Military

SHAPE News Morning Update

25 September 2003

NATO

• The government will cut troop numbers by nearly half over the next decade as part of a wide-reaching reform of the military, the defense minister said Wednesday. Ferenc Juhasz said the cuts would make the army deployable in any part of the world and compatible with the defense structures of NATO and the European Union. The number of people serving in the army and military administration will be cut to 26,500 by 2013 from a current total of 45,000, Juhasz said. Juhasz said the military will be completely re-equipped as it makes the transition from a conscription-based army to a professional force made up of volunteers by 2005. The army will receive new uniforms and weapons, while old equipment will be sold off or scrapped and some military bases closed. (AP 241605 Sep 03)
  
  
• NATO Secretary-General Lord Robertson pledged Wednesday to help the former Soviet republic of Tajikistan modernize its armed forces as the security alliance aims to boost its presence in Central Asia, a region on the "front line" in the war on terror. Robertson met Tajik President Emomali Rakhmonov earlier in the day and said the war on terror had been at the top of their agenda. "Today we have a new common enemy _ terrorism _ and we must use all of our resources and unite all of our forces to make sure that terrorism will be beaten," Robertson said. Robertson noted that NATO has assumed command of peacekeeping troops in Afghanistan, and said that the some 5,600 troops serving there was the "right number." Robertson continues his trip Thursday in Uzbekistan. (AP 241253 Sep 03)

IRAQ

• The United States has asked South Korea to send 5,000 troops to back up the U.S.-led military operations in Iraq, the Hankook Ilbo newspaper said on Wednesday. "We hope South Korea makes a final decision by mid-October on the deployment of 5,000 troops," a high-ranking U.S. defense official told newspaper in Washington. Government officials could not immediately be reached for comment. South Korea, which already has 700 non-combat soldiers in Iraq, sent a fact-finding team to the country on Wednesday to help decide whether Seoul should contribute combat troops. President Roh Moo-hyun faces a public backlash if he agrees to the request but risks alienating Washington -- as the two states mark the 50th anniversary of their alliance -- if he refuses. (Reuters 241252 GMT Sep 03)
  
  
• U.S. President George W. Bush and German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder drew a line under a bitter, year-long dispute over the Iraq war on Wednesday, but Washington's quest for foreign troops to share the burden of occupation remained elusive. A senior U.S. official acknowledged after Bush held two days of consultations on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly that a new resolution to create a multinational force for Iraq and set up a government system might take weeks. Bush met Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf and Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee to seek help in Iraq, but officials said neither pledged peacekeeping troops. The German leader pledged economic assistance for reconstruction and training for Iraqi police and soldiers in Germany, but not troops on the ground, saying German forces were fully stretched in the Balkans and Afghanistan. "I have told the president how very much we would like to come in and help with the resources that we do have," he told reporters. Chirac, Schroeder and Russian President Vladimir Putin, who united earlier this year to prevent U.N. blessing for the war, met in New York and agreed to work together on a new resolution "in a positive and constructive spirit," Chirac said. Asked whether the Schroeder-Bush rapprochement left France isolated, he added: "There is not the slightest shadow or a difference between the French and German positions." (Reuters 250020 GMT Sep 03)

AFGHANISTAN

• U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan and U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell called on donor nations to extend more financial aid to Afghanistan. Addressing an ad hoc meeting on Afghanistan reconstruction, Annan said Wednesday a conference may be needed early next year to review the country's mounting reconstruction needs. (AP 250149 Sep 03)