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NATO Approves New Reaction Force for Eastern Europe NATO Plans a Special Force to Reassure Eastern Europe and Deter Russia
(about 9 hours later)
NEWPORT, Wales — NATO leaders approved plans on Friday for a 4,000-person rapid reaction force to be based in Eastern Europe, and meant to reassure members of the alliance unnerved by events in Ukraine, where Russia has seized and annexed the Crimean peninsula and backed separatist rebels in the east. NEWPORT, Wales — NATO struggled to find responses to new challenges as it concluded its summit meeting here on Friday, announcing limited steps to deter Russia in Eastern Europe and starting to marshal broader international support to confront radical Islamists in the Middle East.
The NATO secretary general, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, said that the force, a “spearhead” for a larger reaction force, would send a clear message to potential aggressors, namely Russia, and would represent “a continuous presence.” The alliance said it would establish a rapid-reaction force with an essentially permanent presence in Eastern Europe and would enhance military cooperation with Ukraine.
“Should you even think of attacking one ally, you will be facing the whole alliance,” he declared at the close of the two-day NATO summit in southern Wales. But the limits of the alliance were visible, too. The United States and Britain used the meeting to try to advance their own emerging policies, especially toward the spread of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, while most members shied away from specific commitments to increase military spending.
In a news conference after the summit, President Obama said that the principle of collective defense was “nonnegotiable” and that NATO “will defend every ally.” The combination of crises — one on NATO’s borders with a resurgent Russia and the other involving a possible new terrorism threat from radical Islam — represents the first major challenge to NATO in a quarter of a century. Though many words were said about the need to “reinvigorate and refocus” the alliance, as the host, Prime Minister David Cameron of Britain put it, the summit meeting made only a small step toward doing so.
Mr. Obama said the leaders had agreed to a “new readiness action plan,” including the creation of the new force, the stationing of more equipment in Central and Eastern Europe, more rotations of forces into the area and more training exercises there. He said that all 28 allies would contribute to the effort “as long as necessary,” and that members who were not already meeting the alliance’s goal of spending 2 percent of gross domestic product on defense would increase their military budgets. President Obama, in a concluding news conference, said the message from the summit meeting to Russia was that “actions have consequences” and that a combination of NATO moves to enhance deterrence and coordinated sanctions on Russia from the United States and the European Union had helped pressure President Vladimir V. Putin to agree to a tentative cease-fire in Ukraine.
“NATO will not be complacent,” Mr. Obama said. There must be “follow-through on the ground,” Mr. Obama said. “We are hopeful, but based on past experience also skeptical that, in fact, the separatists will follow through and the Russians will stop violating Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity. So it has to be tested.”
Though Ukraine is not a member of the alliance, the president said, NATO was committed to upholding the country’s “sovereignty, independence, territorial integrity and right to defend itself.” He said that all 28 allies would provide security assistance to Ukraine, including help with logistics and with command and control, and that NATO’s resolve would send “a strong message to Russia.” It was clear from the start that NATO would neither deploy military force against Russia in Ukraine nor offer Ukraine any credible path toward membership in the alliance. Despite the harsh language about Russia’s actions in Ukraine, accusations against Mr. Putin of duplicity and statements of support for Ukraine and its president, Petro O. Poroshenko, the real effort of NATO here was to reassure those of its own members geographically closest to Russia that the alliance would come to their defense, if necessary.
Mr. Obama said that the door to NATO membership “remains open to nations that can meet our high standards,” and that the alliance would reinforce its cooperation with other countries as well. He specifically mentioned two, Georgia and Moldova, where Russian-backed separatist rebels have broken off chunks of territory from government control, as well as Jordan and Libya. Those Eastern European members said they came away from Wales reassured, but for Ukraine, a NATO partner but not a member, there was mostly moral support. No NATO country, let alone the alliance itself, is prepared to provide Ukraine with lethal military equipment to fight Russia and the rebels, and Mr. Poroshenko was being urged essentially to make the best deal he could with Russia’s proxies while working for a more inclusive Ukrainian constitution and new parliamentary elections.
Earlier Friday, the Obama administration said it had formed a coalition of countries to oppose Sunni militants with the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, unveiling a military and political campaign that officials said could eventually serve as a model for fighting extremist groups around the world. There were pledges of about $20 million for trust funds to help Ukraine’s military, and different countries were urged to help in various ways with nonlethal equipment and intelligence. And the United States and the European Union tried to put more pressure on Moscow by threatening to put new economic sanctions in place, probably early next week, a move that has nothing to do with NATO, which is a military organization. But sanctions have a longer-term effect while troops move quickly on the ground.
