7 New Messages
Digest #4692
Messages
Tue Apr 30, 2013 2:38 pm (PDT) . Posted by:
"Rick Rozoff" rwrozoff
http://www.eucom.mil/article/2
United States European Command
April 30, 2013
United States is committed to Europe
Ambassador Stephen Mull
====
Militarily, even though there have been some cutbacks, there are more American troops in Europe than in any other place in the world...Even as we are cutting back in places like Germany, in Poland we’re actually establishing a larger military presence.
In 2018, we will open a new, much bigger base in northern Poland, in Redzikowo, as part of the NATO missile defense system for Europe. That will bring about 100 American naval personnel, based in Poland, to establish that system.
Article 5 is like a religion, it’s absolutely sacred, and the United States is very serious about it.
There are many American defense manufacturers who are coming quite regularly to Poland.
====
From Warsaw Voice: In an era of changing threats, the United States is still committed to Europe, while in terms of bilateral business between Poland and America, there is huge potential for improvement, Stephen Mull, the U.S. ambassador to Warsaw, tells the Voice’s Andrzej Jonas.
Since the collapse of communism, Poland has looked to the United States as the main guarantor of its security. With America now preoccupied with problems in other parts of the world, how strong are ties between Poland and the U.S.?
The ties are very strong and, in fact, getting stronger. Militarily, even though there have been some cutbacks, there are more American troops in Europe than in any other place in the world. With one exception — the United States, of course. After that, the largest concentration of U.S. military power is in Europe...Even as we are cutting back in places like Germany, in Poland we’re actually establishing a larger military presence. In November, we opened an air force detachment in Łask airbase [in central Poland.] It is small, only 10 people, but these 10 people will be coordinating joint exercises between the United States and Poland four times a year.
In 2018, we will open a new, much bigger base in northern Poland, in Redzikowo, as part of the NATO missile defense system for Europe. That will bring about 100 American naval personnel, based in Poland, to establish that system.
Militarily, the United States is going to participate in NATO’s Steadfast Jazz exercise in November. I think all of this is a sign that our military relationship is as strong as ever.
So Poland can still count on Article 5 — an attack on one NATO member will be regarded as an attack on all members?
Article 5 is like a religion, it’s absolutely sacred, and the United States is very serious about it. Everybody is talking about China, Brazil, South Africa and all of these growing economies, but if you look at the trading relationship between the United States and the EU, it amounts to more than one-third of all of the trade in the world.
The GDP of the United States and Europe together accounts for one half of all of the wealth in the world. We are starting a new free trade initiative that President Barack Obama announced back in February. It will make this already very profitable trading zone even more unified in the standards that apply to trade. So this is a very strong relationship that I think is going to get stronger...
On the diplomatic front, the United States does not have any closer friends in the world than our European friends.
...
In view of the problems with North Korea, is the United States still fully committed to building a missile defense system in Europe?
Absolutely, because the NATO shield for all of Europe — and the United States — is going to be built primarily to defend against the threat of missiles from the Middle East, mostly Iran, and not so much North Korea.
The threat from North Korea is quite serious now and we are making adjustments to our own National Missile Defense System to deal with that.
But in terms of the system in Poland, a new base will be opened in 2018 — there is money in the American budget for it. In the five months since I’ve been here, we’ve had three visits from teams that are going to prepare the site in northern Poland. I am completely convinced that it will open on time.
...
There are a couple of promising things. Poland is one of a few countries in Europe that consistently spends a good amount of money on its own defense. It is guaranteed in the constitution that the Polish government has to spend 1.95 percent of GDP on it. The United States strongly welcomes that and very strongly supports it and very strongly wants to participate in that program. There are many American defense manufacturers who are coming quite regularly to Poland.
Shale gas changed the American economy. Do you think it could transform the Polish economy?
We love shale gas in the United States. It’s laid out a way for us to become energy independent in less than 10 years. It has a very exciting strategic dimension, because the more diversified supplies of gas are, the cheaper the gas will be. Strategically, it is a good thing for all of us economically. I’m not a geologist so I am hesitant to predict things, but I do know that while Exxon Mobil left last year, the rest of the American companies which are here are staying and seem to be very excited about the possibilities that they have here. ConocoPhillips is here, Chevron is here, as is Marathon Oil. They are communicating with the government, which is introducing new amendments to the law on how this shale gas will be regulated.
Is there room for more scientific corporation between Poland and America?
Absolutely. In the United States, we have already hosted dozens of Polish scientists, business people and government executives to study shale gas, how you regulate it, how you develop it, the technology, science, the economics of that. We are going to continue the program. Later this year, we’re bringing a group of academics from the University of West Virginia who are coming here to share their expertise on shale gas with their Polish academic counterparts...
...
==============================
Stop NATO e-mail list home page with archives and search engine:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/
Stop NATO website and articles:
http://rickrozoff.wordpress.co
To subscribe for individual e-mails or the daily digest, unsubscribe, and otherwise change subscription status:
stopnato-subscribe@yahoogroups
==============================
United States European Command
April 30, 2013
United States is committed to Europe
Ambassador Stephen Mull
====
Militarily, even though there have been some cutbacks, there are more American troops in Europe than in any other place in the world...Even as we are cutting back in places like Germany, in Poland we’re actually establishing a larger military presence.
In 2018, we will open a new, much bigger base in northern Poland, in Redzikowo, as part of the NATO missile defense system for Europe. That will bring about 100 American naval personnel, based in Poland, to establish that system.
Article 5 is like a religion, it’s absolutely sacred, and the United States is very serious about it.
There are many American defense manufacturers who are coming quite regularly to Poland.
====
From Warsaw Voice: In an era of changing threats, the United States is still committed to Europe, while in terms of bilateral business between Poland and America, there is huge potential for improvement, Stephen Mull, the U.S. ambassador to Warsaw, tells the Voice’s Andrzej Jonas.
Since the collapse of communism, Poland has looked to the United States as the main guarantor of its security. With America now preoccupied with problems in other parts of the world, how strong are ties between Poland and the U.S.?
The ties are very strong and, in fact, getting stronger. Militarily, even though there have been some cutbacks, there are more American troops in Europe than in any other place in the world. With one exception — the United States, of course. After that, the largest concentration of U.S. military power is in Europe...Even as we are cutting back in places like Germany, in Poland we’re actually establishing a larger military presence. In November, we opened an air force detachment in Łask airbase [in central Poland.] It is small, only 10 people, but these 10 people will be coordinating joint exercises between the United States and Poland four times a year.
In 2018, we will open a new, much bigger base in northern Poland, in Redzikowo, as part of the NATO missile defense system for Europe. That will bring about 100 American naval personnel, based in Poland, to establish that system.
Militarily, the United States is going to participate in NATO’s Steadfast Jazz exercise in November. I think all of this is a sign that our military relationship is as strong as ever.
So Poland can still count on Article 5 — an attack on one NATO member will be regarded as an attack on all members?
Article 5 is like a religion, it’s absolutely sacred, and the United States is very serious about it. Everybody is talking about China, Brazil, South Africa and all of these growing economies, but if you look at the trading relationship between the United States and the EU, it amounts to more than one-third of all of the trade in the world.
The GDP of the United States and Europe together accounts for one half of all of the wealth in the world. We are starting a new free trade initiative that President Barack Obama announced back in February. It will make this already very profitable trading zone even more unified in the standards that apply to trade. So this is a very strong relationship that I think is going to get stronger...
On the diplomatic front, the United States does not have any closer friends in the world than our European friends.
...
In view of the problems with North Korea, is the United States still fully committed to building a missile defense system in Europe?
Absolutely, because the NATO shield for all of Europe — and the United States — is going to be built primarily to defend against the threat of missiles from the Middle East, mostly Iran, and not so much North Korea.
The threat from North Korea is quite serious now and we are making adjustments to our own National Missile Defense System to deal with that.
