DOCUMENT A/1803

3 December 2002

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Participation of European forces in crisis management - reply to the annual report of the Council

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Document A/1803

3 December 2002

Participation of European forces in crisis management -
reply to the annual report of the Council

REPORT¹

submitted on behalf of the Defence Committee²
by Mr Palis, Rapporteur

_____________

¹ Adopted unanimously by the Committee on 13 November 2002.

² Members of the Committee: Mr Schloten (Chairman) (Alternate: Palis); MM Wilkinson, McNamara (Vice-Chairmen); Mr Acosta Padrón, Mrs Aguiar, Mrs Alvarez-Arenas, MM de Arístegui San Román, Mrs Bakoyianni, Lord Burlison, MM Contestabile, Cox, Dees, Dreyfus-Schmidt, Glesener, Goris, Goulet, Gubert, Henry, Irmer, Jacquat, Jardim, Kortenhorst, Koulouris, Lengagne, Medeiros Ferreira, Neumann, de Puig, Ranieri, Rigoni, Rivolta (Alternate: Nessa), Schneider, Siebert, Skoularikis, Timmermans F, Timmermans J, Walter, Zierer.

Associate members: MM Docekal, Ibl, Ms Fjeldsted, MM Gönul, Hegyi, Janas, Kalkan, Komorowski, Lorenz, Mutman, Necas, Mrs Nybakk, MM Surjan, Tabajdi, Telek, Wrzodak, N ...

N.B. The names of those taking part in the vote are printed in italics.

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RECOMMENDATION 717¹

(i) Considering the progress made over the last decade as regards the participation of European national armed forces in crisis management in Europe and the rest of the world;

(ii) Welcoming the tenth anniversary of the WEU Petersberg Declaration of June 1992, which defined the "Petersberg missions";

(iii) Aware of the efforts the European Union is making to meet its headline goal, as set in Helsinki, of being able to field a 50 000 to 60 000-strong force deployable outside Europe within two months and capable of carrying out the full range of Petersberg missions;

(iv) Supporting the efforts being made by European countries to create multinational forces that are formed and trained in peacetime, in order to improve forces' interoperability and responsiveness;

(v) Stressing the important role European national armed forces play in humanitarian and peacekeeping missions and the contribution they make to world peace and security;

(vi) Recalling the essential contribution they make as regards the protection of civilian populations, respect for human rights and social and economic stabilisation, and the assistance they provide in rebuilding infrastructure in zones of conflict;

(vii) Expressing its appreciation of and support for the officers and soldiers engaged in past and present crisis-management operations;

(viii) Underlining that is it important and urgent for national forces to be equipped and trained in such a way as to be able to carry out the full range of Petersberg missions and take effective action to fight terrorism and counter the threat of the use of weapons of mass destruction;

(ix) Pointing to the need for a decision to engage armed forces in crisis-management operations to be accompanied by a clear political crisis exit strategy supported by realistic and credible economic and social measures, so that forces do not find themselves in a situation where they are merely marking time at the place of their deployment;

(x) Stressing that national governments and the international organisations concerned should make arrangements for setting up the machinery required to settle crises, and should develop an active policy of preventive diplomacy taking in both civil and military aspects, in which the use of force remains the last resort;

(xi) Expressing the wish that national governments involve national parliaments more closely in the process leading up to a decision to deploy armed forces in crisis-management missions,

1. Ensure that the armed forces of WEU countries are adequately equipped and trained to be able to carry out the full range of Petersberg missions and play an active part in fighting terrorism and countering the threat of the use of weapons of mass destruction;
2. Include on its agenda the question of setting up the machinery for civil and military crisis management in cooperation with the competent authorities of NATO, the European Union and the OSCE;
3. Urge the WEU countries to honour the commitments they made in the framework of the EU headline goal whereby the European Union is to be able to field and deploy a 50 000 to 60 000-strong force, taking due account also of the North Atlantic Council's decision to set up a new rapid response force;
4. Keep the Assembly informed about any initiatives taken by WEU countries in the field of military participation in crisis management and about the attainment of force objectives in the European Union and NATO.

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EXPLANATORY MEMORANDUM

1. The last ten years have seen major political and operational changes in the way European armed forces are involved in the settlement of crises both within and outside Europe. European states are actively engaged in the military management of crises that have erupted in the Balkans, Africa and Asia through their participation in United Nations peacekeeping missions, NATO operations in the Balkans or ad hoc coalitions such as the one formed for Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan and the Horn of Africa. There is widespread support among public opinion in European countries for operations of this type, not least because they have humanitarian and peaceful objectives as is also the case in the fight against international terrorism. Although armed forces have been engaged in "crisis-management" missions in almost every continent of the world and almost continuously since 1945, the media attention they now attract tends to give the impression that this is something new.
2. Conflicts arising as a result of the decolonisation of African and Asian countries, international crises (e.g. Suez, Congo/Zaire, Cyprus, Lebanon, Chad) and even internal strife (such as that in Northern Ireland) have required military intervention by European countries which has lasted from a few weeks to several years. In some cases the conflict took the form of outright war, in others it was more a case for crisis management in the meaning this concept acquired with WEU's definition of the "Petersberg" tasks² in 1992, and in yet others it was a fight against terrorism. Some countries, particularly the Nordic states, have concentrated more specifically in taking part in United Nations and other peacekeeping missions.
3. Developments in the 1990s constituted a break with the previous period in which national interests had been the driving force behind the use of force, justified by a country's historical, political and economic considerations. The objective of intervention in the crisis and then the war in the Gulf was to uphold international law with a view to the emergence of a new world order. After the end of the conflict, the crisis that erupted in March-April 1991 in the north of Iraq marked the start of humanitarian intervention in the form of Operation Safe Haven conducted by the United Kingdom and the Netherlands, with the active assistance of WEU which was responsible for organising coordination and cooperation among the European states that came forward to provide assistance in particular to the Kurds and also to the Turkmen, Arab and other populations in the region.
4. Intervention on humanitarian grounds justifies missions wherever crises and conflicts break out, whether these be in Europe (former Yugoslavia), Africa, the Caribbean (Haiti) or Asia (Cambodia). Military means are deployed in the first instance to protect those sent to crisis zones to provide humanitarian assistance, more often than not on the basis of a United Nations mandate, and also to separate the warring factions and make safe areas used as humanitarian sanctuaries. This type of peacekeeping mission gradually helps to restore peace through the presence of military personnel, as was notably the case from 1995 onwards when, after the British and French armed forces present with UNPROFOR (United Nations Protection Force) had stepped up their action in the Bosnian conflict, NATO aircraft went into Bosnia.
5. The use of military means is increasingly becoming a key factor in crisis management and intervention on humanitarian grounds, which is legitimate in the vast majority of cases, can in certain circumstances be considered justifiable when motivated primarily by geopolitical considerations (regional stability, zones of influence, credibility of alliances and organisations engaged in resolving a crisis for example) but also by economic factors (reconstruction, protecting markets and access to raw materials) which lie in the background. The crisis and conflict in Kosovo were instructive in that they put an end to confusion between military intervention and humanitarian action which was a lesser priority than the prime objective of occupying the territory and establishing a "protectorate" pending a lasting political solution.
6. American and European intervention in Afghanistan in 2001 by means of Operation Enduring Freedom and the presence of European forces in the International Secretary Assistance Force (ISAF) formed part of the war on terrorism. The objective was to provide a secure environment for the new Afghan regime as well as afford protection for humanitarian aid workers. This assistance was limited to Kabul because ISAF did not cover the Afghan territory as a whole. It would seem that the era of humanitarian intervention using military means is thus drawing to a close with a return to "realpolitik" considerations based more on the international balance of forces than on universally held values as enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations. Nonetheless, the humanitarian aspect is always underlined when the case for intervention is put to public opinion.
7. For European countries this succession of intervention missions has had a number of practical consequences whose effects are now being taken into account for the purpose of developing and implementing the European Security and Defence Policy. They concern:

