Military

SHAPE News Summary & Analysis

10 December 2003

ESDP

• According to AP, DSACEUR, Adm. Feist, backed on Wednesday a proposal for the EU to have a permanent defense cell at SHAPE. “If it is expected that I work for the European Union, then yes, I need some experts,” Adm. Feist reportedly told a news conference. He added that a “handful” of officers representing the EU should be based full-time at SHAPE to help with coordination between NATO and the EU as it develops its own defense policy. The dispatch notes that Adm. Feist acts as commander of EU missions that use NATO backup under an agreement between the two organizations. He led the EU’s Operation Concordia, which began in March and is due to end Monday, it adds.
  
  
• In an interview with Belgian daily De Standaard, the EU envoy in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Alexis Brouhns, discusses the Concordia mission and cooperation with the United States and NATO. Brouhns highlights that Operation Concordia was the first force to serve under the EU flag. While the mission was modest, he adds, it was an exceptional laboratory for other missions. Brouhns is quoted saying: “It was the first implementation of Berlin Plus, the first concrete cooperation between the EU and NATO. We were able to test all procedures, all texts negotiated by diplomats and military over the past four years…. We cooperated very smoothly with NATO. There is also a very good partnership between the United States and the EU. Both have the same agenda, the same objective for (the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia) and that facilitates cooperation. For myself, as the special European envoy, it was in fact more difficult to coordinate the European players in a crisis situation than to coordinate with NATO or the Americans.”
  
  
• According to AFP, Defense Minister Struck Tuesday defended plans to set up an autonomous EU military planning cell alongside NATO, but insisted the Alliance remained the “first choice” for crisis operations. He reportedly stressed that developing an EU capability was not about duplicating NATO but providing “a necessary complementarity in a changing environment,” adding: “NATO is still the first choice for any crisis operation for American and European allied forces. If NATO does not want to engage, the EU will decide whether it is willing to take over leadership.” If there was no possibility of using NATO structures, “we should have, and we should create, a capability for joint planning and acting,” he reportedly added. He explained that the goal was to turn Europe into “a player that can contribute to security at all levels,” envisaging a time when it would rank alongside the United States “as a peace-bringer.”

NRF

• Sofia’s Kapital, Dec. 6, carried an interview with Chief of the Bulgarian Army General Staff, Gen. Kolev, in which he indicated that his country’s military was currently studying the “NRF doctrine.” Gen. Kolev was quoted saying: “These will be relatively small units with a very high level of readiness and ability to be deployed at very long distances. They will primarily be used to manage emerging crises and act as prevention forces. At present, so-called Pools 1 and 2 have been formed. These forces will be operated on a rotation basis, maintaining high levels of readiness for six months. Then they will be replaced by another pool. No one is able to constantly maintain such high readiness forces. At the present time, we are exploring the needs and our capabilities. Probably in the spring, we will state what we will contribute to Pools 5 and 6. However, these are mainly small, mobile, light forces with relatively high combat capabilities. They include light infantry; mechanized infantry; special operation forces; intelligence forces and means; forces to clean up the consequences of nuclear, chemical, and biological agents; and engineering unit; aviation; and navy. At this stage, the incumbent NATO member states have a sufficient potential to form the first units. We were advised not to hurry, but to carefully study our needs and assess our capabilities so that we can act in an adequate manner.”

U.S. TROOP BASING

• The Czech news agency CTK quotes a Defense Ministry spokesman saying in Prague Tuesday that the Czech Republic will not be considered as a possible location for new U.S. military bases in Europe, despite speculation that the United States might intend to do so. Though high-ranking Defense Department officials have begun a series of visits to Europe to discuss relocating American bases, the Czech Republic is not on their list, because Prague did not offer Washington the opportunity of locating bases here, the spokesman reportedly said.

AFGHANISTAN

• According to The Times, Lakhar Brahimi, the UN special representative to Afghanistan, said Tuesday that elections planned to take place in the country next year may have to be postponed until conditions were right. Brahimi reportedly said that if security improved to a reasonable level, it would be possible to hold presidential elections “by the end of next summer.” However, he added that if the conditions were not right, the polls, which are planned to take place next June, should be delayed. The newspaper recalls that around 500 delegates will gather in Kabul this weekend for a Loya Jirga, or grand tribal assembly, which is expected to take several weeks to finalize a constitution to take Afghanistan to its first presidential elections.

OTHER NEWS

• Under the title, “Struck pushes missile project with the United States, Duesseldorf’s Handelsblatt, Dec. 8, reported that the Federal Government has favored the U.S. Medium Extended Air Defense System (MEADS) over a European development. According to the newspaper, the decision has cleared two crucial hurdles: on the one hand, the Bundeswehr Chief of Staff will include the development, costing about 4 billion Euros, in his priority list in the revision of equipment and materiel planning at the end of the year. On the other hand, the Federal Defense Ministry supports the project. “MEADS is the system of the future in the field of guided missiles. We will make development funds available in the course of the equipment and materiel planning for the 2005 budget,” the newspaper quoted Defense Minister Struck saying. The article stressed that in 2004, the Bundestag Budget Committee will also give its approval. It noted that the military regards MEADS as the successor to the ground-supported Roland and Hawk air defense systems, which the Bundeswehr is gradually phasing out, and later on as replacement for the Patriot air defense missiles. The newspaper also observed that MEADS is given major symbolic importance in Berlin and Washington, following the conflict over the Iraq war, particularly because it involves the only large transatlantic project. All other major defense projects in which Germany is involved are purely European developments.