As Russia continues its aggression in Ukraine and moves more military assets to its borders with the European Union and NATO, both of those entities have begun assessing how quickly the alliance could muster troops in an emergency.
Officials have found mobilization capabilities lacking, and have therefore agreed to make that a priority moving forward.
Specifically, NATO and the EU are going to work out how to quickly move U.S. troops across national borders, which is currently an issue due to legal hurdles.
American military leaders have been focusing on the need to back off customs regulations while building up infrastructure along NATO’s eastern flank, to make sure that tank convoys and other military equipment can move with speed during a crisis.
While beefing up its European operations in countries like Poland and the Baltic states, U.S. soldiers have participated in a number of convoys that stretch along the length of the alliance’s eastern borders, which has resulted in logjams at border crossings.
NATO and the EU are now looking for ways to create more bureaucratic uniformity that would remove obstacles that slow convoys.
“Moving our forces and equipment quickly is vital for our security. This means we need procedures for rapid border crossing,” NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said.
Also at issue: Strengthening roadways to handle heavy U.S. and NATO tanks and military vehicles. [source]
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