8. Throughout the 1990s the armed forces of European countries took part in military operations in virtually every continent of the world but it was of course in the Balkans that troops were deployed on a massive scale. Today however, there has been a significant fallback both in the number of troops abroad and in the geographic area over which they are spread. Wear and tear, budget cuts and different strategic and political assessments have made governments more cautious and selective about military interventions, especially as regards their scale, form (national, multinational, in a coalition or an institutional framework such as NATO or the EU) and duration. France's Operation Turquoise in Rwanda (1994), the Italian-led Operation Alba in Albania (1997), British intervention in Sierra Leone and, more recently, the anti-terrorist operations conducted in Afghanistan were all cases in which states intervened alone or without any cooperation. Even in the case of Operation Alba, in which eight WEU countries were involved, it was conducted outside the appropriate institutional frameworks of WEU and NATO in the absence of consensus among the member states to take responsibility for this operation which was supposed to put an end to the situation of civil war that was emerging in Albania.
9. It is in the forces that NATO has deployed in the Balkans, in SFOR, KFOR and in Operation Amber Fox, that the Europeans have been most active and have dispatched a significant number of troops and equipment despite the fact that they are now being scaled down due to the relative stability that has been restored in the region largely as a result of their presence. The experience acquired in these peacekeeping operations and the lessons learnt from the conflicts in Bosnia and Herzegovina and Kosovo that preceded them have had major repercussions both at national level, in that countries have been forced to adapt and reform their armed forces to meet the requirements of multinational operations, and at NATO and EU level with the enhancement and development of command and control structures, or the setting up of new ones, for military operations in which there is major involvement by European national forces.
10. Outside Europe, the part European countries have played in crisis management has focused on United Nations missions many of which are long-standing such as the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL), or UNFICYP, its peacekeeping force in Cyprus. European forces are in the majority in two more recent missions: ISAF in Afghanistan (2001) and the United Nations Mission of Support in East Timor (UNMISET). In the case of Afghanistan, military units from European countries are also integrated in the US set-up for Operation Enduring Freedom.

1. NATO operations in the Balkans

11. The immediate reaction of European countries to the violent break-up of Yugoslavia in 1991 was to have recourse to conventional peacekeeping missions based on resolutions of the UN Security Council. As had been done with Iraq, an embargo was imposed on Serbia and Montenegro among others. The war in Bosnia and Herzegovina, in which there were flagrant violations of the Geneva Conventions on human rights, acted as a spur for both political and military initiatives designed to put an end to the conflict. Initially, WEU was at the centre of a series of actions: setting up a system to monitor the embargo in the Adriatic (1992) and along the Danube in Romania and Bulgaria (1993). The WEU member countries started discussing plans for military intervention on a large scale in 1991 but in the end responsibility for implementing it was transferred to the United Nations, which set up the United Nations Protection Force (UNPROFOR) in 1992 for the countries of former Yugoslavia.
12. The continuing civil war in Bosnia and the UN's inability to control the situation led some European countries and the United States to turn to NATO in order to plan and carry out a military operation with a view to arriving at a negotiated settlement. The Dayton Peace Agreement, which was signed on 21 November 1995, put an end to the conflict and created a new federal state consisting of the Bosnian-Croat Federation and Republika Srpska. Some 60 000 NATO troops were deployed throughout the territory of Bosnia and Herzegovina in December 1995 to replace UNPROFOR. IFOR, (the Implementation Force established by the Dayton Peace Agreement) was replaced in November 1996 by the much smaller SFOR (Stabilisation Force - 30 000 troops) which is still deployed.
13. The deployment of NATO troops in Bosnia and Herzegovina, who are working with the armed forces of countries which are members of the Partnership for Peace, including Russia, makes that Organisation the core of crisis-management activities in south-eastern Europe. The Kosovo crisis and war (1999), during which the United Nations was sidelined once NATO began its air strikes against the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY), confirmed this, at least as far as former Yugoslavia was concerned. Once the war in Kosovo was over, NATO set up a new 40 000-strong force in June 1999 called KFOR, the Kosovo Force. Operation Amber Fox, whose purpose is to contribute to the protection of international observers in the former Yugoslav Republic of Yugoslavia (FYROM) began in September 2001 and is NATO's most recent mission in the region.

14. SFOR's overall mission is to "stabilise the peace, contribute to a secure environment by providing a continued military presence in the Area of Responsibility (AOR), target and coordinate SFOR support to key areas including primary civil implementation organisations, and progress towards a lasting consolidation of peace"³. The force consists of units from 34 states including 28 European countries. By the end of 2002 its total complement will not exceed 12 000 soldiers. In operation since 1996, SFOR is the force with the longest record for European troops serving abroad in a multinational mission. The participant countries are members of NATO, WEU, the EU and those organisations' partner and applicant states. The number of European troops and the length of their service in SFOR are an important indication of the progress Europe has made in cooperating in the area of defence.
15. Being part of a NATO force with all that entails in terms of day-to-day cooperation, shared experience, joint exercises and missions has brought armed forces of different levels closer together. Some consist of professional soldiers while others are mixed (professionals and volunteers) and their rules of engagement and technical and technological capabilities may be very different. For the central European states which are candidates for NATO membership, this experience has been extremely valuable in that it has enabled them to apply the methods, procedures and rules in force in the Alliance. For the EU countries involved SFOR is a very useful framework in which they can work together, while the active participation of EU states which do not belong to NATO is also helping both organisations to set up cooperation arrangements for military crisis management.

