The aim is to create a fully functioning, division-sized force for rapid deployment and regular, frequent exercises. Officials involved in the planning say it will have the capacity to increase significantly in size.
The force will incorporate air and naval units as well as ground troops and will be led by British commanders, with other participating nations contributing a range of specialist troops and units. Countries involved at present include Denmark, Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Norway and the Netherlands. Canada has also expressed an interest in taking part.
The Financial Times also reports that Sweden and Finland may soon enter the NATO alliance.
10 comments:
Does not look good. If NATO gets involved in a combat in Ukraine it may lead to a much bigger war. I hope there is a peaceful solution. Right now there is too much hype on both sides.
Mound, I tweeted your post. I hope more people will read your post.
Hi, LD. I was surprised to come across this in FT, a Brit paper. I had seen no mention of it in the Canadian media. This is the sort of thing, though, that a guy like Harper would do under the radar.
This seems to just get worse by the day, and it's really starting to worry me as to how it will all pan out.
All we get from the MSM is Putin bad, more sanctions etc when it is no secret that the US have been the root cause of the troubles in Ukraine, no mention of sanctions there though, heaven forbid.
There have been many articles by Mound, Paul Craig Roberts and others that give a much truer and honest background. Why has it all gone quiet regarding the Malaysian Airways incident, why was there no reporting of the atrocities in Odessa, why are the eastern Ukrainians 'rebels' when they are trying to defend themselves against a clearly hostile government. How can the US and the EU come out and say that Russia cannot just invade another sovereign state when the US seem to do just that for a pastime. How can they say these things with a straight face.
I will be 60 in a couple of weeks, and I'm hoping for about another 20years, or so, before I shuffle of this mortal coil. There are some days when I really don't think that will happen due to the insanity shown by so called 'world leaders'.
I was brought up not to 'poke my nose' into the business of others, clearly I was never going to be a politician.
Harpers self delusion of being a great warrior leader is no longer funny, it's now dangerous. He has been itching to get Canada into a war. This fundamentalist christian right moron is actually our PM and he views war in a primarily religious context. I find it also very interesting mound that you found the article in a British newspaper not in a Canadian one. With the exception of very few journalists I find the Canadian MSM totally apathetic. It is bloggers like yourself who write and expose the political truth. 2015 is too far away!
Mound, Harper likes veil of secrecy. He has even volunteered to join the U.S. to attack ISIS in Iraq.
Of course, LD. Tony Abbott's already in on that so how could Harper keep Canada out? What's not clear is how Australia (or Canada) would base their warplanes. The Americans are using one of their carriers but we'd have to find an airbase.
This was reported on CBC last evening at around 3am in the morning from Germany I think. I happened to turn the radio on while not being able to sleep but missed where. But it was not Canadian.
No Action Talk Only . . .
Now, it's "Plan to have 4,000 allied troops ready ‘at very short notice’"
Even 10,000 is smaller than most army divisions.
This isn't 1944, or 1914, it's 2014.
The point is, if, say, things around the Ukraine get hostile, the 3-dimensional war environment is totally unlike anything we've seen. Things like drones, phased-array radar and lasers and hyperbaric munitions, etc., etc.
And small politically-arranged dribbles of troops like the expeditionary force envisaged will disappear as fast as cellophane in a fire.
Then again, a force like that might have some benefit as a follow-on. How so?
You see, we have yet to see balls-to-the-wall, all-out ground warfare with this technology, so most pundits are unaware of just how time-limited that kind of offensive is. With this kind of ordnance the consumption rate is unbelievable, so the antagonists may very well shoot themselves dry of all the high tech munitions. At that point an expeditionary force might be able to survive.
My 2¢
Ed, I think we've become so distanced from peer-on-peer conflict that such a thing would be akin to the introduction of the Maxim gun in WWI.
Both sides, but especially ours, would be putting a good deal of reliance on technology that's never had a real world field test.
It would also be a major social and economic shock to our societies. Do you think your neighbours are mentally conditioned to support this sort of conflict? After decades of offshoring, do we even have the skilled manufacturing base remaining to support the logistic needs of a war?
America bankrolled WWII. It's now broke. Who will bankroll America and on what terms?
I don't see any basis for a protracted war. It'd be pretty much a "come as you are" party which means you would go through your stuff fairly quickly moving ever further up the ladder of escalation.
As a society I don't think we're remotely tough enough to endure this sort of thing.
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