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Another milestone on the road to Frogistanâs Illusions of Grandeur.... The French government is pushing ahead with plans to create a military staff independent of NATO that could be used outside of the American-led alliance. French Gen. Bernard Thorette, army chief of staff and Gen. Richard Wolsztynski, the air force chief of staff, notified the French National Assemblyâs Defense Committee last week of the command structure. France wants the independent force structure because of growing anti-Americanism in that country. French forces recently completed an air-based military exercise called Opera 03 that tested a command structure adapted to mobilizing national forces of allied nations. The exercise used a cellular structure to conduct 200 air sorties. Wolsztynski told Le Monde that the French forces aim to establish an operational air staff by 2005 that can do the same planning and coordination as do NATO commands in Germany and Italy. The goal is to develop the capability for France to conduct 600 air sorties per day outside of the NATO structure. France could then claim "leader nation" status so it can plan and carry out allied inter-service action on behalf of the European Union, without NATO and, particularly, U.S. support. France also wants to run a NATO Response Force of some 21,000 troops that can be mobilized within five days for out of area operations. France has detailed eight Mirage jets, an AWACs aircraft, a tanker and electronic warfare jet for the force. I wonder if they will have backups for these systems, esp. AWACs or if the AWACs system is down, will they be dead in the water? Posted by: Alaska Paul 2003-11-13 |
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