16. The mission of the Kosovo Force, which was deployed in June 1999 after NATO's air campaign against the FRY, is to "establish and maintain a secure environment in Kosovo, including public safety and order; to monitor, verify and when necessary enforce compliance with the agreements that ended the conflict; and to provide assistance to the UN Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK)"⁴. It is currently NATO's biggest mission with 34 000 troops stationed on Kosovar territory and also in FYROM, Albania and Greece. Most of the force is made up of troops from 30 European states which are members of NATO and/or the EU, or are applicant states, or from Russia, Ukraine, Azerbaijan, Georgia and Switzerland. Unlike its force in Bosnia, the NATO Kosovo Force was initially obliged, in addition to its main mission of establishing and maintaining a secure environment, to carry out internal security tasks which among other things entailed preventing and combating crime. The insecurity which continues to be a problem is preventing refugees (for the most part Serbs) from returning to the province, slowing down economic development and is a source of instability in those regions of Serbia and FYROM with an Albanian majority. This partly explains why the KFOR reduction (32 000 soldiers by the end of 2002) is not as big as that planned for SFOR.
17. The European countries have had to make a considerable extra effort to provide the number of troops KFOR needs while at the same time they have had to keep up their level of participation in SFOR. NATO's air campaign also highlighted European shortcomings, particularly in terms of the air transport facilities and modern combat technologies needed to sustain a medium-intensity operation. While the presence of European troops on the ground along the borders of Kosovo was significant, it was not sufficient in terms of manpower and equipment for a large-scale ground offensive. Although the British Government proposed such an option on a number of occasions, the other European countries and the United States had more reservations about this type of engagement. Once in Kosovo the KFOR units had to deal with the problem of maintaining law and order and the challenge of reconstruction until UNMIK (the UN Mission in Kosovo) was able to take responsibility for the task of stabilising everyday civilian life with the support of the European Union and the OSCE. This first phase gave the armed forces additional experience with civil and military crisis management when local civilian structures break down.

18. Operation Amber Fox was the follow-up to Operation Essential Harvest (August-September 2001) whose purpose was to collect weapons held by armed Albanian groups. Both these NATO operations encountered problems of participation, in terms of achieving the troop numbers decided at the outset. The scale and duration of commitments in Kosovo had taken up a good part of the defence, human, material and budgetary resources of most of the European countries engaged in the province. When the situation in FYROM deteriorated during 2001 and, on the diplomatic front, NATO and the EU decided to take preventive action, it was difficult to set up a new force with the limited manpower available (3500 troops for Operation Essential Harvest). It was thanks to a firm commitment from the United Kingdom to provide over half the contingent (1900 troops) that the weapons-collecting operation was able to go ahead.
19. In order to ensure that the situation remained stable, the government of FYROM asked NATO to remain in the country and in response NATO deployed a task force of some 1000 soldiers. Over half this number were originally provided by Germany, which was given the command of Operation Amber Fox at its inception⁵. The force's objectives are to "contribute to the protection of international monitors who will oversee the implementation of the peace plan in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia"⁶. The operation, which was originally planned to last three months, was extended first until April 2002 and then again until October when it was envisaged that if an agreement with NATO had been reached, the EU would take over responsibility for the command and control of a new European stabilisation force following parliamentary elections in FYROM. Following the September 2002 elections and given the lack of progress in the negotiations between NATO and the EU, it would seem logical for NATO to extend its mission at the request of the new FYROM government.

2. Europe's involvement in United Nations missions - the case of Afghanistan

20. Because of the very large number of troops they have deployed in south-east Europe, European countries, including the biggest, have only a limited and selective presence in the United Nations' current peacekeeping missions. The experience acquired by UN forces in former Yugoslavia, their rules of engagement and political constraints have meant that the major European countries have tended to abandon conventional UN operations and concentrate on specific engagements where more flexible rules apply, particularly as regards their stance vis-à-vis local politicians and forces under their command. One example of this phenomenon was the United Kingdom's intervention in Sierra Leone in May 2000 which was decisive in bringing an end to the crisis provoked by attacks by armed groups of the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) against forces serving in the United Nations Mission in Sierra Leone (UNAMSIL). Members of the British Parachute Regiment and the Special Forces stabilised the situation to the rear, thus allowing a better redeployment of UNAMSIL forces (especially the Indian and Jordanian contingents). They also clashed with RUF units, causing losses which weakened the Front and forced it to comply with the disarmament and peace process under way.
21. There have been other cases of this desire for flexibility in the application of the conventional UN rules on peacekeeping and the preservation of national autonomy of action. The first and only instance for many years was the Korean war (1950-53) during which large numbers of European troops were deployed under American command in a UN mission to restore the peace. Of the 15 countries which took part in the mission, alongside the United States, seven were European⁷ and put up a total of 93 000 soldiers (5 400 of whom were killed or reported missing). The 1991 Gulf war saw the start of the current trend but it was not until 1995 that it became commonplace with NATO's interventions in Bosnia and above all Kosovo (the UN Security Council was not consulted before the start of the air campaign). Peacemaking has now taken priority over peacekeeping and the deployment of an armed force is not intended just to stabilise a crisis situation and help social leaders and the local leaders of mainstream political parties achieve a peaceful settlement but also to guide them in their choices on the basis of policies that are now defined by the intervening parties too.
22. This new approach has worked well so far in Europe but has met with only partial success in Africa, particularly during the crises and wars in the Great Lakes region. It ran up against its limits in Afghanistan owing to the specific nature of the "new" war on terrorism. Europe thus finds itself involved in that country under two separate arrangements: it is present within ISAF, which was set up following the Petersberg Accords of November 2001 and whose legal status is provided by UN Security Council Resolution 1386⁸, and is also involved in Operation Enduring Freedom under American command, the basis for which is "legitimate defence"; in the Afghan case this is confirmed by UN Security Council Resolution 1368⁹.