But in terms of the system in Poland, a new base will be opened in 2018 — there is money in the American budget for it. In the five months since I’ve been here, we’ve had three visits from teams that are going to prepare the site in northern Poland. I am completely convinced that it will open on time.
...
There are a couple of promising things. Poland is one of a few countries in Europe that consistently spends a good amount of money on its own defense. It is guaranteed in the constitution that the Polish government has to spend 1.95 percent of GDP on it. The United States strongly welcomes that and very strongly supports it and very strongly wants to participate in that program. There are many American defense manufacturers who are coming quite regularly to Poland.
Shale gas changed the American economy. Do you think it could transform the Polish economy?
We love shale gas in the United States. It’s laid out a way for us to become energy independent in less than 10 years. It has a very exciting strategic dimension, because the more diversified supplies of gas are, the cheaper the gas will be. Strategically, it is a good thing for all of us economically. I’m not a geologist so I am hesitant to predict things, but I do know that while Exxon Mobil left last year, the rest of the American companies which are here are staying and seem to be very excited about the possibilities that they have here. ConocoPhillips is here, Chevron is here, as is Marathon Oil. They are communicating with the government, which is introducing new amendments to the law on how this shale gas will be regulated.
Is there room for more scientific corporation between Poland and America?
Absolutely. In the United States, we have already hosted dozens of Polish scientists, business people and government executives to study shale gas, how you regulate it, how you develop it, the technology, science, the economics of that. We are going to continue the program. Later this year, we’re bringing a group of academics from the University of West Virginia who are coming here to share their expertise on shale gas with their Polish academic counterparts...
...
==============================
Stop NATO e-mail list home page with archives and search engine:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/
Stop NATO website and articles:
http://rickrozoff.wordpress.co
To subscribe for individual e-mails or the daily digest, unsubscribe, and otherwise change subscription status:
stopnato-subscribe@yahoogroups
==============================
Tue Apr 30, 2013 2:38 pm (PDT) . Posted by:
"Rick Rozoff" rwrozoff
http://www.aco.nato.int/genera
North Atlantic Treaty Organization
Allied Command Operations
April 30, 2013
====
During the second part from 21 to 25 April EUFOR, under a fictitious Peace Support Operation (PSO) scenario, the EUFOR multinational battalion, composed with UK, Hungarian, Austrian and Turkish companies, joined with a unit from the Armed Forces (AF) of BiH with the aim to further enhance their professional training and international interoperability. This phase of the exercise...was designed to ensure the AF BiH would gain further experience in working with international military units and would continue to develop as a modern armed force at the level required for Euro-Atlantic integration.
====
General Sir Richard Shirreff, OPERATION ALTHEA Commander, inspects Exercise “QUICK RESPONSE 2013
The Exercise "QUICK RESPONSE 2013” was held between 15th and 28th of April 2013 and demonstrated the ability of EUFOR to successfully activate, quickly deploy and integrate companies held at readiness within its Intermediate Reserve Forces normally stationed outside of Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH).
Exercise "QUICK RESPONSE 2013” was the biggest EUFOR exercise within the last 5 years and showed EUFOR and AFBiH training together. A total of approximately 800 personnel were actively involved in the conduct of this exercise.
Since EUFOR took over from SFOR in December 2004...When in September 2012 the number of troops deployed in EUFOR Operation ALTHEA was reduced it was done in recognition of the significant improvement to internal security and the increasing role played by the BiH authorities. Secondly, those reductions were conducted in the knowledge that, if needed, EUFOR could rapidly deploy over-the-horizon forces to sustain security and safety; in order to train and test this key capability, such deployments are rehearsed on a regular basis.
The Exercise "QUICK RESPONSE 2013” was divided into 3 main parts:
1. The first part showed a successfully activation and a quick deployment and integration of two light-infantry companies, one from the UK and the other from Hungary, into the EUFOR structure between 18 and 20 April in the location of Camp BUTMIR, SARAJEVO and nearby at RAJLOVAC barracks.
2. During the second part from 21 to 25 April EUFOR, under a fictitious Peace Support Operation (PSO) scenario, the EUFOR multinational battalion, composed with UK, Hungarian, Austrian and Turkish companies, joined with a unit from the Armed Forces (AF) of BiH with the aim to further enhance their professional training and international interoperability. This phase of the exercise took place in the areas of KALINOVIK and PAZARIC and was designed to ensure the AF BiH would gain further experience in working with international military units and would continue to develop as a modern armed force at the level required for Euro-Atlantic integration.
3. The third part consisted of a Distinguished Visitors Day held on Thursday 26 April at PAZARIC "Zaim Imamovic Barracks”. An impressive military display took place in the presence of the Operational Commander of EUFOR ALTHEA, General Sir Richard Shirreff, the Deputy Defence Minister of BiH, Mr Mirko Okolic, Commander EUFOR, Major General Dieter Heidecker and Chief of the Joint Staff Armed Forces BiH, Major General Anto Jelec. Also present was a wide variety of distinguished visitors from BiH, EUSR, NATO and the International Community.
Following the military demonstration the Operational Commander General Sir Richard Shirreff added that two remarkable achievements had been delivered from the demonstration that were worthy of particular note.
- The first was the highly effective teamwork and levels of co-operation clearly in evidence between soldiers from the armed forces of Austria, BiH, Turkey, Hungary, the United Kingdom and the multi-national team at EUFOR Headquarters.
- The second remarkable achievement was the visible increase in both the capacity and capability of the AF BiH. The demonstration had shown the great professionalism of the AF BiH and that they are, without doubt, soldiers of quality.
[1] The military EU-lead operation ALTHEA in Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) is carried out with recourse to NATO assets and capabilities, under the "Berlin Plus" arrangements.
==============================
Stop NATO e-mail list home page with archives and search engine:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/
Stop NATO website and articles:
http://rickrozoff.wordpress.co
To subscribe for individual e-mails or the daily digest, unsubscribe, and otherwise change subscription status:
stopnato-subscribe@yahoogroups
==============================
North Atlantic Treaty Organization
Allied Command Operations
April 30, 2013
====
During the second part from 21 to 25 April EUFOR, under a fictitious Peace Support Operation (PSO) scenario, the EUFOR multinational battalion, composed with UK, Hungarian, Austrian and Turkish companies, joined with a unit from the Armed Forces (AF) of BiH with the aim to further enhance their professional training and international interoperability. This phase of the exercise...was designed to ensure the AF BiH would gain further experience in working with international military units and would continue to develop as a modern armed force at the level required for Euro-Atlantic integration.
====
General Sir Richard Shirreff, OPERATION ALTHEA Commander, inspects Exercise “QUICK RESPONSE 2013
The Exercise "QUICK RESPONSE 2013” was held between 15th and 28th of April 2013 and demonstrated the ability of EUFOR to successfully activate, quickly deploy and integrate companies held at readiness within its Intermediate Reserve Forces normally stationed outside of Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH).
Exercise "QUICK RESPONSE 2013” was the biggest EUFOR exercise within the last 5 years and showed EUFOR and AFBiH training together. A total of approximately 800 personnel were actively involved in the conduct of this exercise.
Since EUFOR took over from SFOR in December 2004...When in September 2012 the number of troops deployed in EUFOR Operation ALTHEA was reduced it was done in recognition of the significant improvement to internal security and the increasing role played by the BiH authorities. Secondly, those reductions were conducted in the knowledge that, if needed, EUFOR could rapidly deploy over-the-horizon forces to sustain security and safety; in order to train and test this key capability, such deployments are rehearsed on a regular basis.
The Exercise "QUICK RESPONSE 2013” was divided into 3 main parts:
1. The first part showed a successfully activation and a quick deployment and integration of two light-infantry companies, one from the UK and the other from Hungary, into the EUFOR structure between 18 and 20 April in the location of Camp BUTMIR, SARAJEVO and nearby at RAJLOVAC barracks.
