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Category Archives: NATO

NATO hopes Australia will stay in Afghanistan after 2016

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By David WroeFeb. 18, 2015, 6:12 p.m.

The military head of NATO has confirmed the alliance hopes Australia will remain in Afghanistan - including militarily - beyond the current withdrawal date of the end of 2016.

NATO military committee chairman General Knud Bartels. Photo: Carlos Alvarez

NATO military committee chairman General Knud Bartels. Photo: Carlos Alvarez

NATO military committee chairman General Knud Bartels. Photo: Carlos Alvarez

NATO military committee chairman General Knud Bartels. Photo: Carlos Alvarez

The military head of NATO has confirmed the alliance hopes Australia will remain in Afghanistan - including militarily - beyond the current withdrawal date of the end of 2016.

NATO military committee chairman General Knud Bartels has also told Fairfax Media in a wide-ranging interview that it will take "decades" to defeat Islamic extremism in the Middle East.

"Engaging ISIL and defeating ISIL and putting in place sustainable government institutions across the whole range of the [Middle East] area will take a long time," he said, using the acronym for the Islamic State terror group.

Asked to quantify it, he said "decades".

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NATO hopes Australia will stay in Afghanistan after 2016

NATO Secretary General – Doorstep Statement at informal meeting of EU defence ministers, 18 FEB 2015 – Video

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NATO Secretary General - Doorstep Statement at informal meeting of EU defence ministers, 18 FEB 2015
Doorstep statement by NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg at the informal meeting of European Union defence ministers in Riga, Latvia, 18 February 2015.

By: NATO

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NATO Secretary General - Doorstep Statement at informal meeting of EU defence ministers, 18 FEB 2015 - Video

NATO beefs up response force to face threats from Russian, Islamic extremists

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BRUSSELS - NATO defence ministers agreed Thursday to more than double the size of the alliance's Response Force and create a new quick-reaction force of 5,000 troops to meet simultaneous challenges from Russia and Islamic extremists.

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said the decisions made during a daylong meeting at alliance headquarters in Brussels will "ensure that we have the right forces in the right place at the right time."

NATO will now "be able to defend all allies against any threat, from the east or from the south," he told reporters.

NATO's total Response Force was increased from 13,000 to 30,000 troops and its new rapid reaction force should start to deploy within 48 hours, Stoltenberg said.

U.S. Defence Secretary Chuck Hagel and his counterparts from NATO's other 27 member nations also ordered the creation of command-and-control centres in the capitals of the three Baltic states Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania as well as in Poland, Romania and Bulgaria. In an emergency the centres will help speed the arrival of the new quick-reaction force as well as later NATO reinforcements.

A new headquarters to help defend NATO members in northeastern Europe will also be created in western Poland, and Romania has volunteered to host a similar multinational divisional headquarters for southeastern Europe, the ministers said.

Six of NATO's largest European members Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Poland and Spain volunteered on a rotating basis to furnish the nucleus for the quick-reaction force, a brigade-sized, land-based unit accompanied by air- and sea-based elements that should be able to deploy in a week, Stoltenberg said.

"European allies are fully playing their part, taking the lead in protecting Europe," Stoltenberg said.

For 2015, he said, Germany, Norway and the Netherlands have already begun training and exercising a prototype version of the force.

U.S. officials have said they plan to assist the new formation with non-troop support such as airlifts, intelligence, surveillance or reconnaissance capabilities.

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NATO beefs up response force to face threats from Russian, Islamic extremists

NATO Baltic Air Policing Mission: Pilots practice scrambling jets in face of growing Russian threat – Video

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NATO Baltic Air Policing Mission: Pilots practice scrambling jets in face of growing Russian threat
NATO pilots practised scrambling their jets on Tuesday in preparation for potential further unauthorized Russian jets which may be encountered on Baltic patr...

By: UKRAINE TODAY

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NATO Baltic Air Policing Mission: Pilots practice scrambling jets in face of growing Russian threat - Video

‘NATO went too far, overstepped responsibility to protect’ Berlin think tank founder – Video

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#39;NATO went too far, overstepped responsibility to protect #39; Berlin think tank founder
Watch the full episode here: http://youtu.be/A-z0-dKfEz8 The recent diplomatic flurry by Angela Merkel and Francois Hollande has raised hopes for a breakthro...

By: RT

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'NATO went too far, overstepped responsibility to protect' Berlin think tank founder - Video

Will NATO accept Ukraine & Syria defeat without using nuclear weapons? – Video

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Will NATO accept Ukraine Syria defeat without using nuclear weapons?
NATO #39;s nuclear relapse Under the public radar, NATO is modernising its tactical nuclear arsenal. http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2014/12/nato-nuclear-relapse-2014123161917509924.html...

By: PublicEnquiry

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Will NATO accept Ukraine & Syria defeat without using nuclear weapons? - Video


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