23. The start of Operation Enduring Freedom under American command was the beginning of the end of the Taliban's power and led to the need to install a new Afghan regime and stabilise the country. The main objectives were to ensure that in the future the country would not become a haven for terrorist groups and to make the internal situation stable so that work on rebuilding the country's economic and social fabric could begin. The option of recourse to the Kosovo scenario was rejected straightaway given the nature of the situation on the ground and the fact that the Northern Alliance had already seized power. The Alliance consisted mainly of Tajik and Uzbek fighters based in Kabul and Pashtun chieftains in the south of the country (Kandahar). At the Petersberg Conference in Germany, these two groupings agreed to create an Afghan Interim Authority which would govern the country until a Loya Jirga, the Afghan term for a general assembly, was convened in May 2002. At the same time American forces, with the active support of British troops and various contributions from other European states, were to scour the country (and are still doing so) to wipe out combat units answering to al-Qa'ida and the Taliban.
24. What the European countries put together was a force that was independent of the United Nations but was nevertheless based on Security Council Resolution 1386. Its remit was to "assist the Afghan Interim Authority in the maintenance of security in Kabul and its surrounding areas, so that the Afghan Interim Authority as well as the personnel of the United Nations can operate in a secure environment". This force, to which 20 countries, 19 of them European, have contributed some 5000 soldiers, has a strong German contingent¹⁰. Germany has formed a multinational battle group with Austria, Denmark and the Netherlands, with troops totalling some 1500 soldiers. ISAF is now under Turkish command after a short spell under British supervision. Its status and powers are defined in a Military Technical Agreement which was signed with the Afghan authorities in January 2002. ISAF's record to date is good, particularly from the point of view of providing humanitarian aid, stabilising the country and strengthening the political authorities in Kabul. One very important aspect of its work has been demining and disposing of millions of munitions of all types (the number of antipersonnel landmines that were disposed of during the first months of the mission is estimated at over two million¹¹).
25. ISAF's mandate (which was extended in May 2002) expires at the end of the year, but given the continuing instability in Afghanistan, where government control is limited to the area around Kabul and indirectly to the northern and western parts of the country (where Tajiks and Uzbeks are in the majority), the force will probably stay on. This is not without its problems for the European contingents when it comes to logistics and unit rotation. As in Bosnia and Kosovo, European forces may well find themselves pinned down in Afghanistan until the authorities can control the country as a whole and ensure that the threat posed by armed groups with connections with the Taliban or local chieftains does not jeopardise what has already been achieved in the fight against terrorism. The continuing operations being carried out by the Americans also create problems for the international force because they are hindering reconstruction work deep inside the country (which is still a combat zone) and limiting the area in which international human assistance can be distributed.

26. Following the 11 September 2001 attacks against the United States and the Americans' accusation that members of the al-Qa'ida network were the perpetrators, the war on terrorism became a mission reserved for the military. The use of military force against an enemy which is not based in any one country but transcends borders, poses new problems in that any country in the world is a potential battleground. To begin with the United States concentrated its campaign on al-Qa'ida's best known haven: the Afghanistan of the Taliban. After two weeks of unproductive diplomatic attempts to secure the cooperation of the Taliban regime in arresting the al-Quid leaders present in their country, Operation Enduring Freedom was launched on 7 October 2001 by American and British air forces, and by their sea-based aircraft and navies (with cruise missiles launched from a nuclear submarine). Leaving the military aspect aside, a strong political signal was given by tying the fate of the Taliban regime (the Afghan "hosts") to that of the terrorists (mostly non-Afghans) residing in their country. From that moment on, any collusion - even passive - or allowance made for local ethnic, religious or political sensitivities was no longer acceptable in order to shelter a state from a military strike against terrorism.
27. The European countries gave Operation Enduring Freedom their political support, notably by invoking Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty, and provided all the operational support they could. Despite the desire on the part of some member states to involve NATO, that organisation was confined to providing rearguard support by deploying frigates to the Mediterranean to replace US and allied ships that were dispatched to Pakistani waters, and to "lending" its AWACS surveillance aircraft to the United States in order to protect American airspace. Over Afghan territory, the United Kingdom took on a very important role in providing in-flight fuelling and subsequently during the ground combat phase sent in its Special Forces. Germany, France, Italy and the United Kingdom deployed large naval forces and the last three also dispatched carrier groups to the battle zone, including the Charles de Gaulle nuclear aircraft carrier in the case of France. The gradual deployment of American forces to Afghanistan and the capture of certain strategic towns (Mazar-i-Sharif in the north, Bagram near Kabul and Kandahar in the south) enabled the European allies to move in ground troops.
28. France made a major air power contribution with its Super Etendard aircraft and a squadron of Mirage 2000 (6 aircraft based at Manas in Kyrgyzstan) which took part in Operation Anaconda (March 2002) against al-Qa'ida and Taliban forces in the mountains close to the frontier between Afghanistan and Pakistan. The United Kingdom sent in a large contingent of one of its Special Forces, the 45 Commando Royal Marines, whose training and experience in mountainous terrain is without parallel in other European and US armed forces. This force, with a total complement of 1700 soldiers, took part in four combing operations¹² between April and July 2002, the last of which took over a month to complete. This British effort, which was useful in terms of experience and from the point of view of operational intelligence and logistics, was wearing for the soldiers involved. This was one of the reasons for the government's decision to withdraw these units from the field and to reduce the number of its troops in Afghanistan, including those in the ISAF (from 1300 to 400) at the end of July.
29. Germany, almost all of whose ground troops are serving in ISAF (the exception being special forces elements taking part in Operation Enduring Freedom), is maintaining a significant naval presence in the Arabian Sea and off the coast of Djibouti with some 1500 soldiers and sailors, three frigates and three maritime patrol aircraft participating in surveillance and command operations in the Horn of Africa region together with naval units from France, Spain, the United Kingdom and the United States. A nuclear, biological and chemical protection unit equipped with Fuchs detection vehicles has also been deployed to Kuwait as part of this mission.

