The Quest for Relevant Air Power

GERMAN Air Force │ 185
airliners is not reconcilable with the constitution. 217 This again
shows the complexity of civil-military relations in Germany.
On behalf of NATO, the GAF has also regularly contributed to
air policing over the Baltic. For this particular purpose, German
F-4F Phantoms were for the first time dispatched to Latvia from
30 June to 30 September 2005. Since Lithuania, Estonia, and Latvia
do not have adequate aircraft for this type of mission at their
disposal, other NATO nations alternately provide a detachment of
four fighter aircraft for a period of approximately three months. 218
In September 2009, the GAF deployed its Eurofighters to the Baltic,
representing the first operational deployment to involve this
aircraft type. Since the start of the alliance mission in April 2004
up to September 2009, 14 NATO member states provided air policing
duties. As of 2009, this multinational effort was expected to
last until around 2018. 219 Besides the Baltic, the GAF started to
contribute to NATO air policing missions over Iceland in 2010. 220
Furthermore, a number of subsidiary tasks in support of civil
authorities fall within the GAF’s responsibility. The 1994 Defence
White Book explicitly states that the GAF gathered and forwarded
Courtesy GAF; photo by Toni Dahmen
During floods in Germany, GAF units provided assistance and flew rescue
missions. In particular, the GAF A310 medevac fleet evacuated patients
from hospitals.