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President George W Bush set strict limits on the EU's global ambitions last night, saying that there was no need for the Franco-German goal of forming an alternative superpower. In an interview with The Daily Telegraph, his first with a British newspaper since his re-election last year, he pointedly rejected a call by Chancellor Gerhard Schröder for Nato to be overhauled. Mr Schröder's words have been widely interpreted as an attempt to give the EU's fledgling foreign and military bodies more muscle. "I disagree," Mr Bush said. "I think Nato is vital. Nato is a very important relationship as far...

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... After severe disagreement between NATO members, the Alliance is now also in Iraq - personnel there will be extended from 60 to 300... he said there are two potential problems to NATO achieving its wider aims: the growing military capabilities gap between the US and its European...

Stephen Haseler on what the EU must do if it is to remain secure when the American troops have gone home America’s decision to pull troops out of Europe and the Far East should not be seen as a retreat into isolationism. On the contrary: it is classic ‘Rumsfeld-lite’ — the downsizing of old-fashioned Cold War units (principally in Germany) and a new emphasis on flexible, mobile, hi-tech forces to be located around the rim of the Eurasian heartland. By redeploying and streamlining its military the Pentagon believes it will be better placed to respond to threats anywhere in the...

General Hägglund observes in his book that US attention has turned away from Europe Finnish General Gustav Hägglund writes in a recent book that the European Union needs its own united defence capability, and should set it up as soon as possible. Hägglund, who retired from his post as chairman of the Military Committee of the European Union in the spring, has written a new book on European defence. In his book, Hägglund observes that the attention of the United States has turned away from Europe towards the fight against terrorism on other continents. He said that it is unfair...

SALEN, Sweden, Jan 18 (Reuters) - The European Union's top military official suggested on Sunday that American and European forces should be responsible for their own territorial defence and only cooperate on major crises outside their regions. Finnish general, Gustav Hagglund, who is chairman of the EU's military committee, told a defence conference it was time Europe shouldered the defence of the continent itself. "The American and the European pillars (of NATO) would be responsible for their respective territorial defences, and would together engage in crisis management outside their own territories," Hagglund told the conference in Salen, 450 km (280...

HELSINKI: Finland's neutrality is likely to come under increasing strain as a result of the European Union's adoption of a landmark security pact. The new European Security Strategy is an unprecedented attempt to enable the Union to act in a coordinated way on a global level , but the population here has no enthusiasm for greater defence cooperation. However, an important part of the political elite is in favour of stepping up such cooperation with the rest of the EU, even if this means bringing the country close to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Indeed, it was at a summit...

<p>BRUSSELS, Belgium -- Washington has strengthened its opposition to European Union plans on military policy.</p> <p>"The United States cannot accept independent EU structures that duplicate existing NATO capabilities," U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell said in a statement for a meeting of ministers from NATO countries in Brussels.</p>

Rumsfeld tries to cool row over EU military plan US defence secretary and allies play down talk of transatlantic rift over defence initiative Ian Black in BrusselsTuesday December 2, 2003The Guardian The US defence secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, made a conspicuous effort yesterday to avoid a damaging row over Europe's controversial military ambitions. In what was seen as a surprisingly subdued appearance in Brussels, Mr Rumsfeld said he had been convinced that Nato's European members would not undertake initiatives that would duplicate the work of the alliance. The US is worried about plans brokered by Britain to create a 30-strong EU...

U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld says there is no reason for another defense organization to compete with NATO. Mr. Rumsfeld made the comments a day after European Union leaders discussed their own military planning and command group. Secretary Rumsfeld told reporters shortly after arriving in Brussels that NATO has an extraordinary record of contributing to world peace. His remarks followed a decision by European Union foreign ministers to back a proposal for an EU military planning and command group, based at NATO's military headquarters here in Belgium. Washington has worried that such an arrangement would needlessly duplicate resources, and create...

Britain has taken a dramatic step towards a full-fledged European army, signing up to Franco-German proposals for a planning headquarters outside NATO. The deal, reached by British, German and French officials in secret talks in Berlin last week, establishes an operational command in Brussels, allowing the European Union to run day-to-day battlefield missions for the first time. Risking a major clash with Washington, it points to a definitive break with British defence doctrine of the past half century. But British officials hinted that the Prime Minister, Tony Blair, would rewrite the agreement if the US was adamantly opposed. The British...

