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thedrifter
03-03-03, 02:01 PM
Jones: Restructuring proposals for Europe bases aim for speed, agility


By Melissa Eddy, The Associated Press



STUTTGART, Germany — The top U.S. military commander in Europe said Monday the United States is looking at ways to restructure its European bases with an eye toward quicker deployment and a more agile force, not as a “knee-jerk reaction” to Berlin’s refusal to back a war with Iraq.

The new plan would move away from the Cold War focus on western Europe, concentrated in Germany, to smaller, more strategic bases in eastern and southern Europe, where troops would deploy on a rotating basis without dependents, Marine Gen. James L. Jones told reporters.

Jones, who serves both as NATO’s supreme allied commander and the head of the 119,000-strong U.S. forces in Europe, said the plan reflects new security threats, as well as NATO’s eastward expansion.

Leaked reports about the plans, however, have fueled speculation in European capitals that U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld was using the realignment to punish opposition to war in “Old Europe,” namely Germany, to reward countries in “New Europe,” like Poland and Hungary.

The general was quick to quash the interpretation, maintaining that the tens of thousands of mostly Army units currently based in Germany are too heavy and too costly for today’s threats.

“Whatever we are doing is not connected with the current political situation and shouldn’t be seen as a knee-jerk reaction to a political situation,” Jones said. “We recognized we have to move in a certain direction to carry out a strategic mission.”

Jones did not indicate how lean a new European force would be, though clearly it would be downsized.

The concept would be toward smaller groups of soldiers who could deploy quickly from strategic locations. The new organization could resemble the Marines in Okinawa, where the base has a skeleton staff and small numbers of Marines rotate in for several months at a time from bases in the United States.

While plans are still in the “embryonic stages,” Jones said planners would like to have the concept solidified within a year with implementation soon after.

So far, there is no list of bases targeted for closure or reductions — nor a solid plan of where new U.S. installations would be established, although Jones confirmed Poland, Bulgaria and Romania were being considered.

Russia has expressed concern that establishing bases in the former Warsaw Pact region violates agreements signed when NATO expanded to include those countries, but Jones insisted that the plans would respect the accords. Signed in 1999, the agreements rule out permanent stationing of U.S. troops in Poland, but allow for limited deployment of motorized divisions if the alliance faces a threat.

“We are communicating well with Russia that we will live up to the spirit of the agreement,” said Jones. “This is not about building up eastern Europe in the same way we built up western Europe after World War II.”

He said new bases in the east could also serve as points for joint deployments of troops from the host nations and NATO’s planned rapid reaction force.

Some key U.S. installations such as Air Force bases at Ramstein and Spangdahlem — slated for expansions, not reductions — would continue to play a key role as transport hubs in the new configuration, Jones said.

“There will be a significant number of bases that will have an enduring value,” Jones said. “A good many bases over the years will still have a strategic ability and it would be silly to close them because we want to move them a few hundred miles to the east.”

The German opposition has used reports about possible closures to berate Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder for irritating Washington with his anti-war stand.

More than 80,000 U.S. troops are stationed in Germany, the largest force in Europe, but still just a fraction of the 300,000 troops and dependents stationed here at the height of the Cold War.

While their numbers have decreased, the troops who remain have been busier than they ever were during the Cold War, with deployments from the Balkans to the Gulf region since the demise of the Soviet Union.

Schroeder’s government says it is unfazed by the United States’ review of its international troop deployments, including changes to its commitments in Germany.

“That is a completely normal process,” Defense Ministry spokesman Col. Hannes Wendroth said in Berlin. He declined to comment further.

Still, the loss of the tens of thousands of family members and civilian support staff who currently accompany the U.S. troops to their German bases could mean a considerable drop in income for many regions where local economies are heavily dependent on the Americans’ contribution.

Sempers,

Roger