipment purchases. (IMET
funds also return to the U.S. through the purchase of training and
education.) I have provided some preliminary considerations, but other
DoD organizations will provide authoritative cost forecasts for the
upcoming round of enlargement.
We must also consider the potential cost of not enlarging. The
aspirant nations have put forth a strong effort in good faith toward
becoming members, and have taken political positions in support of the
Alliance in recent conflicts. Their elected officials have made
membership an important part of their public agenda and sought to
increase public support for NATO. From a military standpoint, the
outstanding cooperation and support we have enjoyed in terms of troop
contributions to ongoing operations and the use of infrastructure and
transit rights could be jeopardized.
President Bush has endorsed enlargement in principle, as did the heads
of state of the other allies at last June's informal summit. The
enlargement of NATO is ultimately a political, not a military
decision. A country with a relatively weak military may still be a
productive addition to the Alliance for strong political reasons
alone. A case could also be made where a country with a strong
military may not be a productive addition due to political concerns.
There are nevertheless valid military considerations bearing upon
suitability for membership.
The nine aspirant nations have made considerable progress under the
NATO Membership Action Plan (MAP) established in 1999. They have
agreed to pursue Partnership Goals related to the MAP within the PfP
Planning and Review Process. The Partnership Goals integrate lessons
learned from the previous round of enlargement and the tenets of the
NATO Defense Capabilities Initiative (DCI), providing a roadmap toward
reform. NATO has provided the aspirants with feedback on their
progress through assessments of both their accomplishment of
Partnership Goals and their MAP annual national plans. U.S. European
Command (USEUCOM) has conducted in-country assessments of aspirants'
progress at the direction of the Secretary of Defense.
The aspirants have a common legacy of authoritarian Communist defense
planning that was unaccountable to the public. They have dedicated
considerable effort to producing new national strategy documents in a
transparent way, to garner public and parliamentary support. The
aspirant militaries can be broken down into two main categories: those
who inherited a burden of obsolete Warsaw Pact equipment and
imbalanced personnel structures, and those who had to build armed
forces from scratch. Romania, Bulgaria, and Albania fit clearly into
the first category, and Slovakia to a lesser degree, since it began
its existence as an independent nation in 1993, obtaining a disparate
mix of one-third of the Czechoslovak armed forces.
The Baltics fit clearly into the second category, having been stripped
bare of all equipment and infrastructure upon the departure of Soviet
forces. Similarly, Slovenia and Macedonia did not inherit any part of
the Yugoslav armed forces upon independence. Aspirants with legacy
militaries have struggled to downsize equipment and personnel while
restructuring their forces according to their new strategic situation.
Aspirants without legacy militaries have struggled to recruit
sufficient qualified personnel and acquire a coherent mix of
equipment.
Areas of concern to both categories, on which they have made good
progress, include English language capability, legal arrangements in
support of operations, the ability to secure classified information,
infrastructure to support NATO deployments, NCO corps development, and
quality of life for troops. All are financially constrained in their
reform efforts by small defense budgets, which compete with other
national reform priorities.
ASPIRANT MILITARY CAPABILITIES
As EUCOM's military contribution to the political decision making
process regarding which aspirants the United States will support for
admission to NATO, we have been tasked to provide the Secretary of
Defense and the President with an assessment of each aspirant's
current military posture. The aspirant countries have worked to
develop their military capabilities, based on lessons learned in the
previous round of NATO enlargement (Czech Republic, Poland, and
Hungary) and through participation in Operation ENDURING FREEDOM,
SFOR, KFOR, PfP, and the MAP. In making our assessment of their
progress and current status, EUCOM has focused on four primary areas:
strategy and force structure, defensive capabilities, legal and
legislative issues, and security procedures. Following is a general
description of the criteria EUCOM is using to examine the aspirants in
each of these four areas.
STRATEGY AND FORCE STRUCTURE. Sound national security and military
strategy documents, effective interagency resource management,
rationalized force structures, personnel management, and English
language capability are top-level indicators of military potential.
The capstone national strategy documents with public and parliamentary
support are at various levels of development and approval, with no
obvious stragglers. Planning, programming, and budgeting system-type
resource planning is being implemented slowly.
