NATO to Set Up Command Centers on Eastern Flank

By Dow Jones Business News, January 30, 2015, 07:15:00 AM EDT

BRUSSELS--NATO will establish command centers in six of its eastern countries in coming months, Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said Friday, part of a beefed-up response to Russian aggressiveness.

The outposts will form a chain of potential command centers for the North Atlantic Treaty Organization's already announced new rapid-response force of roughly 5,000 troops, whose details are to be finalized at a meeting next week of NATO defense ministers.

The centers also will provide a link between NATO and the armed forces of the six countries where they will be located--Poland, Romania, Bulgaria, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia.

Mr. Stoltenberg announced the new centers at a news conference in Brussels, where he also urged NATO allies to spend more on defense to counter Russia's military budget. Mr. Stoltenberg also said he would meet with Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov in the sidelines of a security conference in Munich in two weeks.

"Especially when times are difficult, as they are now, it is important to meet and discuss also difficult issues," Mr. Stoltenberg said.

The command centers are intended partly as a warning to Russia and a reassurance to NATO allies who have become increasingly jittery following Moscow's aggressive actions in Ukraine and elsewhere.

The creation of the spearhead rapid-response force, designed to mobilize within two days in case of a belligerent move by an adversary, is the highest-profile move by NATO to bolster its defenses in the aftermath of Russia's takeover of Crimea and its incursions into eastern Ukraine, which Moscow denies.

"This will be the biggest reinforcement of our collective defense since the end of the Cold War," Mr. Stoltenberg said.

Each command center will likely be staffed by about 50 military personnel from various NATO countries. The outposts are in a sense a compromise between NATO's eastern countries, some of whom want full-scale NATO bases on their territory, and other members wary of building expensive new installations that could provoke Moscow.

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NATO to Set Up Command Centers on Eastern Flank