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BULGARIA-GEN. RALSTON

A plan to lower the retirement age for senior Bulgarian officials appears to be generating interest in the country’s media. Some note that during his recent visit to Sofia, Gen. Ralston said NATO was not putting pressure on Bulgaria to dismiss those officers.

In a commentary supporting the plan, Sofia’s Mediapool, March 19, opined that the way the issue will be handled will prove to what extent the Bulgarian statesmen’s declared priorities about NATO membership matter. Claiming that the idea to make a legal requirement for lower-age retirement of senior military emerged as the only option to "rectify" the disproportion between young and old officers, the report continued: "Gen. Ralston, who left Bulgaria on March 19, said NATO would not put any pressure on Bulgaria to dismiss those senior officers who had been trained in the former Soviet Union…. No senior NATO officials has so far put any uncompromising demands to Bulgaria: neither regarding the generals, nor the MiGs, not even the former collaborators of State Security or the KGB. But these are all problems Bulgaria has to solve on its own with the aims it has in mind. If Bulgaria is indeed eyeing NATO, there could hardly be any doubt about which way to choose…. NATO realizes quite well what state this country’s armed forces are in and what reforms are needed. It is impossible to complete all the reforms ahead of the NATO Summit in Prague. Importantly, everyone, including Gen. Ralston, has pointed out that the decision to invite Bulgaria or not will be a political one. That the Bulgarian statesmen and institutions are determined to implement the military and political commitments Bulgaria has undertaken will be decisive. It is action rather than words that proves the existence of political determination." Sofia’s Republika, May 20, reported that the Bulgarian General Staff, led by its chief, Gen. Mikhov, Tuesday protested to President Purvanov against the early retirement plan. The daily also observed that before he left Bulgaria, Gen. Ralston said the Alliance had not demanded that the generals, who are graduates of Russian military academies, retire.

ISAF

• The prime candidate for replacing Britain as ISAF’s head is Turkey but agreement has been delayed by cost concerns and Ankara’s desire for guarantees of U.S. military protection, writes the Financial Times, noting: "The former issue is under discussion but the latter could best be dealt with by establishing a more formal structure for ISAF that would provide continuity during rotation of peacekeepers." Against this background, the newspaper stresses that one option would be for NATO to take up the role. "The feet on the Kabul streets should also come from other countries outside the NATO Alliance…. However, NATO’s military infrastructure could provide the command structure for ISAF and would automatically bring with it the guarantee of a U.S. military shield," the newspaper insists.

A commentary in French daily Le Monde, March 20, pondered NATO’s future. NATO’s capacity for adaptation seems insufficient to keep pace with an international environment undergoing rapid changes: confronted with changing threats, NATO seems more and more like an obsolete tool, the newspaper wrote, quoting a senior French official saying: "There are no military tasks for which the Americans need the Alliance. For them, NATO is a complementary system that guarantees that the Europeans are aligned with their own policy." The newspaper stressed, however, that this verdict deserves certain qualifications, though it is true that the Alliance does now seem ill prepared to meet four major challenges. The first is embodied by Sept. 11, which revealed not only the scale of the terrorist threat, but also the failure of traditional military alliances to adapt. The second lies in the emergence of a European defense though this has revealed its weaknesses, at the same time as it has asserted its ambitions. The third is linked to NATO’s enlargement strategy, which is comparable in some respects to the EU’s headlong rush. Last, the fourth is inseparable from the strategic rapprochement with Russia, which could well turn NATO into a more political than military organization. But, the newspaper concluded: "NATO remains popular!…. Paradoxically, its existential difficulties are both weakened and confirmed by its enlargement strategy.… The undeniable fact is that, for a large number of countries that belong to it, or that aspire to belong to it, the Alliance remains a necessity…. The fact of joining the Atlantic Club brings applicants stability, both domestically and with respect to their neighbors. The danger is that, by enlarging itself too much, the Alliance will dilute its message and its character. Like the EU, in the years to come it will have to answer questions about its ‘borders’ and the need for a ‘steering body.’ Not to mention the fact that the growing strength of European defense could well, eventually, force it to become a kind of increasingly vague security ‘federation.’"

BALKANS

• Oslo’s NRK, March 20, reported that from June, Norway will provide fewer soldiers to KFOR because several NATO countries have expressed the view that there is less need for soldiers in the area. The report quoted the military’s supreme command saying this does not imply that the attention paid to the region has lessened, but that work has to be done to transfer a number of tasks to the civil authorities. The Norwegian military will continue to be represented in KFOR by a battalion, but the force will be reduced by a rifle company and a few support elements, the report added.

UNITED STATES-DEFENSE

• The U.S. Army’s senior leaders in Europe are bracing for deep cuts in the top commands as part of an army-wide paring of headquarters staff. It is now seen as all but inevitable the Army will lose at least some of its top-level management in Europe, although no decision has been made, writes the Stars and Stripes. According to the newspaper, even USAREUR is being considered, as well as V Corps and the currently Reserve-focused 7^th U.S. Army. "One headquarters will end up still standing," the newspaper quotes one senior Army official saying. According to article, officials say privately that the cuts could see as many as 1,500 troops—mostly top commanders and their staffs—dropped from the U.S. Army’s 63,000-strong force in Europe.

Media note the warning by U.S. military leaders, including Gen. Ralston in his capacity as head of the European Command, in a testimony to the House Armed Services Committee Wednesday that the war on terrorism has overtaxed troops and equipment.

"Top Brass: Military spread too thin," writes the Washington Times, which, based on an AP dispatch, remarks: "Gen. Ralston, whose command oversees 91 countries, said he is short- staffed, even with 115,000 forward-based troops, 8 percent of the military’s total active-duty personnel."

The U.S. military would be without adequate forces in the Pacific and European regions if resources continue to be diverted to Afghanistan and the United States strikes Iraq, commanders of those regions said Wednesday, reports Reuters and adds: "Gen. Ralston said his command has not had an aircraft carrier ‘in many months, other than for the few days that they transit through the Mediterranean going to the Central command.’" The dispatch also remarks that Gen. Ralston said he believed there were Al Qaeda members in Georgia.

GEORGIA-ABKHAZIA

• According to AP, the leader of Georgia’s breakaway region of Abkhazia said Thursday the Georgian government was trying to paint his region as a haven for terrorists in order to pave the way for possible military action. Abkahzian Prime Minister Dzhergeniya reportedly told a news conference in Moscow that Georgia had taken a much tougher line on Abkhazia ever since last month’s announcement that U.S. special forces would be training Georgian troops to fight terrorists. The dispatch recalls that Abkhazia has been a flash point in relations between Russia and Georgia since the breakup of the Soviet Union. Separatists there achieved de facto independence in 1993 after a two-year war against Georgian troops. It observes that with U.S. special forces due to arrive soon for an anti-terror mission in Georgia, Abkhazian officials are eager to distinguish their region from the Pankisi Gorge, where U.S. officials say international terrorists have taken refuge.

A400M MILITARY TRANSPORT PLANE

• Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung reports that Parliament’s Budget Committee opened the way Wednesday for the German government to purchase 73 A400M military transport planes being developed by an alliance of eight European nations. The newspaper recalls that the A400M is designed to give European forces the transcontinental reach that they lack today and be a key element of EU plans to set up its own military force of 60,000 men able to deploy quickly.

 FINAL ITEM