2. During the second part from 21 to 25 April EUFOR, under a fictitious Peace Support Operation (PSO) scenario, the EUFOR multinational battalion, composed with UK, Hungarian, Austrian and Turkish companies, joined with a unit from the Armed Forces (AF) of BiH with the aim to further enhance their professional training and international interoperability. This phase of the exercise took place in the areas of KALINOVIK and PAZARIC and was designed to ensure the AF BiH would gain further experience in working with international military units and would continue to develop as a modern armed force at the level required for Euro-Atlantic integration.
3. The third part consisted of a Distinguished Visitors Day held on Thursday 26 April at PAZARIC "Zaim Imamovic Barracks”. An impressive military display took place in the presence of the Operational Commander of EUFOR ALTHEA, General Sir Richard Shirreff, the Deputy Defence Minister of BiH, Mr Mirko Okolic, Commander EUFOR, Major General Dieter Heidecker and Chief of the Joint Staff Armed Forces BiH, Major General Anto Jelec. Also present was a wide variety of distinguished visitors from BiH, EUSR, NATO and the International Community.
Following the military demonstration the Operational Commander General Sir Richard Shirreff added that two remarkable achievements had been delivered from the demonstration that were worthy of particular note.
- The first was the highly effective teamwork and levels of co-operation clearly in evidence between soldiers from the armed forces of Austria, BiH, Turkey, Hungary, the United Kingdom and the multi-national team at EUFOR Headquarters.
- The second remarkable achievement was the visible increase in both the capacity and capability of the AF BiH. The demonstration had shown the great professionalism of the AF BiH and that they are, without doubt, soldiers of quality.
[1] The military EU-lead operation ALTHEA in Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) is carried out with recourse to NATO assets and capabilities, under the "Berlin Plus" arrangements.
==============================
Stop NATO e-mail list home page with archives and search engine:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/
Stop NATO website and articles:
http://rickrozoff.wordpress.co
To subscribe for individual e-mails or the daily digest, unsubscribe, and otherwise change subscription status:
stopnato-subscribe@yahoogroups
==============================
Tue Apr 30, 2013 2:38 pm (PDT) . Posted by:
"Rick Rozoff" rwrozoff
http://www.atlantic-community.
Atlantic Community
April 30, 2013
Sweden: A Special NATO Partner?
Ryan C. Hendrickson
====
[I]t was during NATO's Operation Unified Protector in Libya that Sweden reached a new level of partnership, which has no parallels among partner states.
The Swedish parliament authorised the contribution of eight Swedish Gripen aircraft, a C-130 "Hercules" refuelling aircraft, and one Gulfstream IV surveillance aircraft.
In all, Sweden provided 2,770 reconnaissance reports to NATO.
====
Among the policy agendas advanced during his tenure as NATO's Secretary General, Anders Fogh Rasmussen has been a robust advocate for the creation of new and enhanced partnerships for the Alliance. Many states have cultivated closer ties to NATO during his leadership, including Australia, Ireland, South Korea, New Zealand and Mongolia. But Sweden certainly ranks near the top among those whose bonds have been strengthened and improved.
Sweden and NATO share many priorities. [T]hese priorities have become increasingly evident during Secretary General Fogh Rasmussen's tenure.
But Sweden is no newcomer to NATO. Since the onset of NATO's Partnership for Peace programme in 1994, of which Sweden was an initial member, this "neutral" ally has been anything but ambivalent to NATO or its transition to a post-Soviet world.
In NATO's operational environment, Sweden has been consistently present too, whether on the ground with peacekeepers in Bosnia and Kosovo, or in the Indian Ocean in EU and NATO anti-pirate policing operations.
Since 2006, Sweden has had civilian and military professionals on the ground in the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan. It has played a leadership role in a Provincial Reconstruction Team in Mazir-e-Sharif...As it works on the transition to Afghan-led teams, Sweden will work with NATO Allies Norway and Latvia, as well as with NATO partner Finland. In doing so, Sweden not only advances democratic development abroad, but also gains a seat at the table in shaping Alliance policy directions.
But it was during NATO's Operation Unified Protector in Libya that Sweden reached a new level of partnership, which has no parallels among partner states.
The first notable aspect was how quickly Sweden responded to the 2011 Libyan crisis. After the United Nations Security Council passed Resolution 1973 and NATO requested Swedish assistance to the operation, the Swedish parliament quickly authorised Sweden's participation in the mission, in a vote of 240 to 18 with 5 abstentions. Though public opinion polls across Europe varied, most Swedes strongly favoured of their country's engagement. The domestic political debate in Sweden over its military engagement for the mission was quite limited.
The Swedish parliament authorised the contribution of eight Swedish Gripen aircraft, a C-130 "Hercules" refuelling aircraft, and one Gulfstream IV surveillance aircraft. In addition, 130 Swedes helped carry out the mission. Within two days of Sweden's parliament's decision, the Gripens were ready in place at Signolla Air Base in Sicily.
...
Over the course of the entire operation, which was Sweden's first air deployment since the 1960s United Nations operation in the Congo, Swedish planes flew 570 operations. Some of these missions were simply police enforcement of the no-fly zone. Its C-130s also carried out refueling operations.
More importantly, by midway through the operation, the Swedes had provided at least 30 per cent of all reconnaissance sorties. It was here, along with the diplomatic significance and benefit of having Sweden's cooperation, where Sweden provided the most meaningful and substantive assistance to the Allies.
In all, Sweden provided 2,770 reconnaissance reports to NATO. Due to past training exercises with the Allies, and because of the excellent capabilities evident in its Gripen aircraft, Sweden deserves high marks for the quality of its interoperable defences and excellent troops. Sweden's defence investments and industry have clearly kept pace, at least on this measure, with military advancements within the Alliance. Such a military contribution has few peers among partner nations, and for NATO and the Allies, again demonstrates just how valuable a partner can be.
In a forthcoming publication, Swedish defence expert Robert Egnell makes a strong case that it was partly Sweden's activities in the EU's Nordic Batttle Group that allowed it to respond so rapidly to NATO's request for assistance. When the crisis unfolded, Sweden was participating in its rotational training exercises with the Battlegroup, which helped foster a rapid response to NATO's request for assistance. Sweden's previous participation in other NATO operations and training exercises also paved the way for a relatively easy transition into Unified Protector.
Despite domestic political concerns over full membership of NATO, Sweden and its public have demonstrated how a NATO partner can truly assist the Alliance...This partnership allows Sweden to excel where its strengths are evident, and gives Sweden a place in NATO's diplomatic and operational settings. Put simply, both sides benefit.
Ryan C. Hendrickson is professor of political science at Eastern Illinois University and author of Diplomacy and War at NATO: The Secretary General and Military Action After the Cold War.
This article was originally published in the NATO Review under the theme: "Partners - Who Needs Them?" The opinions in this article are those of the author alone and do not necessarily reflect those of the NATO Alliance or any of its member states.
==============================
Stop NATO e-mail list home page with archives and search engine:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/
Stop NATO website and articles:
http://rickrozoff.wordpress.co
To subscribe for individual e-mails or the daily digest, unsubscribe, and otherwise change subscription status:
stopnato-subscribe@yahoogroups
==============================
Atlantic Community
April 30, 2013
Sweden: A Special NATO Partner?
Ryan C. Hendrickson
====
[I]t was during NATO's Operation Unified Protector in Libya that Sweden reached a new level of partnership, which has no parallels among partner states.
The Swedish parliament authorised the contribution of eight Swedish Gripen aircraft, a C-130 "Hercules" refuelling aircraft, and one Gulfstream IV surveillance aircraft.
In all, Sweden provided 2,770 reconnaissance reports to NATO.
====
Among the policy agendas advanced during his tenure as NATO's Secretary General, Anders Fogh Rasmussen has been a robust advocate for the creation of new and enhanced partnerships for the Alliance. Many states have cultivated closer ties to NATO during his leadership, including Australia, Ireland, South Korea, New Zealand and Mongolia. But Sweden certainly ranks near the top among those whose bonds have been strengthened and improved.
