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Paris (AFP) May 11, 2010 One year after rejoining NATO military command, France wants to see the alliance's headquarters cut down in size, officials in Defence Minister Herve Morin's office told AFP on Tuesday. French officers feel the Atlantic alliance's 12,500-strong command staff is too large and its structures too unwieldy for 21st century combat. Paris officials have contacted NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen and US Defence Secretary Robert Gates urging that plans be drawn up to abolish redundant and overlapping command structures, they said. "This rationalisation could allow us to cut down manpower and command structures by a third and at the same time improve our effectiveness," a French official said, arguing that NATO needed more "deployable assets". France hopes that proposals as to how this can be done should be agreed before the next full meeting of NATO defence ministers, which is to be held in Brussels on June 10 and 11. While remaining a Western ally, France pulled out of NATO's integrated command structure in 1966. It nevertheless contributed to several NATO missions notably in the Balkans and the current war in Afghanistan, and President Nicolas Sarkozy decided to rejoin the command last year.
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Western troops march on Russia's Red SquareMoscow (AFP) May 9, 2010 Troops from four NATO states marched through Red Square for the first time Sunday as Russia marked victory in World War II with its biggest military parade since the collapse of the Soviet Union. In a moment of huge symbolism, soldiers from Britain, France, Poland and the United States paraded on the square's famous cobbles in Moscow at the same time as nuclear-capable missiles that once wou ... read more |
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