30. The participation of European forces in the management of recent crises provided an opportunity to review the legislative procedures and legal machinery governing the use of military force outside national borders. The crisis in former Yugoslavia was the most significant in this respect, particularly from 1995 when NATO intervened directly in the conflict in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The Kosovo crisis made reforms all the more necessary, not least because of the absence of a mandate from the United Nations Security Council and because the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia did not launch an attack against another European state. The previous requirement for United Nations authorisation for states to engage their armed forces in operations against a country with which they were not at war did not apply in the case of Kosovo, although many countries consider it has to be secured a posteriori.
31. The question of a mandate has been the subject of heated discussion in Germany where a decision by the Constitutional Court in 1994 became necessary concerning the participation of German armed forces units in the United Nations' operation in Somalia (UNOSOM II, 1993-95), in the naval mission in the Adriatic concerning surveillance of the UN embargo against former Yugoslavia (first a WEU and then a NATO operation) and in NATO's surveillance of the air space over Bosnia and Herzegovina (1993-95). The Court ruled that the participation of German armed forces in missions abroad conducted in the framework of United Nations operations or of an alliance of which Germany was a part (NATO, WEU and now the EU) did not infringe the provisions of the 1949 Basic Law, in particular Articles 87(a)2¹³ and 24.2¹⁴. However, authorisation by Parliament is necessary for all armed intervention. If such authorisation is not forthcoming until after troops have been deployed, Parliament also has the right to end the operation.
32. It is also interesting to note that Japan conducted a similar debate about the participation of units of its self-defence forces in the United Nations operation in Cambodia (United Nations Transitional Authority in Cambodia - UNTAC, 1992-93). Under the International Peace Cooperation law on the deployment of Japanese forces abroad which was passed in June 1992, armed forces units were authorised to participate in United Nations peacekeeping missions on a restricted basis (this often meant that participation was limited to providing logistic support). The 1994 decision of the German Constitutional Court allowed more scope for German armed forces. It meant they could play an active part in the settlement of the Kosovo crisis and be present in Afghanistan today. A large number of German troops are involved in Operation Enduring Freedom, thus strengthening their country's diplomatic activity.
33. The question of who decides when armed forces should be deployed and under what conditions has arisen in other European countries and many of them have passed laws that take account of the changes resulting from settlement of the crises in Bosnia, Kosovo, East Timor and Afghanistan which have seen a series of humanitarian, peacekeeping and peacemaking missions. Alongside this political and legal debate there has also been a thorough review in military circles of arrangements for the participation of forces in crisis-management operations and the new requirements and problems these involve in terms of managing personnel and equipment. The necessary changes are being made to the structure of armed forces, their role and the type of forces and equipment required, but being able to meet these requirements has proved difficult and complex regardless of the type of operation envisaged (which can include combat missions).

1. Parliaments and the participation of armed forces in crisis-management operations

34. All European states are parliamentary democracies. In all the member states which belong to NATO¹⁵, the EU and WEU as well as in the countries which have applied for membership and in their various partner states, the government is a reflection of parliament and, to varying degrees, is accountable to an elected assembly. The use of military force in crisis management is no exception to this rule but the provisions that were in force up to the 1990s have had to be revised, adapted and, in some countries, even drawn up for the first time.
35. The Gulf war marked the start of this development which at that time was facilitated by the legal cover provided by United Nations resolutions authorising the use of force. As interventions became more frequent, but still came under the auspices of the United Nations, issues such as the expediency of deploying armed forces and the accompanying arrangements arose in the political and constitutional debate going on in each country. Initially, and for as long as intervention was of a "conventional" nature, i.e. consisting of UN peacekeeping operations, or took the form of commitments entered into within an alliance (NATO and WEU for example), or was provided for in bilateral cooperation agreements (as was the case of French action in Chad), the question of parliamentary scrutiny was no more than a matter of complying with the constitutional rules and laws in force and in most cases Parliament was merely consulted or informed without being given any real possibility of influencing the executive's decision.
36. By the time the crises in Somalia and then Bosnia and Herzegovina erupted, humanitarian and peacekeeping missions (for example, ensuring ceasefire observance, surveillance of demarcation lines, verification measures) had evolved into peacemaking or peace enforcement operations. The UN blue beret troops, a symbol of neutrality, were replaced by troops flying national flags and implementing a more proactive policy which, while countries remained open to the various factions engaged in conflict, was already a sign that sides had been taken. US intervention in Somalia against the militia led by General Aidid (1993) was a forerunner in this respect but it was not until 1995 in Bosnia and Herzegovina that the United States and the European members of NATO openly espoused such a policy. The Kosovo crisis confirmed this choice of more forceful intervention without any legal authorisation from the United Nations but with continued reference to the values of the UN Charter and justified by the need to avert a humanitarian disaster when all other means (diplomatic) had been exhausted.
37. Further afield in Asia, Australian and international intervention in East Timor was conducted along the same lines (though in agreement with a United Nations resolution). The intervention in Afghanistan in the context of Operation Enduring Freedom or the ISAF is also in keeping with the general aim of making and enforcing peace, though in the case of ISAF, the mission is limited to providing protection and assistance for the humanitarian operations.
38. It is the transition from a clearly defined system to a situation hedged by uncertainty in which armed forces on a "peaceful" peacekeeping mission become combatants that has caused public opinion to ask questions. Those who generally speaking approve of operations with a humanitarian purpose are much more divided when it comes to operations of a military nature and more critical of the political parties in parliaments and governments who carry the responsibility for them. The rules that existed in the past had to be changed in order both to comply with constitutional principles of a general nature governing the use of armed forces and providing for parliamentary scrutiny, and to enable governments to act with the flexibility necessary to deal with changing political and military situations. The agreement of both Parliament and Government is essential to maintain the credibility of the armed forces and ensure they are successful in an operation abroad, not only in the eyes of national public opinion but also as regards their image in other countries and especially in other allied countries whose troops are also engaged.
39. The problem of parliamentary scrutiny had therefore become a central issue in the debate on the participation of armed forces in crisis management. The response has been varied depending on the traditions, constitutional and political practices of individual countries. In the vast majority of cases, for example in the NATO member states, the procedures in force provide for no more than consulting and informing Parliament, and government decisions do not necessarily have to be approved by a vote by Parliament or by a resolution. However, many governments do endeavour to gain the support of Parliament and to take account of its reservations, as is the case in the Netherlands, for example. Parliamentary approval is required in five countries in the Alliance - Germany, Hungary, Norway, the Czech Republic and Turkey. The way in which political forces develop between Parliament and Government will in practice determine which trend wins the day in individual countries. The media attention that crises and operations now attract, pressure from public opinion and the stage reached in the political debate going on in Europe's democracies make these five countries, among others, an important test bed of developments in parliamentary scrutiny over the deployment of armed forces abroad.
40. Another aspect of the important role of parliaments is their work of adapting existing laws or passing new ones on the conditions and rules governing the deployment of forces. For UN missions or operations conducted to honour commitments entered into in an alliance a complex series of procedures has to be followed concerning, for instance, insurance premiums and policies for individual soldiers, repatriation, funding for operations, liability (in the event of an accident or incident), jurisdiction in the event of a dispute, etc. When WEU defined the Petersberg missions and NATO had recourse to the concept of operations outside Article 5 of the Washington Treaty to justify its intervention in Bosnia and Herzegovina and later in Kosovo, the rules that existed under national law had to be revised, and in some cases new ones had to be drawn up, to meet the legal and practical requirements of troop deployments under those conditions.
41. The countries of central Europe which are members of NATO or candidates for membership of the Alliance and the European Union faced a huge task in having to adapt their legislation so that they could participate fully in NATO operations in the Balkans. The laws in question concerned not only their forces' status, rights and responsibilities but also aspects such as secure communications between themselves and NATO and the implementation of the relevant proper security measures. In this process of adaptation, the states in question brought their legislation more into line with the laws that apply in the NATO and EU member states and this has to be seen as a very positive step with a view to their joining both organisations. Such an experience has proved useful for these applicant countries as it has made their parliamentarians more aware of defence issues and given them oversight of the conditions and arrangements that apply to the deployment of national forces. It is also valuable for the parliamentary assemblies of the long-standing members of NATO and the European Union which have had to address the same issues over the last ten years.