Sweden and NATO share many priorities. [T]hese priorities have become increasingly evident during Secretary General Fogh Rasmussen's tenure.
But Sweden is no newcomer to NATO. Since the onset of NATO's Partnership for Peace programme in 1994, of which Sweden was an initial member, this "neutral" ally has been anything but ambivalent to NATO or its transition to a post-Soviet world.
In NATO's operational environment, Sweden has been consistently present too, whether on the ground with peacekeepers in Bosnia and Kosovo, or in the Indian Ocean in EU and NATO anti-pirate policing operations.
Since 2006, Sweden has had civilian and military professionals on the ground in the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan. It has played a leadership role in a Provincial Reconstruction Team in Mazir-e-Sharif...As it works on the transition to Afghan-led teams, Sweden will work with NATO Allies Norway and Latvia, as well as with NATO partner Finland. In doing so, Sweden not only advances democratic development abroad, but also gains a seat at the table in shaping Alliance policy directions.
But it was during NATO's Operation Unified Protector in Libya that Sweden reached a new level of partnership, which has no parallels among partner states.
The first notable aspect was how quickly Sweden responded to the 2011 Libyan crisis. After the United Nations Security Council passed Resolution 1973 and NATO requested Swedish assistance to the operation, the Swedish parliament quickly authorised Sweden's participation in the mission, in a vote of 240 to 18 with 5 abstentions. Though public opinion polls across Europe varied, most Swedes strongly favoured of their country's engagement. The domestic political debate in Sweden over its military engagement for the mission was quite limited.
The Swedish parliament authorised the contribution of eight Swedish Gripen aircraft, a C-130 "Hercules" refuelling aircraft, and one Gulfstream IV surveillance aircraft. In addition, 130 Swedes helped carry out the mission. Within two days of Sweden's parliament's decision, the Gripens were ready in place at Signolla Air Base in Sicily.
...
Over the course of the entire operation, which was Sweden's first air deployment since the 1960s United Nations operation in the Congo, Swedish planes flew 570 operations. Some of these missions were simply police enforcement of the no-fly zone. Its C-130s also carried out refueling operations.
More importantly, by midway through the operation, the Swedes had provided at least 30 per cent of all reconnaissance sorties. It was here, along with the diplomatic significance and benefit of having Sweden's cooperation, where Sweden provided the most meaningful and substantive assistance to the Allies.
In all, Sweden provided 2,770 reconnaissance reports to NATO. Due to past training exercises with the Allies, and because of the excellent capabilities evident in its Gripen aircraft, Sweden deserves high marks for the quality of its interoperable defences and excellent troops. Sweden's defence investments and industry have clearly kept pace, at least on this measure, with military advancements within the Alliance. Such a military contribution has few peers among partner nations, and for NATO and the Allies, again demonstrates just how valuable a partner can be.
In a forthcoming publication, Swedish defence expert Robert Egnell makes a strong case that it was partly Sweden's activities in the EU's Nordic Batttle Group that allowed it to respond so rapidly to NATO's request for assistance. When the crisis unfolded, Sweden was participating in its rotational training exercises with the Battlegroup, which helped foster a rapid response to NATO's request for assistance. Sweden's previous participation in other NATO operations and training exercises also paved the way for a relatively easy transition into Unified Protector.
Despite domestic political concerns over full membership of NATO, Sweden and its public have demonstrated how a NATO partner can truly assist the Alliance...This partnership allows Sweden to excel where its strengths are evident, and gives Sweden a place in NATO's diplomatic and operational settings. Put simply, both sides benefit.
Ryan C. Hendrickson is professor of political science at Eastern Illinois University and author of Diplomacy and War at NATO: The Secretary General and Military Action After the Cold War.
This article was originally published in the NATO Review under the theme: "Partners - Who Needs Them?" The opinions in this article are those of the author alone and do not necessarily reflect those of the NATO Alliance or any of its member states.
==============================
Stop NATO e-mail list home page with archives and search engine:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/
Stop NATO website and articles:
http://rickrozoff.wordpress.co
To subscribe for individual e-mails or the daily digest, unsubscribe, and otherwise change subscription status:
stopnato-subscribe@yahoogroups
==============================
Wed May 1, 2013 5:54 am (PDT) . Posted by:
"Rick Rozoff" rwrozoff
http://english.ruvr.ru/2013_05
Voice of Russia
May 1, 2013
NATO transits: Hidden reefs of Caspian waterway
Nikita Sorokin
The recent proposal by Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev to lease the Aktau port on the Caspian coast to the United States for NATO transit shipments to and from Afghanistan has received wide media coverage. Analysts have reason to suspect that the future "transit point" may in fact become a naval base catering for U.S. and NATO needs.
WikiLeaks was the first to report about the possible Aktau deal. Later, the news was indirectly confirmed by Mangistau region governor Birzhan Kaneshev in an interview with local media. Nazarbayev’s proposal followed his meeting with U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asia Robert Blake.
Director of the Moscow-based Foundation for Strategic Culture Andrei Areshev fears that the move might have a negative impact on the situation in the Caspian region, Central Asia and the Caucasus, above all because "as we know from similar cases in the past, the deployment of American military personnel at key transit and communications routes has thorny consequences for regional security."
Any new military bases in the Caspian region may complicate the situation in Central Asia, echoes Dmitry Abzalov, Vice President of the Center for Strategic Communications in Moscow. "The situation may deteriorte, particularly since this is a promising oil and gas region. In addition, the base may serve as a springboard for economic projects such as, for example, a trans-Caspian gas pipeline, which may strain relations with Moscow.
Despite cooperation between the CSTO (Collective Security Treaty Organization) and NATO, such decisions should take into account the positions of all CSTO member states," he told the Voice of Russia.
A NATO transit center in Aktau may prompt a sharp response from Tehran. Iran always reacted nervously to any U.S. or NATO presence near its borders.
There have already been signs of a rift between Iran and Azerbaijan as the latter continues to "flirt" with Western blocs. Now it looks like the Iranian-Kazakh relations may also cool down for the same reason, ruining the prospects for a multilateral agreement on the status of the Caspian Sea.
This may play into Russia’s hands as chances of a trans-Caspian oil and gas pipeline from Central Asia to Europe ever being built will get slimmer. And without that pipeline, the Nabucco project, designed to oust Russia from the European energy market, makes no sense.
==============================
Stop NATO e-mail list home page with archives and search engine:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/
Stop NATO website and articles:
http://rickrozoff.wordpress.co
To subscribe for individual e-mails or the daily digest, unsubscribe, and otherwise change subscription status:
stopnato-subscribe@yahoogroups
==============================
Voice of Russia
May 1, 2013
NATO transits: Hidden reefs of Caspian waterway
Nikita Sorokin
The recent proposal by Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev to lease the Aktau port on the Caspian coast to the United States for NATO transit shipments to and from Afghanistan has received wide media coverage. Analysts have reason to suspect that the future "transit point" may in fact become a naval base catering for U.S. and NATO needs.
WikiLeaks was the first to report about the possible Aktau deal. Later, the news was indirectly confirmed by Mangistau region governor Birzhan Kaneshev in an interview with local media. Nazarbayev’s proposal followed his meeting with U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asia Robert Blake.
Director of the Moscow-based Foundation for Strategic Culture Andrei Areshev fears that the move might have a negative impact on the situation in the Caspian region, Central Asia and the Caucasus, above all because "as we know from similar cases in the past, the deployment of American military personnel at key transit and communications routes has thorny consequences for regional security."
Any new military bases in the Caspian region may complicate the situation in Central Asia, echoes Dmitry Abzalov, Vice President of the Center for Strategic Communications in Moscow. "The situation may deteriorte, particularly since this is a promising oil and gas region. In addition, the base may serve as a springboard for economic projects such as, for example, a trans-Caspian gas pipeline, which may strain relations with Moscow.
