NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg welcomed new pledges to support Ukraine, “including more heavy weapons and military training”, at the end of a meeting of NATO defence ministers on Wednesday 15 February.
“This is essential. Ukraine has a window of opportunity to tip the balance and time is running out”, said the Secretary General, as Russia is reportedly preparing a major offensive.
The day before, after the meeting of the Ukraine Defence Contact Group, US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin noted that in recent months the group had committed to providing significant quantities of battlefield capabilities, tanks, air defence and munitions. “Eleven countries have promised tanks. Twenty-two have promised infantry fighting vehicles. Sixteen have promised artillery and ammunition. And nine others have promised air defence artillery”, he added.
Mr Austin said the group’s meeting - the ninth - had focused on the delivery of the promised capabilities and the effective provision of the training, spares, support and logistics needed to make full use of these systems. “It’s a monumental task to bring all these systems together, to train the troops on these platforms, to make sure we have the support for all these systems and to get these systems into combat”, he said.
In addition to support for Ukraine, Allied Ministers agreed to step up support for Bosnia and Herzegovina, Georgia and Moldova “to strengthen their defence capabilities, resilience and interoperability with NATO”, according to Mr Stoltenberg.
Development of multinational projects
The Allies also discussed ways to build up industrial capacity and replenish stocks of weapons and ammunition, which have been greatly reduced as a result of support to Ukraine. “The Allies agree on the need to work hand in hand with the defence industry to increase our industrial capacity”, said Mr Stoltenberg, adding that they were reviewing NATO’s capacity goals for ammunition stocks.
He welcomed the approval of several multinational projects. For example, eight countries have joined the multinational ammunition storage initiative.
Twelve countries also agreed to work on acquiring various tools to enable the Alliance to ensure mobility across all terrains. Ten Allies have launched the design phase for a modular solution for very short, short and medium range ground-based air defence (GBAD) capabilities, and four countries will combine various CBRN defence facilities into a single architecture.
See projects: https://aeur.eu/f/5cd
In addition, 16 Allies, Finland and Sweden have launched a new initiative, the Alliance Persistent Surveillance from Space(APSS), which will establish a virtual constellation - ‘Aquila’ - of national and commercial space assets, such as satellites, using the latest advances in commercial space technology. This initiative will help streamline the collection, sharing and analysis of data among Allies and with the NATO command structure while generating cost savings, according to the Alliance.
See the project: https://aeur.eu/f/5ce
Similarly, Denmark and Sweden have joined the European Sky Shield initiative, coordinated by Germany and now involving 17 countries. One of the aims of this initiative is to strengthen NATO’s integrated air and missile defence by facilitating the multinational acquisition and integration of a wide range of air defence capabilities by European countries.
Strengthening the security of underwater infrastructure
Defence Ministers also asked NATO’s Military Authorities to advise on what more their countries should do, including improving coordination and cooperation with the private sector, to enhance the security of critical undersea infrastructure.
The Alliance is also setting up a Critical Undersea Infrastructure Coordination Cell at its headquarters, to be headed by German Lieutenant General Hans-Werner Wiermann. According to Mr Stoltenberg, the cell will facilitate engagement with industry and bring together key military and civilian players to share best practice, leverage innovative technologies and enhance the security of undersea infrastructure.
Further decisions are expected to be taken at the Vilnius summit in July, the Secretary General announced.
At the summit, leaders are also expected to take decisions on future defence investment commitments beyond 2024. The Allies have committed to spending 2% of their GDP on defence by 2024. (Original version in French by Camille-Cerise Gessant)