2. Operational requirements and the ability of forces to attain mission objectives

42. Increasing participation by European forces in crisis-management operations since the Gulf war and above all in the Balkans has put the spotlight on capabilities and deficiencies and has helped to focus national thinking on how to optimise the use of human and material resources. This has led to increased bilateral and multilateral cooperation on defence issues which runs deeper than preparing for military crisis management as it is determining the shape of Europe's armed forces for the years ahead and speeding up the process of setting up joint European capabilities. WEU set the stage for consideration of these matters by creating and then developing the concept of Petersberg missions. The range of these missions calls for mobile, rapidly deployable and all-purpose forces given that they must be capable not just of engaging in conventional warfare but also of carrying out missions whose purpose is to maintain law and order (policing) and assisting with (civilian and humanitarian) reconstruction projects.
43. As far as doctrine is concerned, NATO's intervention in Bosnia and Herzegovina marked the turning point for the Atlantic Alliance in that it had to switch from being a conventional defence pact and become a collective security organisation responsible not only for the geographic area covered by its member states but also for the areas surrounding them. The concept of operations outside the scope of Article 5 of the Washington Treaty (out of area) allowed NATO to intervene in Kosovo in 1999 even without the legal cover provided by a UN Security Council resolution. However, this development triggered a political debate both in NATO and the European Union (with reference to future Petersberg missions) on the need for a United Nations mandate for such operations and on which criteria should be adopted in the event of a refusal by the Security Council to provide a mandate. The debate has not ended but since the war in Kosovo the European countries have gone back to the practice of securing United Nations "authorisation" to engage in military operations abroad (e.g. Sierra Leone, East Timor, Afghanistan; this also applies to the deployment of KFOR¹⁶).
44. In operational terms, European missions planned by WEU or led by NATO during the first half of the 1990s led to the development of a very useful arrangement: Combined Joint Task Forces (CJTF). The flexibility of these command and control structures proved extremely useful in Bosnia and Kosovo for managing the multinational force which includes troops from member and non-member states, and work is in progress within the military structures of the Atlantic Alliance to perfect the system. Another concept which is still being developed (having been drawn up by WEU and implemented for the first time in the crisis in Albania in 1997) is that of a framework or lead nation. Italy took this role in Operation Alba, whose purpose was to stabilise the situation in that country. Under this concept action is taken outside any institutions providing for cooperation; this adds a further layer of complexity in terms of the law and legislation governing the deployment of armed forces for missions abroad.
45. All these new arrangements and political and operational innovations have strengthened the case for synergy among states and thoughts have turned away from the purely national dimension towards a common European approach. With the exception of two or three of the big European countries, intervention abroad is no longer envisaged by one nation acting alone but rather as part of a multinational cooperative venture and in some countries (such as Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg) also with a view to the progressive integration of their forces. Joint action taken by Portugal and Italy in Bosnia, the European Corps in Bosnia and Kosovo, and the force set up by Austria, Denmark, Germany and the Netherlands in Afghanistan can be quoted as examples of recent, highly intensive cooperation among European countries made possible as a result of the need for a series of interventions, the debate on their organisation and objectives and the resources necessary for operations to be successful.
46. The question of resources, however, is the weak point in all these developments. In human terms, the process under way in a number of countries which are moving to professional armed forces is supposed to improve the future management of manpower and make for more rapid troop deployments with forces that are more compatible than has been the case in the past. But this will not be achieved overnight, especially as there is no certainty that recruitment targets will be met, which means that the size of forces, including those available for deployment abroad, is subject to constant revision. Recourse to reservists, a very common practice in the United Kingdom, is the obvious solution but the setting up of identification and call-up procedures, training and equipment are costly and reduce the funding that could be allocated to frontline troops. Those forces which have maintained or are only just abandoning conscription have large numbers of reservists but their skills and capabilities vary considerably from one country to another. The United Kingdom, for example, with at least thirty years' experience of professional armed forces, can avail itself of a very wide range of skills at an equal level across the services. In order to take on board the effects of overstretching and overburdening, which place a limit on the length of missions abroad, particularly where long distances are involved, it is no longer possible to do without reservists for the purpose of deploying troops and providing them with support. Both these phenomena were to a large extent the reason for the United Kingdom's decision to withdraw the majority of its troops from Afghanistan and, by 2003, from SFOR and KFOR.
47. Equipment is another important aspect of the issue of resources: there is a shortfall in the number and quality of air, sea and ground facilities needed for the rapid transport of troops. Then there are all the various protection systems that have to accompany troop deployments; these concern anti-air defence, the suppression of enemy air defence, intelligence, electronics and communications, air and ground radar and optical observation, data communication and transmissions. The Gulf war and more recently the war in Afghanistan, with twelve years between them, showed that European force capabilities have improved in terms of forces and power projection, and intelligence (three naval groups with airborne facilities were stationed off the coast of Pakistan and a large naval force was deployed around the Horn of Africa). Two Helios 1 optical observation satellites are in service and other projects are under development (Helios 2 and Cosmo-Skymed Pleiade for optical observation and SAR-Lupe for radar observation). It is only the Airbus A400-M military transport aircraft that seems to be at a standstill and is subject to lengthy delays as a result of reservations (justified mainly by budget considerations) on the part of the countries participating in the project. On the whole, and taking account of the starting point for all these developments (in the 1990s) and the many different parties involved - states, organisations (NATO, the EU and WEU) and companies - Europe has made a considerable effort and quite substantial progress in strengthening its capabilities in terms of power projection and the deployment of troops for missions abroad.
48. However, all these efforts to improve human and material resources require substantial funding, and cooperation still has a long way to go in this respect. Each country is alone in funding its forces, equipment and logistic requirements. While part of the cost entailed is sometimes met out of additional budgets, it generally has to be covered by the overall defence budget. If the money is used to rectify shortfalls in various areas, the funding available for modernising equipment, training personnel (and reservists), maintaining national defence facilities and equipment is reduced proportionately. While spending on troop deployments does of course boost intervention capabilities, it also entails the risk of a country's national defence structures stagnating or becoming run down and, in the longer term, having an adverse effect on the forces assigned to missions abroad.
49. Specialisation among allies, something the Netherlands advocates, is one answer to these problems but it implies nothing much less than a revolution in the approach to national defence. This idea is based on the theory that very few countries have the means to maintain overall capabilities that can respond to all types of threat. Pooling resources, not just in terms of equipment (transport aircraft or vessels), but also of task-sharing (with one ally providing air protection for another which supplies bases and provides fuelling services, for example) is an approach with the potential to put the capabilities of the smaller European countries to the best use and improve their credibility vis-à-vis the more powerful European states. This also raises important political questions, in that it implies a loss of sovereignty in a sensitive area and calls for a binding commitment of a permanent nature on the part of the countries that adopt such a model.
50. But it is the framework of developing the EU's European Security and Defence Policy that most progress has been made in addressing the matter of operational requirements and how to muster forces to carry out Petersberg missions. Since the EU's Helsinki Summit (December 1999) the European Union has not only set up politico-military crisis-management structures (the Political and Security Committee, Military Committee and Military Staff) but has also drawn up methods and procedures that will enable it to deploy a reaction force of 60 000 troops in two months and sustain it for a year with a commitment from member states to provide the necessary military units. This is consistent with the objective of the EU's headline goal under which a European rapid reaction capability is to be on stream in 2003.