<p>BRUSSELS &#8212; A largely philosophical debate over the wisdom of a separate EU army is rapidly coming to a head in this city, headquarters to the European Union and the trans-Atlantic alliance NATO.</p> <p>Pushed primarily by France, the EU force is seen by supporters as a boost to Europe's lagging defense capabilities and by skeptics as a direct challenge to Washington's dominance in the security field.</p>

German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer on Thursday distanced Berlin from plans to create EU military headquarters separate from NATO. The proposal had created tension with Washington. In a move likely to be seen as an olive branch in the continuing smoothing of relations between Germany and the United States, the German government has softened its stance on the creation of a large and independent military planning headquarters for EU-led military operations. "I do not believe you need another big operational headquarters such as (NATO’s planning arm) SHAPE," said Joschka Fischer, the German foreign minister. "You have a NATO planning headquarters,...

According to today's Financial Times ("NATO Urged to Challenge European Defence Plan"), U.S. Ambassador to NATO Nicholas Burns "has called an extraordinary meeting of NATO to challenge the creation of a new security and defense policy for the European Union." He was correct to do so. This meeting follows on the heels of a recent decision by Paris, Berlin and London to move forward on the creation of a European Union defense planning organization, independent of the NATO. Most American commentators have viewed the creation of a separate EU defense capability as more a nuisance than a real problem. And...

<p>Last May, people in the war-torn northern Democratic Republic of the Congo received hope of help from an unexpected source. It came from none less than the European Union (EU). For the first time ever, the EU launched a force of peacekeepers, under the leadership of France. The Congolese got up their hopes of much- needed relief, but given the dearth of manpower and the constraints set by U.N. engagement rules for peacekeepers, the three months' deployment in the province of Ituri was not exactly a great military milestone.</p>

RELATED STORIES • Sun Says By GEORGE PASCOE-WATSON Deputy Political Editor GERMAN defence chiefs want Europe to seize control of Britain’s nuclear weapons under breathtaking EU army plans. The Sun can reveal the UK would be forced to share its arsenal with the Germans — who are banned from possessing their own nukes. Documents circulating in Germany’s defence ministry will send a chill through the Pentagon as they expose how EU states want the new Euro army to rival Nato. An eight-page dossier passed to The Sun states: “Another difficult and delicate area will have to be addressed. That is...

<p>BRUSSELS &#8212; NATO nations opened a special meeting yesterday on the European Union's plan to set up its own defense arm, parts of which have been criticized by the United States as a serious threat to allied unity.</p> <p>The U.S. ambassador to the alliance, Nicholas Burns, called for the meeting after expressing alarm about the direction of the EU's military ambitions, in particular proposals backed by France and Germany for the Europeans to have a separate headquarters to plan operations independent of NATO.</p>

PARIS - The "Old Europe" so despised by United States Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has started to exact a discreet diplomatic revenge for the Iraq war, cautiously pushing ahead with a scheme for closer military co-operation that would gradually weaken Washington's European clout. The plan, driven forward by the Franco-German alliance, is still in its sketchiest stages, and all concerned have been making soothing noises to placate the Americans, who are angry at what they see as a veiled attempt to sideline them in Europe. Even so, the worried responses from the US show that a scheme to set up...

The United States cautioned France and Germany on Tuesday against going ahead with plans for a European military headquarters separate from NATO, warning it would be an expensive duplication of resources and risked harming alliance unity. U.S. Ambassador to NATO Nicholas Burns said the Europeans should focus on modernizing their armed forces to deal with global terrorism rather than build an expensive new headquarters. "The rules of the road are that NATO and the European Union are partners ... that the EU will not develop duplicative institutions," Burns said at a breakfast meeting organized by a Brussels think tank. The...

AN EU security policy must be backed-up by military power to be credible, Foreign Affairs Minister Brian Cowen said yesterday after the EU leaders discussed the issue at their summit in Greece. A 16-page document produced by the EU's foreign policy chief Javier Solana set out a broad outline of a common security policy that was welcomed by the Taoiseach and the other EU heads of government at the three day meeting. The EU heads requested the preliminary study in a desperate bid to avoid another open rift between member states similar to that over the Iraq war when some...

Germany Calls for Stronger Europe Defense Wednesday May 21, 2003 8:09 PM By TONY CZUCZKA Associated Press Writer BERLIN (AP) - Germany unveiled its first new military strategy in 11 years Wednesday, calling for stronger European defense capabilities while saying that the United States remains ``indispensable'' for Europe's security. Defense Minister Peter Struck said Germany would shut nine bases and disband dozens of units over the next few years as the military shifts from a heavily armored bulwark at ground zero of the Cold War to a mobile, modern force for international peacekeeping missions and combating terrorism. The strategy overhaul...