The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) is meeting this Thursday and Friday to go over ways to offer better protection in Eastern Europe. The military alliance is considering the creation of a rapid reaction force, reports GHN based on dw.de
This summit will probably be called "historic," top NATO diplomats speculated as they prepared for the two-day meeting in Wales. That's because the Ukraine crisis and the increasing confrontation with Russia will lead to a complete change in priorities for the alliance. Over the last 13 years, especially with the Afghanistan mission, NATO has focused on crisis management beyond alliance territory. Now it's back to national defense in Europe. At the end of 2014, the NATO combat mission in Afghanistan is to be replaced by a much smaller training mission.
"We are getting ready for the next phase of NATO," the Atlantic alliance's top commander in Europe, US General Philip Breedlove, said. "We are going from a deployed force to a ready force. How do we bring this deployed force home?"
NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen has taken a hard line against Russia in recent weeks. He sees the future role of NATO as follows: "We cannot afford to be naive, and we don't have any illusions. We are faced with a reality that Russia considers us an adversary, and we will adapt to that situation."