Despite cooperation between the CSTO (Collective Security Treaty Organization) and NATO, such decisions should take into account the positions of all CSTO member states," he told the Voice of Russia.
A NATO transit center in Aktau may prompt a sharp response from Tehran. Iran always reacted nervously to any U.S. or NATO presence near its borders.
There have already been signs of a rift between Iran and Azerbaijan as the latter continues to "flirt" with Western blocs. Now it looks like the Iranian-Kazakh relations may also cool down for the same reason, ruining the prospects for a multilateral agreement on the status of the Caspian Sea.
This may play into Russia’s hands as chances of a trans-Caspian oil and gas pipeline from Central Asia to Europe ever being built will get slimmer. And without that pipeline, the Nabucco project, designed to oust Russia from the European energy market, makes no sense.
==============================
Stop NATO e-mail list home page with archives and search engine:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/
Stop NATO website and articles:
http://rickrozoff.wordpress.co
To subscribe for individual e-mails or the daily digest, unsubscribe, and otherwise change subscription status:
stopnato-subscribe@yahoogroups
==============================
Wed May 1, 2013 6:11 am (PDT) . Posted by:
"Rick Rozoff" rwrozoff
http://www.eucom.mil/article/2
United States European Command
May 1, 2013
U.S. Military Bases in Europe Are Vital to America’s Security
Luke Coffey, The Foundry
From The Foundry: It has been announced that U.S. Marines will soon be arriving at a small American air base in Spain to form a U.S. rapid reaction force for the North African region. This deployment is clearly linked to last year’s brutal terrorist attack in Benghazi that left the U.S. ambassador and three other Americans dead.
By the end of May, Morón Air Base in southern Spain will be home to 500 U.S. Marines. Morón has been a U.S. air base since 1953. The 500 Marines will be supported by six V-22 Osprey aircraft and C-130 tactical cargo planes that can also serve as air-to-air refuellers.
This deployment of U.S. Marines, and the fact that the United States has an air base in the region for them to deploy to, is another example of why the American military presence in Europe is so important.
There are those arguing that U.S. bases in Europe are a Cold War relic and that the American taxpayer should not be paying for the defense of Germany, Spain, or any other European country. This argument is based on a false premise. U.S. troops in Europe are not there to protect Europeans. First and foremost, they are there to protect U.S. interests in the region.
As a report published by The Heritage Foundation states:
"From the Arctic to the Levant, from the Maghreb to the Caucasus, Europe is at one of the most important crossroads of the world. U.S. bases in Europe provide American leaders with flexibility, resilience, and options in a dangerous multipolar world. The huge garrisons of American service personnel in Europe are no longer the fortresses of the Cold War, but the forward operating bases of the 21st century."
The U.S. military presence in Europe deters American adversaries, strengthens allies, and protects American interests. The basing and support cost of the almost 50,000 U.S. troops in Germany cost $4 billion last year. That is less than 1 percent of the overall defense budget.
Whether preparing U.S. and allied troops for Afghanistan or responding to an unexpected crisis in the region, the U.S. can project power and react to the unexpected because of its forward-based military capabilities in Europe.
Reducing these capabilities would only weaken America on the world stage.
==============================
Stop NATO e-mail list home page with archives and search engine:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/
Stop NATO website and articles:
http://rickrozoff.wordpress.co
To subscribe for individual e-mails or the daily digest, unsubscribe, and otherwise change subscription status:
stopnato-subscribe@yahoogroups
==============================
United States European Command
May 1, 2013
U.S. Military Bases in Europe Are Vital to America’s Security
Luke Coffey, The Foundry
From The Foundry: It has been announced that U.S. Marines will soon be arriving at a small American air base in Spain to form a U.S. rapid reaction force for the North African region. This deployment is clearly linked to last year’s brutal terrorist attack in Benghazi that left the U.S. ambassador and three other Americans dead.
By the end of May, Morón Air Base in southern Spain will be home to 500 U.S. Marines. Morón has been a U.S. air base since 1953. The 500 Marines will be supported by six V-22 Osprey aircraft and C-130 tactical cargo planes that can also serve as air-to-air refuellers.
This deployment of U.S. Marines, and the fact that the United States has an air base in the region for them to deploy to, is another example of why the American military presence in Europe is so important.
There are those arguing that U.S. bases in Europe are a Cold War relic and that the American taxpayer should not be paying for the defense of Germany, Spain, or any other European country. This argument is based on a false premise. U.S. troops in Europe are not there to protect Europeans. First and foremost, they are there to protect U.S. interests in the region.
As a report published by The Heritage Foundation states:
"From the Arctic to the Levant, from the Maghreb to the Caucasus, Europe is at one of the most important crossroads of the world. U.S. bases in Europe provide American leaders with flexibility, resilience, and options in a dangerous multipolar world. The huge garrisons of American service personnel in Europe are no longer the fortresses of the Cold War, but the forward operating bases of the 21st century."
The U.S. military presence in Europe deters American adversaries, strengthens allies, and protects American interests. The basing and support cost of the almost 50,000 U.S. troops in Germany cost $4 billion last year. That is less than 1 percent of the overall defense budget.
Whether preparing U.S. and allied troops for Afghanistan or responding to an unexpected crisis in the region, the U.S. can project power and react to the unexpected because of its forward-based military capabilities in Europe.
Reducing these capabilities would only weaken America on the world stage.
==============================
Stop NATO e-mail list home page with archives and search engine:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/
Stop NATO website and articles:
http://rickrozoff.wordpress.co
To subscribe for individual e-mails or the daily digest, unsubscribe, and otherwise change subscription status:
stopnato-subscribe@yahoogroups
==============================
Wed May 1, 2013 7:20 pm (PDT) . Posted by:
"Rick Rozoff" rwrozoff
http://english.ruvr.ru/2013_05
Voice of Russia
May 1, 2013
Terrorism: It is a duplicitous game which the US is good at playing - Rozoff
Recorded on April 21, 2013
Audio at URL above
One of the Boston Marathon bombers praised U.S.-backed-terrorists operating in Syria against President Bashar Al-Assad shortly before he set off the bombs which tore through the crowds at the finish line in Boston. Rick Rozoff considers the implications of the fact that these Chechen-born terrorists were given asylum by the United States. For the U.S., terrorism is okay when it happens to other countries, especially if it assists in attaining geopolitical goals. Mr. Rozoff from Stop NATO, also talks about plans by NATO, already in place, to pull Syria and Lebanon into NATO once their regimes are changed.
Rozoff: I really wish your listeners would take this in: Every country in Europe excluding the five micro-states [Andorra, Lichtenstein, Monaco, San Marino and the Vatican] is either a member of NATO or a member of a NATO partnership program except for, at the moment, Cyprus, but with the change in government in Cyprus several weeks ago the new administration has indicated clearly they are going to join NATO’s Partnership for Peace program, which now means that every European state is either a NATO member or a NATO partner. Every one, bar none.
Robles: I think that is what they wanted.
Rozoff: Of course it is, but if we had had this discussion 20 years ago and somebody were to tell you in a generation in the future every country in Europe would be - and we have to remember the anecdote about at the time the US Secretary of State James Baker assuring the first and last president of the Soviet Union Michael Gorbachev that NATO would not expand one inch or one foot or one mile eastward.
Robles: At that point I think we would have agreed that NATO would be dissolved right after the Warsaw Pact was dissolved.
Rozoff: But now it has ensconced itself firmly as a political force in East Asia, throughout the Mediterranean, in the South Caucuses, in Central Asia, in the Middle East...One other thing we should mention before I forget, inbetween the Baltic States and Northeast Asia is the Persian Gulf, and in the last week or so the United Arab Emirates has opened up an embassy at NATO Headquarters.