51. Participation by European countries' armed forces in crisis-management operations in and around Europe or in the rest of the world is no longer the subject of a controversial debate. After the first few years of efforts, with both failures and successes, it has become a reality in the minds the public at large, which for the majority supports this armed European presence beyond the national borders. Currently the European states in WEU, NATO and the EU are together deploying some 50 000 men and women from all three service branches on almost all the continents. The political debate has matured, the role of parliaments, generally speaking, has been enhanced, even in countries in which the fundamental texts (constitution and laws) do not make explicit provision for parliamentary powers in this area, and specific legislation on forces deployment has been voted and promulgated.
52. The experience gathered by the national forces has proved to be extremely useful for the reform of the armed forces. Practical lessons learned on the ground make it easier to compare countries from the point of view of doctrine, rules of engagement and equipment. The work done side by side on a daily basis has also contributed to intergovernmental cooperation at all levels, from planning through to the sharing of resources and tasks. It has become common practice for a European state to call on another country to transport its forces, for example, or for a national unit from one country to share the control of a sector with a unit from another country, and for both to call on troops from a third country for support. The national units destined for deployment abroad receive more rigorous training, better equipment and a number of advantages in terms of bonuses and promotion. However, it should not be forgotten that the risk factor (including post-operational damages) is present on a daily basis and that it is greater than for purely "territorial" troops.
53. Such missions abroad have had a major and lasting impact on the process of reforming the national armed forces, with the emphasis being laid at present on transforming them into rapidly deployable reaction forces capable of operating in a multinational environment. Progress has been considerable, if only in terms of transforming the conscript armies that were typical of European countries at the beginning of the 1990s into professional armed forces, or ones with a large number of voluntary recruits signing up for greater or lesser periods. Each country is moving forward at its own pace, but in most cases towards a common goal.
54. The participation of national armed forces in external crisis-management operations has also brought together European countries that were previously separated by the cold war divide. Central and south-eastern European troops and Russian and Ukrainian forces are involved in NATO operations, in ISAF and in Enduring Freedom. Their presence is a strong political sign of the will to achieve integration, cooperation and partnership among European countries and with the transatlantic allies.
55. The practical problems connected with the participation of armed forces in crisis-management missions have not been totally resolved, whether it be in terms of the command and control of multinational operations, interoperability, combined operations or logistics. However, to a very large extent these are technical issues - albeit with political implications - in a climate of general consensus as far as the operational requirements are concerned. The solutions that are adopted may vary, but all the European states participating in these missions are involved in the same process of reflection, regardless of whether or not they belong to the European and transatlantic cooperation structures. There are, however, two eminently political issues to which so far no answer has been found: the legitimacy of intervention and exit strategy.
56. The reference to the right to interfere on humanitarian grounds provided the legal basis, sanctioned before or after the event by the UN Security Council, for the vast majority of military crisis-management operations from 1991 (in northern Iraq) to 2001 (ISAF in Afghanistan). But these days, at the instigation of the current US Administration, military intervention is no longer seen merely in terms of a response, for example, to an unfolding humanitarian disaster or to a clear case of aggression, but also in proactive terms, as an action that takes place before the presumed threat (or humanitarian disaster) has had a chance to materialise. This stance raises complex and delicate issues that challenge the very foundations of the present international system. The immediate question that arises is that of the criteria for such intervention and above all, who is to judge the nature of the threat and whether intervention is appropriate. It also calls profoundly into question the principle of the equality and sovereignty of states, which while it may be theoretical, would be a source of conflict for years to come were it to be modified by force. Whatever the power of a state, alone or in a coalition, it cannot refashion the world in its own image or according to its national interests.
57. The exit strategy for military crisis-management operations is another problem to which no satisfactory solution has been found. The experience in the Balkans has shown that, while the deployment of a force is conducive to restoring peace and stability, a military presence on its own does not provide the answer to the problem of rebuilding a modern and functioning state. Six years after IFOR, the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina is far from being a "normal" country with sustained social and economic development, while Kosovo remains a "Serb province", notwithstanding three years of international presence. FYROM is entering into a hopeful phase, but there are still tensions which, without the NATO military presence, would degenerate into violence and instability. The military forces of European countries that are involved in those three operations are doing a remarkable job, particularly as regards their civil action in the field of reconstruction, security and medical and humanitarian assistance, but in the absence of any political or economic development that is adapted to the specific national and regional characteristics of this part of the world, they have become the only solution to the crisis. Thus the presence of armed forces in the region has tended to become a permanent state of affairs, creating a situation of dependence that is counter-productive.
58. That situation has also had a wearing effect on personnel and equipment, in terms of budgetary resources, and it could give rise to conflicts of interest among the participating states, in as much as one or other of them may wish at a given moment to withdraw or re-deploy its forces, which can be detrimental to the effectiveness of the military force as a whole. If the state concerned is a small one, it may prove not to be too difficult to replace it, as was the case, for example, with Portugal, which withdrew its contingent from Kosovo in order to strengthen its troops in East Timor (UNMISET). However, the withdrawal of a large state - European or non-European - would lead not only to operational, but also to political problems, which may be serious enough to call the continuation of a mission into question. The longer the military presence lasts, the greater the risk, if only because the larger states are more likely to be engaged in international crisis-management operations, with the problems of over-stretch and under-staffing that this entails. Equipment wear and tear, maintenance of the logistic chain and operational costs (shared or borne by individual countries) are a constant concern for military planners and the political authorities.
59. The use of military means of crisis management has made a major contribution to resolving the conflicts in south-eastern Europe and in other regions of the world, but it has become more than ever necessary for the political, economic and social aspects to be taken on board from the very outset of a mission and for projects in those areas to be implemented as quickly as possible by the political decision-makers. Crisis management must be seen as a whole, in which success closely depends on tackling these issues on all fronts at once. A military presence can restore peace, but for obvious reasons of costs, wear and tear of equipment and human resources, political changes and adjustments of priorities, it can only be a solution for the short and medium term. The EU seems to have learnt a number of lessons in recent years in that it has developed civil-military crisis-management structures in which the two aspects are complementary. At the same time, the forces of European countries involved in such missions must not be transformed into global "firemen" or "policemen". Indeed, it is important to preserve the combat capabilities that are specific to the armed forces and hence a balance must be struck between combat capabilities (war environment) and peacekeeping capabilities. Having created the Petersberg missions, we now need to create the Petersberg forces. This is the challenge that the EU and all the European states concerned must meet in order to become credible players in today's unipolar and unstable world.

