EUROPEAN NATO partners have reacted with scepticism to British and US calls to deploy rapid reaction forces in Europe and Afghanistan.
Ahead of a Nato meeting yesterday in Krakow, Poland, British defence secretary John Hutton suggested using a 3,000-strong Nato response force (NRF) in mainland Europe to free other troops for deployment elsewhere.
Washington, meanwhile, has called for a separate rapid reaction force to be deployed in Afghanistan ahead of the presidential election there in August.
Days after President Barack Obama announced the deployment of 17,000 extra US soldiers and support personnel to Afghanistan, US defence secretary Robert Gates renewed his call for European Nato partners to shoulder a greater military burden in the country.
But the muted reactions of European defence ministers, ranging from cautious to dismissive, indicated that a familiar reality is slowly creeping back into transatlantic relations.
In a Financial Times interview, Mr Hutton suggested that Nato member states in central Europe would be happier to commit troops to foreign missions, he said, “certain in the knowledge that there is a dedicated homeland security force that will have no other call on its priorities than European homeland security”.
The NRF was created at Nato’s 2002 Prague summit as a 25,000-strong force ready to be deployed anywhere in the world in five days.
However, disagreement over its role means that, to date, it exists only on paper.
German defence minister Franz-Josef Jung dismissed a US idea to deploy NRF troops in Afghanistan, saying the NRF “should not be considered a reserve force”.
A spokesman for Mr Jung said the government was anxious to stick to the “founding principles” of the NRF and Germany is understood to be unwilling to be involved in any European deployment.
Germany announced that it would provide an additional 600 soldiers to its 3,500-strong deployment in Afghanistan but declined to say whether they would remain after the election.
Italy has made another 500 soldiers available. Britain said it had yet to reach a decision.
Mr Gates said yesterday he was disappointed by his allies’ response to the request for additional troops for Afghanistan.