NATO has divulged, more than acknowledged, that it has a military training site right now in Kuwait. A NATO delegation recently went to several Persian Gulf states. It has a military partnership, I mentioned earlier, as one of the four that participated in the Bosnia event, that is called the Istanbul Cooperation Initiative, set up nine years ago in 2004 at the NATO summit at Istanbul, Turkey, which has pulled in the Persian Gulf sheikdoms and monarchies in the Gulf Cooperation Council into a formal military alliance with the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.
So, now we have NATO - this is the best way I could encapsulize it - NATO is not only aimed at Russia and Russia’s western and southern borders, it's now increasingly situating itself or entering into military partnership with nations facing China, and it's consolidating a military partnership in the Persian Gulf aimed squarely at Iran.
Robles: Anything new with Syria and Israel, this 123 million dollar assistance package for the poor Syrian insurgents?
Rozoff: You perhaps have seen, or many of your listeners have seen or read the statement that one of the two suspects, the one killed I believe, in Boston (at the bombing at the Boston Marathon), supposedly hours before, or shortly before his death, posted on his Facebook account or some other site his support for the anti-government rebels in Syria.
I don’t know if that’s been substantiated but it sounds plausible, and it is at precisely that time that the vice president of the United States, Joseph Biden, announces 123 million dollars in supposedly non-lethal aid to the very Syrian rebels being praised by the mastermind of the bomb attack in Boston last week. So, that’s I think more than an irony. I think it is an indication about where the US really stands on the question of international terrorism if it affects any country other than itself and its allies.
Robles: So, this terrorist, he was praising the terrorists in Syria that the US is funding?
Rozoff: That's it, exactly.
Robles: We can go back to agent Tom Ossman (Osama Bin Laden), who was created I believe and funded by the US from the beginning, Al-Qaeda, the Taliban, I think the whole thing with terrorism and the US is: they have supported it, they’ve backed it, it’s back-fired time and time again.
Rozoff: Backfired at the very least, but I think it is even more insidious than that. It is almost as though a modern-day Doctor Frankenstein stitches together some misshapen monster who goes on a killing spree but until he actually assaults the doctor’s own bride, what he has done is either permitted to occur or encouraged or supported. And even after striking the creator’s own homeland, the creator still supports it abroad when it’s convenient because there are cross-border separatist and other attacks that really have to be characterized as terrorist if the word terrorism has any meaning.
Robles: Do you agree that the entire war on terror paradigm requires terrorists to continue existing and the entire militarization of the planet requires an enemy? I mean, if they don’t have one, they’ll have to create one to justify their own existence.
Rozoff: To paraphrase Voltaire, if terrorism didn’t exist it would have to be created, or something to replace communism after 1991, but I think even more than that to compare great things to small, every so often you read in the local press, as I read here in Chicago, about some firefighter in a suburban community who has been charged with arson, with the understanding that the more fires there are the more work there is for him.
Far be it from me to openly accuse any particular law enforcement agency of doing that, but it is certainly not beyond the realm of possibilities that that occurs, and I think this also should be brought to people’s attention: now that Chechnya is on people’s minds because of the attack in Boston, even though it is a real question whether the two young men did it, and I think enterprising journalists, especially investigative journalists, really ought to find out the history of how the two alleged perpetrators and their family achieved asylum in the United States and whether in fact they didn’t receive political refugee status. And if so, that could only be in reference to alleged Russian government persecution, could it not? I don’t see any other scenario.
Robles: There are many Chechens who have asylum, known cop killers...
Rozoff: Yes, Ahmed Zakaev.
Robles: I mean he was supposedly guilty of killing over 23 police officers.
Rozoff: John, but my point is because of the topicality of the tragedy in Boston, that we have a couple things: we have the fact that the perpetrators may very well have received political refugee status, or family members did, because of alleged persecution by the government of Russia. That's number one.
Number two, we do know now that the Russian government, Russian intelligence, probably the Federal Security Bureau, contacted the FBI two years ago and asked that the older brother be monitored, and the FBI gave them a clean bill of health.
But I am raising another issue that most people haven’t thought about: that after the attacks in the United States on 9/11 of 2001, then-Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld at one point, I believe in a telephone conversation, mentioned the Kodori Gorge [should be Pankisi Gorge] in Georgia, which connects Georgia with Russia.
Russia has been complaining for years that the Georgian government was permitting Chechen and other terrorists to operate out of the Gorge, out of the valley, to launch attacks inside Russia, and Rumsfeld mentioned that.
Now at the time I think that was considered to be an effort for him to try enlist Russian support in the so-called “global war on terrorism,” but what in fact occurred was immediately afterwards the Pentagon, he, deployed Green Beret special forces instructors to Georgia to train the Georgian military in what is called a train and equip program which persists to this day. It was handed over by the Green Berets to the US Marine Corps.
With the fact that the alleged perpetrators in Boston are ethnic Chechens, does this give the United States an opportunity to increase its intelligence and military presence in Georgia and possibly Azerbaijan under the guise of fighting the Chechen terrorists who struck “the heartland of America”? Right?
Robles: After 9/11 they invaded Afghanistan and Iraq, even though they were 19 Egyptian terrorists, they didn’t of course invade Egypt and we’re thinking: “Okay, now they’re going to what? Invade Chechnya?”, but this is Russian territory.
Rozoff: They couldn’t openly intervene there. So my suspicion would be again: under the pretense of fighting the very same forces they have backhandedly supported, as you indicate, for the past 28 years, which is Chechen and Dagestani separatists - religious theocratic extremists - that the US will beef up its military presence in Georgia and possibly Azerbaijan.
Which is something long under way and which I am sure they had intended otherwise. This provides them with the rationale for doing so. So, I would be concerned about that.
The US, I'm sure, will make (how sincere or not) overtures to Russia to help it solve the problem with certain terrorists. As you indicate, not only in London but in Washington major ethnic Chechen and Dagestani separatist leaders have been granted political asylum, sometimes in rather lucrative positions with think tanks and other organizations here in the United States as well as Britain.
So, it’s a duplicitous game. That is what the US is good at doing; supporting something backhandedly behind closed doors in one sense and openly proclaiming the opposite. It won’t be the first thing that’s occurred.
We should keep in mind since we were talking about Georgia that what is now called...there is another new phenomenon that people are probably not aware of, something called the Black Sea Rotational Force. The US Marine Corps, I believe three years ago, set up something called a Black Sea Rotational Force. It is based six months of the year in Romania, and its task is to train with, which is to say to integrate the militaries of 14 nations in the greater Black Sea Region, but also in the Caucuses, including Georgia, Azerbaijan, Armenia, all of the Balkan States, but also I believe Moldova for sure and I am quite sure Ukraine into the bargain.
But the Black Sea Rotational Force of US Marines recently staged joint military exercises with the Georgian armed forces, Agile Spirit. It's now going to be deployed, even though it is way out of its area of responsibility, to the Baltic states for this year’s Baltic Operations, BALTOPS, where they participated last year, incidentally.
So, people think that with the budgetary cutbacks resulting from the financial crisis that began almost five years ago, that the US is cutting back its military presence around the world. That is not true.
The government of Spain now has permitted 500 US Marines, a US military strike force, and military aircraft to be based in southern Spain for operations in Africa. This is just openly, how I described it.
And this is in addition to the fact that roughly last year Spain announced that it would permit the United States to base four guided missile destroyers as part of the interceptor missile system, Phase 1 of NATO's interceptor missile system in Europe, to patrol the Mediterranean Sea.
A guided missile destroyer can fire an interceptor missile but can also fire an offensive missile. That's what it was designed for.
These are four more ships in addition to the US 6th Fleet in the Mediterranean Sea and NATO’s so-called Operation Active Endeavor, which has been active since 2001, to have turned the Mediterranean Sea into a private Pentagon-NATO preserve, which it is. And now, as alluded to earlier, with the last European hold-out, Cyprus, coming into NATO’s camp and Libya soon to join NATO’s Mediterranean Dialogue, in the attempt to drag post-Assad Syria and Lebanon into that NATO program, turning the entire Mediterranean Sea Basin into NATO’s sea.
