The Quest for Relevant Air Power

POST–COLD WAR CHALLENGES │ 21
Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania. In 2009 Croatia and Albania became
members of NATO.
In concert with NATO’s enlargement, power projection became
an increasingly important focus for the alliance. The strategic
concept, adopted at the 1999 Washington summit, underlined
NATO’s willingness to support operations under UN
authority. 52 To respond to the demands of deployed operations,
particularly in the wake of 11 September, the alliance launched
the NATO Response Force (NRF) project at the 2002 NATO
summit in Prague. The NRF is a quickly deployable and technologically
advanced joint force numbering up to 25,000 troops. 53
It is designed for worldwide employment across the spectrum of
military operations, from evacuation operations and deployment
as a mere demonstrative force to Article 5 (collective defence)
operations. The response force is inherently joint and
contains land, air, sea, and special operations forces components,
including a brigade-size land component, a naval task force with
a carrier battle group and an amphibious task group, and an air
component capable of 200 combat sorties a day. 54 It reached initial
operational capability on 15 October 2003, and full operational
capability was declared at the November 2006 Riga summit
in Latvia. 55 The process of setting up the NRF was considered
to be a major driving factor behind the alliance’s military transformation
towards expeditionary forces. 56
Requirements of expeditionary warfare, especially in the context
of operations in Afghanistan, led to a further adaptation of
NATO’s military command structure. Operational responsibilities,
formerly shared by ACE and ACLANT, were merged into Allied
Command Operations (ACO), based in Mons, Belgium, under
the responsibility of the supreme allied commander, Europe
(SACEUR). To deal with the transformational challenges, the new
Allied Command Transformation (ACT) was established in the
United States. ACO and ACT are NATO’s two strategic commands.
57 As such, geographical boundaries delineating operational
command authorities had been removed, reflecting the nature
of deployed operations that might occur anywhere. Secondly,
ACT advances NATO’s continuing transformation against the
backdrop of a highly fluid threat and risk spectrum.