21 November 2002
NATO Building New Capabilities for New Challenges
(Issued November 21 at the NATO summit in Prague) (1220)
Following is a White House fact sheet on transforming NATO to meet the
new challenges of the 21st century, released November 21 during the
NATO summit in Prague, Czech Republic.
(begin fact sheet)
THE WHITE HOUSE
Office of the Press Secretary
(Prague, Czech Republic)
November 21, 2002
FACT SHEET
NATO: Building New Capabilities for New Challenges
NATO is transforming to meet the new challenges of the 21st century.
NATO's core mission of defending the nations of the Alliance remains;
but the threats of the Cold War have ended, and the new threats -- a
dangerous nexus of terrorism, weapons of mass destruction, and rogue
dictatorial regimes -- is growing. After the September 11, 2001,
attacks on the United States, America's NATO allies wanted to help
fight terror and most did, but because of the speed with which the
Afghan campaign was planned and their limited combat power projection
capabilities, many NATO allies were not able to contribute as fully
and meaningfully as they wanted. Our agenda for NATO capabilities
improvements at Prague is intended to make NATO able to play the vital
role its members on both sides of the Atlantic want in defending
against new threats.
The capabilities improvements have four interrelated components: (1) a
NATO response force; (2) the Prague Capabilities Commitment; (3)
streamlining NATO command structures; and (4) creating a strategic
command dedicated to shaping the transformation of our military
forces.
NATO Response Force (NRF)
The NRF will be a force that can quickly deploy to undertake the full
range of military missions and sustain itself for 30 days. It will
consist of air, maritime, and ground units rotating in assignment for
six months and commanded by a Combined Joint Task Force headquarters.
The size of the force will be determined by the mission, but would
notionally consist of air assets and command and control capabilities
to support up to 200 combat sorties per day, a brigade-sized land
force, and maritime forces up to the size of a NATO Standing Naval
Force. This translates into roughly 21,000 personnel.
The units will train prior to that assignment to ensure they are
capable of fighting together on 7-30 days notice anywhere in the
world. NATO will focus its exercise program and joint training on
units that will be participating in an upcoming NRF rotation. SACEUR
will certify the units' readiness prior to assignment and tailor
contributions into high-readiness force packages that NATO could
employ for combat operations. The NRF will link high-readiness forces
with combined joint task force headquarters to better integrate NATO's
command and force structures. By doing so, it increases the
deployability, sustainability, and fighting capability of the Alliance
for new tasks we may face.
Prague Capabilities Commitment. NATO is embarking on a focused program
to concentrate spending on specific near-term capability improvements.
The goal is to encourage European allies, old and new, to focus their
defense spending on the most critical combat shortfalls identified by
NATO military authorities: deployability, sustainability,
interoperability, information superiority, and
chemical/biological/radiological/nuclear defense (CBRN). Rather than
attempting to sustain interoperability across the combat spectrum, our
goal is to focus on creating niches of excellence in these areas of
allied forces.
Through their Prague Capabilities Commitment, NATO leaders have
resolved to equip Alliance forces with leading-edge communications and
weaponry essential to NATO dominance of the battlefield. New members,
as well as existing Allies, will be able to produce specialized niche
capabilities in their forces by concentrating modernization and
transformation efforts on units identified for the NATO Response
Force.
NATO Secretary General George Robertson has organized several efforts
to fill shortfalls through multinational efforts:
-- Germany is committing to lease C-17 transport aircraft as an
interim measure, and lead a consortium of nations aimed at pooling
airlift resources and capabilities;
-- Canada, France, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, and Turkey are
individually committing to buy UAVs;
-- The Netherlands is leading a consortium with Canada, Denmark,
Belgium, and Norway to pool purchases of precision-guided munitions;
-- Spain and the Netherlands are buying munitions for suppression of
enemy air defenses (SEAD);
-- Denmark and Norway are contributing air-to-air refueling and Spain
is leading a consortium of nations interested in pooling their
refueling capabilities;
-- Norway and Germany have committed to improving maritime
counter-mine capabilities; and
-- Poland and Hungary, are improving nuclear, chemical, and biological
identification and defense capabilities.
Command Restructuring
NATO's current headquarters structure was designed to fight in place
with a fixed contribution of forces. It is undergoing a major
restructuring to make it limber enough to run joint task forces of
varying sizes and composition. Large, static headquarters are having
personnel reduced and missions reassigned. Lower-level headquarters
are being redesigned to command joint task forces of varying sizes and
composition. Other headquarters will become specialized to functions
like improving special operations forces or assigning transport assets
(comparable to U.S. Specified Commands). Allied commands will have
greater flexibility in organizing their staffs to increase their
ability to address new threats and missions.
The new command structure will include two commands at the highest
(military-strategic) level -- one for operations and one for
functional transformation of Alliance forces. Previously, two NATO
commanders divided responsibility for operations between Europe and
the Atlantic. In the new structure, the strategic commander for
operations will be responsible for the preparation and conduct of all
operations, including defense of the NATO territory previously under
the responsibility of SACLANT.
Reducing headquarters is a difficult political challenge, akin to
closing military bases in the U.S. However, NATO has committed to
making those difficult choices so that our structure is better able to
meet the challenges of deploying combined and joint military forces.
The new NATO command structure provides an effective but streamlined
organization capable of performing the full spectrum of Alliance
missions. We expect the new command structure to be fully agreed at
the Spring 2003 NATO Ministerial meetings and implemented by 2004.
Allied Command Transformation (ACT)
NATO will establish a new command at the highest level, based in
Norfolk, Virginia, and co-located with the U.S. Joint Forces Command.
NATO's SHAPE (Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe) command will
focus on the near-term operational requirements (as do U.S. Combatant
Commanders). ACT will focus on the longer-term shaping of the force
(akin to the role of JFCOM and U.S. Service Chiefs). Its work will
focus on improving the interoperability of NATO forces and reducing
the "transatlantic capabilities gap" over time by sharing innovation
and experimentation with new concepts of warfare now possible because
of improvements in technology. ACT will develop concepts and doctrine;
design and conduct experiments; identify future force requirements;
supervise military education and training; and set and assess unit
standards for jointness and transformation. We expect the command to
begin functioning by the summer of 2003.
There will be some realignment of responsibilities between SHAPE and
ACT. Allied Command Transformation will be NATO's means of
synchronizing efforts across our national programs and forces to
create a more effective alliance fighting team. ACT will increase
interoperability by ensuring that as transformation accelerates in
U.S. and other militaries, our soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines
are able to find solid, creative solutions to the operational
challenges of coalition warfare against the new threats.
This ambitious program of capability initiatives will dramatically
change NATO military operations. These improvements in NATO's military
forces, and thus the effectiveness and credibility of NATO, depends on
our ability to create this new, more capable NATO.
(end fact sheet)
(Distributed by the Office of International Information Programs, U.S.
Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)
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