Robles: You mean NATO’s already taken steps to pull post-Assad Syria into NATO?
Rozoff: You heard this from me but I’ve been saying it for two years. And one thing I did predict before the fact was that when NATO took over from US Africa Command the air war and naval blockade against Libya two years ago, so-called Operation Unified Protector, that at the end of it, Libya, which has been the only North African country not a member of NATO’s Mediterranean Dialogue, that it would be incorporated into the Mediterranean Dialogue. That fact was stated immediately after the overthrow and murder of Muammar Gaddafi by no less authorities than the US ambassador to NATO Ivo Daalder and the Secretary General of NATO Anders Fogh Rasmussen who confirmed that.
Now that would mean that the only two countries in the area of responsibility of the Mediterranean Dialogue would be Lebanon and Syria and I have no question in my mind that they are targeted, after the regime change in both countries, to be incorporated into a NATO program. And, I believe, the United States intends both Yemen and Iraq to be pulled into the Istanbul Cooperation Initiative with the Persian Gulf monarchies.
Robles: Oh my God! Rick, sorry we have to stop because I have to read the news.
==============================
Stop NATO e-mail list home page with archives and search engine:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/
Stop NATO website and articles:
http://rickrozoff.wordpress.co
To subscribe for individual e-mails or the daily digest, unsubscribe, and otherwise change subscription status:
stopnato-subscribe@yahoogroups
==============================
Voice of Russia
May 1, 2013
Terrorism: It is a duplicitous game which the US is good at playing - Rozoff
Recorded on April 21, 2013
Audio at URL above
One of the Boston Marathon bombers praised U.S.-backed-terrorists operating in Syria against President Bashar Al-Assad shortly before he set off the bombs which tore through the crowds at the finish line in Boston. Rick Rozoff considers the implications of the fact that these Chechen-born terrorists were given asylum by the United States. For the U.S., terrorism is okay when it happens to other countries, especially if it assists in attaining geopolitical goals. Mr. Rozoff from Stop NATO, also talks about plans by NATO, already in place, to pull Syria and Lebanon into NATO once their regimes are changed.
Rozoff: I really wish your listeners would take this in: Every country in Europe excluding the five micro-states [Andorra, Lichtenstein, Monaco, San Marino and the Vatican] is either a member of NATO or a member of a NATO partnership program except for, at the moment, Cyprus, but with the change in government in Cyprus several weeks ago the new administration has indicated clearly they are going to join NATO’s Partnership for Peace program, which now means that every European state is either a NATO member or a NATO partner. Every one, bar none.
Robles: I think that is what they wanted.
Rozoff: Of course it is, but if we had had this discussion 20 years ago and somebody were to tell you in a generation in the future every country in Europe would be - and we have to remember the anecdote about at the time the US Secretary of State James Baker assuring the first and last president of the Soviet Union Michael Gorbachev that NATO would not expand one inch or one foot or one mile eastward.
Robles: At that point I think we would have agreed that NATO would be dissolved right after the Warsaw Pact was dissolved.
Rozoff: But now it has ensconced itself firmly as a political force in East Asia, throughout the Mediterranean, in the South Caucuses, in Central Asia, in the Middle East...One other thing we should mention before I forget, inbetween the Baltic States and Northeast Asia is the Persian Gulf, and in the last week or so the United Arab Emirates has opened up an embassy at NATO Headquarters.
NATO has divulged, more than acknowledged, that it has a military training site right now in Kuwait. A NATO delegation recently went to several Persian Gulf states. It has a military partnership, I mentioned earlier, as one of the four that participated in the Bosnia event, that is called the Istanbul Cooperation Initiative, set up nine years ago in 2004 at the NATO summit at Istanbul, Turkey, which has pulled in the Persian Gulf sheikdoms and monarchies in the Gulf Cooperation Council into a formal military alliance with the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.
So, now we have NATO - this is the best way I could encapsulize it - NATO is not only aimed at Russia and Russia’s western and southern borders, it's now increasingly situating itself or entering into military partnership with nations facing China, and it's consolidating a military partnership in the Persian Gulf aimed squarely at Iran.
Robles: Anything new with Syria and Israel, this 123 million dollar assistance package for the poor Syrian insurgents?
Rozoff: You perhaps have seen, or many of your listeners have seen or read the statement that one of the two suspects, the one killed I believe, in Boston (at the bombing at the Boston Marathon), supposedly hours before, or shortly before his death, posted on his Facebook account or some other site his support for the anti-government rebels in Syria.
I don’t know if that’s been substantiated but it sounds plausible, and it is at precisely that time that the vice president of the United States, Joseph Biden, announces 123 million dollars in supposedly non-lethal aid to the very Syrian rebels being praised by the mastermind of the bomb attack in Boston last week. So, that’s I think more than an irony. I think it is an indication about where the US really stands on the question of international terrorism if it affects any country other than itself and its allies.
Robles: So, this terrorist, he was praising the terrorists in Syria that the US is funding?
Rozoff: That's it, exactly.
Robles: We can go back to agent Tom Ossman (Osama Bin Laden), who was created I believe and funded by the US from the beginning, Al-Qaeda, the Taliban, I think the whole thing with terrorism and the US is: they have supported it, they’ve backed it, it’s back-fired time and time again.
Rozoff: Backfired at the very least, but I think it is even more insidious than that. It is almost as though a modern-day Doctor Frankenstein stitches together some misshapen monster who goes on a killing spree but until he actually assaults the doctor’s own bride, what he has done is either permitted to occur or encouraged or supported. And even after striking the creator’s own homeland, the creator still supports it abroad when it’s convenient because there are cross-border separatist and other attacks that really have to be characterized as terrorist if the word terrorism has any meaning.
Robles: Do you agree that the entire war on terror paradigm requires terrorists to continue existing and the entire militarization of the planet requires an enemy? I mean, if they don’t have one, they’ll have to create one to justify their own existence.
Rozoff: To paraphrase Voltaire, if terrorism didn’t exist it would have to be created, or something to replace communism after 1991, but I think even more than that to compare great things to small, every so often you read in the local press, as I read here in Chicago, about some firefighter in a suburban community who has been charged with arson, with the understanding that the more fires there are the more work there is for him.
Far be it from me to openly accuse any particular law enforcement agency of doing that, but it is certainly not beyond the realm of possibilities that that occurs, and I think this also should be brought to people’s attention: now that Chechnya is on people’s minds because of the attack in Boston, even though it is a real question whether the two young men did it, and I think enterprising journalists, especially investigative journalists, really ought to find out the history of how the two alleged perpetrators and their family achieved asylum in the United States and whether in fact they didn’t receive political refugee status. And if so, that could only be in reference to alleged Russian government persecution, could it not? I don’t see any other scenario.
Robles: There are many Chechens who have asylum, known cop killers...
Rozoff: Yes, Ahmed Zakaev.
Robles: I mean he was supposedly guilty of killing over 23 police officers.
Rozoff: John, but my point is because of the topicality of the tragedy in Boston, that we have a couple things: we have the fact that the perpetrators may very well have received political refugee status, or family members did, because of alleged persecution by the government of Russia. That's number one.
Number two, we do know now that the Russian government, Russian intelligence, probably the Federal Security Bureau, contacted the FBI two years ago and asked that the older brother be monitored, and the FBI gave them a clean bill of health.
But I am raising another issue that most people haven’t thought about: that after the attacks in the United States on 9/11 of 2001, then-Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld at one point, I believe in a telephone conversation, mentioned the Kodori Gorge [should be Pankisi Gorge] in Georgia, which connects Georgia with Russia.
Russia has been complaining for years that the Georgian government was permitting Chechen and other terrorists to operate out of the Gorge, out of the valley, to launch attacks inside Russia, and Rumsfeld mentioned that.