But Ukraine remained the most important issue for the alliance, even as a cease-fire was announced on Friday in Minsk, Belarus, by representatives of Ukraine, the pro-Russian rebels, Russia and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. And Mr. Poroshenko, with his forces at risk of losing a major port, Mariupol, in the end has endorsed a truce that seems to leave the status of eastern Ukraine uncertain and will probably be sharply criticized at home. NATO, rather than strongly bolstering Mr. Poroshenko’s position, in some sense encouraged him to negotiate with the very rebels, “the terrorists,” as the Kiev government calls them, with whom he had said he would never negotiate.
The United States and the European Union have expressed skepticism about a cease-fire in the Ukraine conflict and said they were preparing further coordinated economic sanctions against Russia. Asked at the news conference whether those sanctions would go ahead if the cease-fire took hold, Mr. Obama gave a guarded answer. Though “the only reason we are seeing a cease-fire is the sanctions” against Russia, he said, European leaders were still discussing how and when to proceed with a new round. If Ukraine fell into a security no man’s land, this NATO meeting more directly addressed important issues of deterrence and reassurance, making it clear to Moscow that any interference or “hybrid” attack on a NATO member, even one with a large Russian minority, would produce a strong collective military response. It was also because of NATO that France decided to suspend its delivery of Mistral amphibious assault ships to Russia, a contract that had been signed years ago but became a large embarrassment for the current government because of Russian actions in Ukraine.
“The path for Russia to rejoin the community of nations that respects international law is still there,” Mr. Obama said. As advertised, NATO on Friday approved plans for a 4,000-member rapid-reaction force, based in Eastern Europe and initially led by the British, to reassure existing members near Russia that the principle of collective defense remains sacrosanct.
Britain said it would supply 1,000 troops, including a brigade headquarters, for the new NATO rapid reaction force, and that 3,500 British troops will take part in NATO exercises in Eastern Europe through 2015 — though there may be some overlap between the two commitments. NATO’s secretary general, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, said the upgraded force, a spearhead for a larger reaction force, would send a clear message to potential aggressors, namely Russia, and represent “a continuous presence.”
NATO also announced that its next summit, in 2016, will be held in Warsaw, the Polish capital, where “the Warsaw Pact was created and overthrown,” said President Bronislaw Komorowski of Poland. “Should you even think of attacking one ally, you will be facing the whole alliance,” he declared as a two-day summit meeting in southern Wales drew to a close.
Earlier Friday, the Obama administration said it had formed a coalition of countries to oppose Sunni militants with the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, unveiling a military and political campaign that officials said could eventually be a model for fighting extremist groups around the world.
But some diplomats said they were uncomfortable using a summit meeting of the 28-nation alliance as a backdrop for a smaller group with no NATO imprimatur and, except for Turkey, no named Muslim partners.
Ukraine remained the prime issue for the alliance, with peace talks in Minsk, Belarus, where Ukraine, Russia and pro-Russian rebels produced what appeared to be an agreement for a cease-fire. Western leaders remain skeptical about whether the truce will last. They intend to go ahead with new sanctions on Russia, leaders at the meeting in Wales said. The European Union can suspend the new sanctions later, if Moscow withdraws its troops from Ukraine and observes the cease-fire, Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany said.
A cease-fire declaration is not enough, Ms. Merkel said. Verification is needed to determine whether the cease-fire is being carried out, whether Russian troops are being withdrawn and whether a buffer zone is established. “Everything is in flux,” she said. “Therefore we should expect that these sanctions could indeed be put into force, but with the proviso that they can be suspended again if this process really takes place.”
Britain’s foreign secretary, Philip Hammond, told the BBC he favored immediately imposing the sanctions and then lifting them if the cease-fire held.
NATO also grappled with the unwillingness of most of its members to meet their commitments to spend an amount equivalent to 2 percent of their gross domestic product on defense, an issue on which the United States, which bears most of the alliance’s costs, has become increasingly outspoken. The meeting yielded no new binding commitments for individual nations to move quickly to meet the defense spending target. But the alliance did agree to stop cutting defense spending, to spend more in real terms as their economies grew and to reach the 2 percent target within a decade. Members were also encouraged to spend at least 20 percent of their defense spending on equipment and research, not just on salaries and benefits.
“Russia’s aggression against Ukraine is a wake-up call,” Mr. Rasmussen said. The crisis had led the governments of NATO-allied nations “to reconsider defense investment because it’s now obvious that we cannot take our security for granted,” he said.
On Russia, the NATO communiqué condemned Moscow’s annexation of Crimea and military incursion into eastern Ukraine and continued the suspension of “all practical civilian and military cooperation” with Russia, although diplomatic conversations would continue.
“We continue to believe that a partnership between NATO and Russia based on respect for international law would be of strategic value. We continue to aspire to a cooperative, constructive relationship with Russia,” the alliance said, but “in a Europe where each country freely chooses its future.”
Britain also said it would supply 1,000 personnel, including a brigade headquarters, for the new rapid-reaction force. In addition, 3,500 British troops will take part in NATO exercises in Eastern Europe through 2015, though there may be some overlap between the two commitments.
NATO announced that its next summit meeting, in 2016, would be in Warsaw.