– NATO...Are Its Final Days Just Ahead

EU's military capability is 'worrisome'
By Honor Mahony

EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - NATO will have trouble maintaining its 'great strategic shift' if the EU does not brush up on its military capabilities, according to Washington's ambassador to the Alliance.

Speaking on Monday (10 January) at the Centre for European Policy Studies, a Brussels thinktank, Nicholas Burns outlined NATO's new role in the world as focussing on the Middle East, North Africa and South and East Asia.

He also said that the Alliance's main focal points in 2005 will be Afghanistan and Iraq.

NATO, which has been struggling to re-identify itself since the end of the Cold War and the major divisions caused by the Iraq war, took on a peace-keeping role in Afghanistan in 2003 - this was its first mission ever outside Europe.

After severe disagreement between NATO members, the Alliance is now also in Iraq - personnel there will be extended from 60 to 300.

Mr Burns spoke of a "great strategic shift" in NATO's approach and of a "great expansion of effort" to create a new security dialogue particularly with the Caucasus and Russia.

US spending more than double the rest
However, he said there are two potential problems to NATO achieving its wider aims: the growing military capabilities gap between the US and its European counterparts and the lack of troops.

Mr Burns said that while the US spends 420bn dollars per year on defence, the rest of the NATO members combined (24 European countries plus Canada) spend less than half that amount.

The Ambassador said the gap is "worrisome" but reserved praise for some countries such as the UK, France, Norway and Denmark for their defence spending and capabilities and the Czech Republic for specialising in biological and chemical decontamination.

'Biggest problem'
Calling it "our biggest problem", Mr Burns also criticised European countries for having large reserves of troops but with such a small percentage that are actually deployable.

Only 3-5% of European forces can be "deployed beyond European national borders" this contrasts with up to 75% on the US side.

"This is truly a problem of a huge dimension that Europe must grapple with", said the ambassador.

Mr Burns, who has been at NATO since 2001, refused to comment on media reports that he is to become the under secretary for political affairs at the US State Department.