Now at the time I think that was considered to be an effort for him to try enlist Russian support in the so-called “global war on terrorism,” but what in fact occurred was immediately afterwards the Pentagon, he, deployed Green Beret special forces instructors to Georgia to train the Georgian military in what is called a train and equip program which persists to this day. It was handed over by the Green Berets to the US Marine Corps.
With the fact that the alleged perpetrators in Boston are ethnic Chechens, does this give the United States an opportunity to increase its intelligence and military presence in Georgia and possibly Azerbaijan under the guise of fighting the Chechen terrorists who struck “the heartland of America”? Right?
Robles: After 9/11 they invaded Afghanistan and Iraq, even though they were 19 Egyptian terrorists, they didn’t of course invade Egypt and we’re thinking: “Okay, now they’re going to what? Invade Chechnya?”, but this is Russian territory.
Rozoff: They couldn’t openly intervene there. So my suspicion would be again: under the pretense of fighting the very same forces they have backhandedly supported, as you indicate, for the past 28 years, which is Chechen and Dagestani separatists - religious theocratic extremists - that the US will beef up its military presence in Georgia and possibly Azerbaijan.
Which is something long under way and which I am sure they had intended otherwise. This provides them with the rationale for doing so. So, I would be concerned about that.
The US, I'm sure, will make (how sincere or not) overtures to Russia to help it solve the problem with certain terrorists. As you indicate, not only in London but in Washington major ethnic Chechen and Dagestani separatist leaders have been granted political asylum, sometimes in rather lucrative positions with think tanks and other organizations here in the United States as well as Britain.
So, it’s a duplicitous game. That is what the US is good at doing; supporting something backhandedly behind closed doors in one sense and openly proclaiming the opposite. It won’t be the first thing that’s occurred.
We should keep in mind since we were talking about Georgia that what is now called...there is another new phenomenon that people are probably not aware of, something called the Black Sea Rotational Force. The US Marine Corps, I believe three years ago, set up something called a Black Sea Rotational Force. It is based six months of the year in Romania, and its task is to train with, which is to say to integrate the militaries of 14 nations in the greater Black Sea Region, but also in the Caucuses, including Georgia, Azerbaijan, Armenia, all of the Balkan States, but also I believe Moldova for sure and I am quite sure Ukraine into the bargain.
But the Black Sea Rotational Force of US Marines recently staged joint military exercises with the Georgian armed forces, Agile Spirit. It's now going to be deployed, even though it is way out of its area of responsibility, to the Baltic states for this year’s Baltic Operations, BALTOPS, where they participated last year, incidentally.
So, people think that with the budgetary cutbacks resulting from the financial crisis that began almost five years ago, that the US is cutting back its military presence around the world. That is not true.
The government of Spain now has permitted 500 US Marines, a US military strike force, and military aircraft to be based in southern Spain for operations in Africa. This is just openly, how I described it.
And this is in addition to the fact that roughly last year Spain announced that it would permit the United States to base four guided missile destroyers as part of the interceptor missile system, Phase 1 of NATO's interceptor missile system in Europe, to patrol the Mediterranean Sea.
A guided missile destroyer can fire an interceptor missile but can also fire an offensive missile. That's what it was designed for.
These are four more ships in addition to the US 6th Fleet in the Mediterranean Sea and NATO’s so-called Operation Active Endeavor, which has been active since 2001, to have turned the Mediterranean Sea into a private Pentagon-NATO preserve, which it is. And now, as alluded to earlier, with the last European hold-out, Cyprus, coming into NATO’s camp and Libya soon to join NATO’s Mediterranean Dialogue, in the attempt to drag post-Assad Syria and Lebanon into that NATO program, turning the entire Mediterranean Sea Basin into NATO’s sea.
Robles: You mean NATO’s already taken steps to pull post-Assad Syria into NATO?
Rozoff: You heard this from me but I’ve been saying it for two years. And one thing I did predict before the fact was that when NATO took over from US Africa Command the air war and naval blockade against Libya two years ago, so-called Operation Unified Protector, that at the end of it, Libya, which has been the only North African country not a member of NATO’s Mediterranean Dialogue, that it would be incorporated into the Mediterranean Dialogue. That fact was stated immediately after the overthrow and murder of Muammar Gaddafi by no less authorities than the US ambassador to NATO Ivo Daalder and the Secretary General of NATO Anders Fogh Rasmussen who confirmed that.
Now that would mean that the only two countries in the area of responsibility of the Mediterranean Dialogue would be Lebanon and Syria and I have no question in my mind that they are targeted, after the regime change in both countries, to be incorporated into a NATO program. And, I believe, the United States intends both Yemen and Iraq to be pulled into the Istanbul Cooperation Initiative with the Persian Gulf monarchies.
Robles: Oh my God! Rick, sorry we have to stop because I have to read the news.
==============================
Stop NATO e-mail list home page with archives and search engine:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/
Stop NATO website and articles:
http://rickrozoff.wordpress.co
To subscribe for individual e-mails or the daily digest, unsubscribe, and otherwise change subscription status:
stopnato-subscribe@yahoogroups
==============================
Thu May 2, 2013 6:22 am (PDT) . Posted by:
"Rick Rozoff" rwrozoff
http://www.defense.gov/news/ne
U.S. Department of Defense
April 30, 2013
Hagel Hosts German Defense Minister at Pentagon
WASHINGTON: Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel hosted German Defense Minister Thomas de Maizière today at the Pentagon and commended Germany's leadership in Europe and among the NATO allies, Pentagon Press Secretary George Little said.
In a statement summarizing their meeting, Little said the two leaders discussed Germany's essential support to allied operations in Afghanistan.
“Secretary Hagel thanked Germany for its vital leadership within the International Security Assistance Force, particularly its leadership of Regional Command North,” Little said. “Secretary Hagel applauded Germany’s recent announcement to continue security support to Afghanistan post-2014 and discussed U.S. considerations for an enduring presence.”
Hagel also appreciates Germany for its support to NATO's defensive mission in Turkey along the Syrian border, the press secretary said. Noting that Germany, the Netherlands, and the United States have contributed Patriot anti-missile batteries to augment Turkey's defenses, he added that “the mission demonstrates the solidarity of the alliance against common threats.”
The two defense leaders also discussed NATO’s future and the importance of the alliance, Little said.
“Secretary Hagel affirmed that NATO is not only the cornerstone of the transatlantic relationship, but the benchmark for multilateral security cooperation around the world,” he said. “The leaders discussed ideas for improving NATO’s capabilities and approaches for ensuring NATO remains capable of meeting future security challenges.”
U.S. Department of Defense
April 30, 2013
Hagel Hosts German Defense Minister at Pentagon
WASHINGTON: Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel hosted German Defense Minister Thomas de Maizière today at the Pentagon and commended Germany's leadership in Europe and among the NATO allies, Pentagon Press Secretary George Little said.
In a statement summarizing their meeting, Little said the two leaders discussed Germany's essential support to allied operations in Afghanistan.
“Secretary Hagel thanked Germany for its vital leadership within the International Security Assistance Force, particularly its leadership of Regional Command North,” Little said. “Secretary Hagel applauded Germany’s recent announcement to continue security support to Afghanistan post-2014 and discussed U.S. considerations for an enduring presence.”
Hagel also appreciates Germany for its support to NATO's defensive mission in Turkey along the Syrian border, the press secretary said. Noting that Germany, the Netherlands, and the United States have contributed Patriot anti-missile batteries to augment Turkey's defenses, he added that “the mission demonstrates the solidarity of the alliance against common threats.”
The two defense leaders also discussed NATO’s future and the importance of the alliance, Little said.
“Secretary Hagel affirmed that NATO is not only the cornerstone of the transatlantic relationship, but the benchmark for multilateral security cooperation around the world,” he said. “The leaders discussed ideas for improving NATO’s capabilities and approaches for ensuring NATO remains capable of meeting future security challenges.”
