Military

SHAPE News Morning Update

06 October 2003

NATO

• The most senior military and civilian defence officials of 26 allied countries will participate in an unusual exercise on Wednesday at a high-security U.S. military base to explore ways of using a planned NATO rapid-reaction force. A senior Pentagon official said Friday that the closed-door session at Schriever Air Force Base, Colorado, will feature the presentation of a hypothetical international crisis from which the allied officials can draw implications about how they might use the rapid-reaction force, which is scheduled to be available on a limited basis next June and be fully operational in 2006. The event kicks off a two-day meeting of defence ministers and military chiefs of the 19 NATO member countries, plus the seven countries who are scheduled to join the alliance next May. Russian Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov will attend a portion of the NATO talks on Thursday and is scheduled to hold a one-on-one session with Defence Secretary Rumsfeld, but Russia will not be part of the Schriever session. (AP 040020 Oct 03)
  
• A NATO anti-terrorism task force, Operation Active Endeavor, was anchoring on Sunday in Algiers on a three-day mission that includes joint naval exercises with Algerian vessels. Since 2000, Algeria has been part of NATO’s “Mediterranean dialogue” program aimed at increasing cooperation with key Mediterranean countries. (AP 051313 Oct 03)
  

BALKANS

• A former U.S. envoy said Saturday that it would be a “historic mistake” if the United States pulls out its peacekeepers from the Balkans. Richard Holbrooke, a former U.S. ambassador to the UN, said that any withdrawal of troops from Kosovo and Bosnia would mean breaking President Bush’s pledge to stay engaged militarily with NATO allies in the region. “The pledge was made before the war in Iraq ... the Pentagon did not anticipate that it would have to keep 130,000 troops in Iraq after the war,” he said. “We haven’t finished the job in Bosnia and we haven’t even defined the end of the job in Kosovo yet,” Holbrooke added. (AP 041722 Oct 03)
  
• The European Union agreed on Saturday to aim for a takeover of NATO’s Bosnia peacekeeping mission by mid-2004, a timeframe the United States had earlier rejected as too hasty. “We are looking at some time during 2004 and more likely the second half of 2004,” said French Defence Minister Michele Alliot-Marie. Officials said Britain had offered to take command of the operation. It was still not clear whether the mission would be given purely military or partly policing tasks. Ministers stressed that no decision was taken during their informal talks, pointing out that the United States would have to be consulted at a meeting of NATO defence ministers in Colorado Springs. (Reuters 041143 GMT Oct 03)
  

AFGHANISTAN

• NATO should start moving in the next few days on plans to expand its peacekeeping mission in Afghanistan despite concerns the alliance may not have enough troops available, German Defense Minister Struck said on Saturday in Rome. Speaking at a meeting of European defense ministers, Peter Struck said a decision was likely by midweek to authorize military planners to prepare for expanding the force beyond Kabul. He said that Slovenia, the Netherlands, Belgium, Switzerland, Sweden, Norway and Denmark had offered to send troops with Germany to Kunduz. German officials said Austria and Finland were also considering helping. Acknowledging the problems raising troops for Afghanistan, NATO Secretary-General Lord Robertson told European ministers here Friday they needed to make more troops available for such overseas missions. (AP 041254 Oct 03)

ESDP

• The EU narrowed sharp differences on Friday over the scope of defence integration across the 15-nation bloc. Diplomats said there was now wide acceptance that the EU needs its own military planning capabilities for crisis operations, but a proposal to set up a full-blown headquarters independent of the U.S.-led alliance was quietly dying. The defence ministers agreed to move ahead with the establishment of a European armaments agency to bolster and coordinate military capabilities across the bloc. (Reuters 031820 GMT Oct 03)