Brussels, 22/11/2004 (Agence Europe) - During a conference on military capabilities between EU Defence Ministers in Brussels on Monday, France, the United Kingdom and Italy announced their intention to make battle groups available to the European Union from 2005. As announced in our issue dated 17 November (p.7), several other Member States have also announced their intention to collaborate in forming "multinational" battle groups to be made available to the EU in 2007. If all these intentions are confirmed and then implemented, the EU should have thirteen such units available in 2007 allowing it to conduct two simultaneous military operations from that date.
Member States have undertaken to implement the "Headline Goal 2010" (Ed.: the new EU objectives in terms of military capabilities by 2010) including the armed battle groups, a move welcomed by Dutch Defence Minster Henk Kamp on Monday during a small press conference after the EU's Military Capabilities Conference. Launched in 2003 at the initiative of France, the United Kingdom and Germany, the concept of battle groups aims to give the EU armed units composed of 1500 men and deployable within ten days in the theatre of operations - for a duration of one to four months - in order to carry out crisis management operations within a United Nations mandate, such as Artemis, the EU's military mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). The EU must be given "coherent, rapidly deployable and credible forces", Mr Kamp explained, placing emphasis on the "complementarity" of these units with the NATO Response Force (NRF).
In the beginning, the EU believed it needed 2 to 3 such units by 2005 and a complete package of 9 units in 2007. The concept has obviously had more success than expected as, from 2007, the EU should have thirteen such battle groups, a declaration adopted after the conference states. The groups would be composed of the different countries as follows: (1) France; (2) Italy; (3) Spain; (4) United Kingdom; (5) France, Germany, Belgium, Luxembourg and possibly Spain; (6) France, Belgium; (7) Germany, Netherlands, Finland; (8) Germany, Austria, Czech Republic; (9) Italy, Hungary, Slovenia; (10) Italy, Spain, Greece, Portugal; (11) Germany, Poland, Slovenia, Lithuania, Latvia; (12) Sweden, Finland and Norway as a third country; and (13) Netherlands and the United Kingdom.
The declaration by EU Defence Ministers specifies that the United Kingdom and France pledge to provide a battle group during the first half of 2005 and that Italy will provide a battle group during the second half of 2005. The battle group formed by France and Germany, and "supported by Member States like Belgium", will be available in 2006 as well as the battle group based on Spanish and Italian amphibian units during the first half of 2006, with "Portuguese and Greek capabilities". Full capacity will be reached in 2007 and, from that date on, the EU should be able to launch two operations almost simultaneously.
Alongside these units, some countries are also said to be willing to provide "niche capabilities", i.e. special capabilities, such as Greece, which proposes its Athens centre of coordination for maritime transport, Lithuania its water purification team, Cyprus a medical team and France a multinational and deployable headquarter structure, the declaration states. Furthermore, the process aimed at giving the EU this kind of force is an ongoing process as Estonia has announced its intention to take part in the battle groups and continues its consultation with its partners on this matter, while Ireland is willing to begin talks with its partners with a view to taking part in the units.
EU Defence Ministers also recalled in their declaration the need to improve the strategic mobility of battle groups. In this context, the overall approach to deployability - a concept that one owes to France - is another major contribution toward improving the units' strategic transport since the aim is to pool and better coordinate strategic transport means within the EU.
Whether the battle groups are national, that is composed for the most part by a single nation, or multinational, composed of different multinational units, they will be infantry dominated, a European official said on Friday. They may be "motorised or carried by air" and some will be flanked by different kinds of sub-units such as NBRC protection units (against nuclear, biological, radiological or chemical threat), he stated. All battle groups will also be associated with strategic and tactical transport means. Even if it is not the only possible solution, the framework-nation concept, as in the case of France for the Artemis operation, will be given preference for command of the forces for reasons of rapidity, the official added.
Belgium will be ready, in 2007, to contribute up to a maximum of 500 men to the battle groups, an official Belgian source told Atlantic News. From 2005, however, it will analyse all requests on a case by case basis and meet requests according to the capabilities available and budgetary means. As of 2006, Belgium will also be able to provide specific capabilities such as a C-130 aircraft or a water decontamination unit.