Liam Fox, the opposition defense spokesman, said Britain's 25,000-strong troop presence in Germany, a leftover from the Cold War, was "no longer necessary."

Such a move, part of a "wholesale recasting of our foreign and defense policy," would free British troops for NATO missions outside Europe, Fox told the London-based Daily Telegraph newspaper.

He noted that some countries in Europe, unlike Britain and France, for example, are unable or unwilling to enter combat in Afghanistan.

With 9,000 troops Britain is NATO's third-largest contributor to the Afghanistan mission, followed by Germany with more than 4,000 troops and France with more than 3,000.

But Germany, for example, has so far refused sending its soldiers into volatile southern Afghanistan, where casualty-heavy firefights with the Taliban insurgency are looming.

"If other countries are willing to take up roles in continental defense that leaves Britain and France able to take on expeditionary roles," Fox told the daily.

Reminding Germans of their unwillingness to send soldiers south doesn't improve the overall situation, Fox added.

"Much as people regard it as a great political sport to be constantly berating our allies on what they do and don't do in Afghanistan, it's more important that we have more effective burden sharing so we can be freed up from some responsibilities," Fox told the daily. "Finding a more creative diplomatic solution in NATO will be a priority for an incoming Conservative government. … We can either hammer on about burden sharing, or we can start looking at what countries will be able to do within their political, constitutional and military constraints. Far better in NATO that countries have roles which they are 100 percent willing to carry out."

Fox's conservatives lead the polls to win Britain's next parliamentary elections. David Cameron has vowed to make Fox Britain's next defense minister if the Tories win power.

The plan to pull out troops from Germany would be expensive -- experts say it could cost up to $8 billion.

While Fox wants to remove troops from continental Europe, he has no similar plans in sight for Afghanistan.

"If in a U.N.-sanctioned mission, carried out by NATO, Britain were unilaterally to pull out, where does that leave Britain as a strategic partner in the future? Where does that leave us? If you want to be in the third division, that's the way to go about it."

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