Military force structure is currently being revised to combine
immediate reaction, rapid reaction, and main/territorial defense
forces, with national resources, to include funding, focused on the
first two. In all cases, transition requires painful personnel
restructuring, and its success will be indicative of a sound National
Military Strategy. Personnel management includes accession, knowing
what specialists you have and need, a balanced rank structure, an
effective NCO corps, quality of life, and professional education.
These are building blocks of a quality force. Similarly, English
language is the foundation of interoperability. All have made
excellent progress in training key individuals during the last few
years.
DEFENSE CAPABILITIES. Defense capabilities, aligned according to the
NATO DCI categories, are the heart of preparedness, and proof of sound
planning and budgeting. The bottom line is: can they deploy a
reasonably sized force, sustain it, communicate with it, protect it,
and fight effectively with it? Deployability and Mobility,
particularly by air and sea, are generally weak areas for all
aspirants. Sustainability and Logistics, to include the nation's
ability to support its deployed forces and to support NATO deployments
on its national territory (host nation support, air transport
handling, airfield, road, rail, and port infrastructure), vary among
the aspirants.
Effective Engagement includes a basic ability to fight, on the offense
and defense, in varying conditions of daylight, weather, terrain, etc.
The aspirants have focused funding on equipping and training elite
units in the short-term, expanding to the entire force in the
long-term. In evaluating an aspirant's ability to engage effectively,
we closely examine the capabilities of their land, air, and maritime
forces. Air forces are expensive, and flying hours have been
under-funded, resulting in degraded training. All aspirants have
marginally effective air forces. Survivability of Forces and
Infrastructure ensures the military can continue to fight once
attacked. Survivability and engagement capabilities vary among the
aspirants.
Consultation, Command, and Control (a NATO term synonymous with U.S.
C4[command, control, communications and computers]), through reliable
and secure communication and information systems strengthen the
effectiveness and interoperability of forces. Aspirants have been
investing in this area and have benefited from comprehensive C4
studies accomplished by USEUCOM and the USAF Electronic Systems
Center. Most have demonstrated progress in establishing centralized C4
planning. Most aspirants can monitor their airspace, but have limited
ability to enforce their airspace sovereignty. The U.S.-funded
Regional Airspace Initiative has provided modern Air Sovereignty
Operations Centers to all aspirants except Macedonia and Albania.
Wrapping up defense capabilities, EUCOM assessed the aspirants'
ability to deploy a small (company-sized) light infantry unit in
support of NATO and their ability to sustain, protect, communicate,
and fight with that force. NATO considers this size effort to be the
lowest common denominator of capability that would be expected of any
NATO aspirant.
LEGAL AND LEGISLATIVE. Aspirants are aware that legal obstacles to
reinforcement of, or transit by NATO forces, as well as to deployment
of national forces in support of NATO, can be prejudicial to
accession. All have resolved or are in the process of resolving these
obstacles.
SECURITY. Another area of interest is the ability to protect
classified information. The aspirants have fairly strict traditions
regarding classified handling and are making good progress in the
establishment of national authorities and policies, investigative
clearance-granting services and document registries. Security of
communications and information systems is generally weaker than
physical and personnel security. Information assurance programs are at
varying levels of development and progress.
The military assessments of the aspirants, based on these criteria,
continue to be updated. It would be premature at this point to
publicly release relative comparisons or rankings.
CONCLUSION
It is important to reaffirm that NATO's overarching objective of
opening up the Alliance to new members is to enhance stability in
Europe as a whole, more than to expand NATO's military influence or
capabilities or to alter the nature of its basic defense posture.
Clearly, the aspirants have focused their efforts on areas crucial to
the previous NATO enlargement, as identified through the MAP process.
The steady integration record of Poland, Hungary, and the Czech
Republic, indicates further enlargement can be successfully managed.
While being cognizant of the dollar cost of enlargement, we should
keep in mind the potential costs of delaying enlargement. NATO remains
relevant and viable in the post-September 11th world, and the aspirant
nations offer limited but improving military capabilities and
infrastructure to the Alliance. I will be pleased to provide the
Committee with any additional information it may require on this or
other matters of concern.
(end text)
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