Euro-Atlantic Security and the Bucharest 9 Group
The NATO member states in the region plead for enhanced forward presence in Eastern Europe
Bogdan Matei, 01.03.2019, 13:12
Ever since its establishment, seven decades ago, when the Cold War started, NATO’s mission has been, according to its first secretary general, “to keep Russians out, and the Americans in (…)”. Along with the fall of the communist dictatorships in the east of Europe, the values of the free world have extended beyond the former Iron Curtain, and the former satellites of the Soviet Union, once set free, have chosen the North-Atlantic Alliance.
From a geopolitical point of view, its eastern flank remains the most vulnerable, so the countries in the area are compelled to coordinate their security strategies. On Thursday, in Kosice, Slovakia, the presidents of Romania, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Slovakia, adopted, at the end of the meeting of the Bucharest 9 Format, a declaration that highlights the importance of NATO’s enhanced forward presence, from the Baltic to the Black Sea. Launched at the initiative of the presidents of Romania and Poland, the B9 Format held its first summit in November 2015, in Bucharest, and the second one in Warsaw, in June 2018.
In Kosice, in the presence of the NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, the nine presidents reiterated their concern for the conflict in eastern Ukraine and the recent tension in the Sea of Azov and the Black Sea. The latest military actions show that Russia keeps threatening the stability of this region, said bluntly Romania’s president Klaus Iohannis. He stressed the fact that developments in the region had shown that the allied states must do more in order to secure a more robust ground, air and maritime defense.
President Iohannis said that the NATO allies and partners in the east, such as Ukraine or Georgia, needed more support to consolidate their defense capabilities against any type of threat, be it military, cybernetic or mere propaganda. Moreover, the Romanian head of state added, a tight cooperation between the EU and NATO is needed. According to Radio Romania’s correspondent, the president of Poland, Andrzej Duda, also pleaded for an enhanced alliance presence on the eastern flank. He termed Russia’s actions as a clear relapse of its imperial ambitions, to which NATO must respond appropriately.
On the ground, these very days US military deployed in Europe are traveling from Poland to the ‘Mihail Kogalniceanu’ air-base in south-eastern Romania, as part of the US’s commitment to ensure the security of NATO’s eastern flank, under the Operation Atlantic Resolve. The 500-strong US military contingent is accompanied by tanks and infantry fighting vehicles, supported by helicopters. Alongside their Romanian comrades, they are participating in multinational exercises. The US troops will be stationed in Romania for nine months, to be then replaced by other units, in order to ensure a constant, rotating presence in Europe.