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APPENDIX

WEU
member countries

Total per country

SFOR¹⁷

KFOR¹⁸

ISAF¹⁹

Enduring Freedom

Germany

11 568

5 045

3 900

1 123

Belgium

1 350

550

800

N/A

-

Spain

3 357

1 058

800

349

France

11 920

2 100

7 300

2 000

520

Greece

1 927

250

1 514

N/A

163

Italy

9 202

1 100

5 000

2 700

402

Luxembourg

51

25

26

N/A

-

Netherlands

4 147

1 063

1 456

1 400

228

Portugal

365

350

-

N/A

15

United Kingdom

14 240

5 400

2 400

6 000

440

Associate members

Iceland

-

-

-

-

-

Norway

1 437

120

1 000

300

17

Hungary

482

58

424

N/A

-

Poland

1 450

300

550

300

300

Czech Republic

822

15

424

250

133

Turkey

2 676

502

684

90

1 400

Observers

Austria

595

520

N/A

73

Denmark

1 409

775

500

100

34

Finland

1 351

500

820

N/A

31

Ireland

827

400

420

N/A

7

Sweden

1 281

500

750

N/A

31

Associate partners
Bulgaria	259	185	42	N/A	32
Estonia	24	1	23	-	-
Latvia	148	4	144	-	-
Lithuania	24	2	7	10	5
BALTBAT20 (Baltic States)		-	-	N/A	-
Slovak Republic	161	25	96	40	-
Romania	444	114	215	60	55
Slovenia	146	140	6	N/A	-
TOTAL	72387	17131	31224	17950	5358

Operation Amber Fox

0. 1000 soldiers from European NATO member countries and candidate countries serve in Task Force Fox (TFF). They provide security for monitors who are overseeing the implementation and progress of the peace plan in the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia. The Netherlands, which is currently in command of the operation (329 soldiers), provides, together with Germany, France and Italy, the majority of personnel.

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¹ Adopted unanimously and without amendment by the Assembly on 3 December 2002 (8^th sitting).

² Humanitarian and rescue tasks, peacekeeping tasks and tasks of combat forces in crisis management, including peacemaking.

³ NATO, SFOR: see http://www.NATO.int/sfor/organisation/mission.htm

⁴ NATO, KFOR: http://www.nato.int/kfor/kfor/about.htm

⁵ The Netherlands currently has the command of this operation.

⁶ NATO, Amber Fox: http://www.afsouth.nato.int/operations/skopje2/fox.htm

⁷ Belgium, France, Greece, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Turkey and the United Kingdom.

⁸ UN Security Council Resolution 1386 of 20 December 2001, on "The situation in Afghanistan"; http://www.un.org

⁹ UN Security Council Resolution 1368 of 12 September 2001 on "Threats to international peace and security caused by terrorist acts"; http://www.un.org

¹⁰ In all, 1300 German soldiers are providing ISAF in Afghanistan and Uzbekistan with logistic support; http://www.bundeswehr.de

¹¹ Operation Fingal, UK Ministry of Defence: http://www.operations.mod.uk/fingal/index.htm

¹² Ptarmigan (16-18 April 2002), Snipe (2-13 May 2002), Condor (17-22 May 2002) and Buzzard (29 May-2 July 2002); UK Ministry of Defence, http://www.operations.mod.uk/veritas/index.htm

¹³ Article 87(a)2 of the Basic Law states that "Apart from defence, the Armed Forces may only be used to the extent explicitly permitted by this Basic Law".

¹⁴ Article 24.2 of the Basic Law states that "For the maintenance of peace, the Federation may enter a system of mutual collective security; in doing so it will consent to such limitations upon its rights of sovereignty as will bring about and secure a peaceful and lasting order in Europe and among the nations of the world".

¹⁵ With the exception of the United States where the Administration is not answerable to Congress.

¹⁶ See paragraph 7 of Resolution 1244 of the UN Security Council on "The situation relating to Kosovo" of 10 June 1999; http://www.un.org

¹⁷ "By the end of 2002, SFOR will draw down to 12 000 troops, while KFOR will reduce to 32 000 troops. For phase three, further KFOR reductions to around 29 000 troops by the end of June 2003 are envisaged." Declaration on the Balkans, Meeting of the North Atlantic Council in Defence Ministers Session, Brussels, 6 June 2002; www.nato.int

¹⁸ Idem.

¹⁹ ISAF forces, October 2002; Austrian Defence Ministry; www.bmlv.gv.at

²⁰ From 1998-1999 the international unit BALTCON-1, comprising BALTBAT's Estonian company, the multinational Headquarters and supporting units, was deployed in Bosnia; Estonian Defence Forces; www.mil.ee