Additionally, NATO will equip "military airfields in Powidz, Lask and Minsk Mazowiecki with new installations to improve the logistical and defence capacity of these bases.
"Air defence headquarters are to be set up in Poznan, Warsaw and Bydgoszcz; a radio communications centre will be located in Wladyslawowo on the Baltic coast.
"A newly built training centre in Bydgoszcz should be fully equipped [with] computer devices by the end of the year (total cost EUR 40 million)." [16]
In June of 2009 Polish Defense Minister Klich disclosed that NATO would inaugurate a Joint Battle Command Centre in the northern city of Bydgoszcz where NATO has run a Joint Force Training Centre since 2004.
The defense chief said, "The Alliance has made the decision to open a new NATO cell, a new joint regiment within NATO. According to the decision, commanders from three regiments will be located in Bydgoszcz.
"In Bydgoszcz, we will have the permanent commanders of [a] battalion and other components: one of six joint mobile modules, a security component and logistics and support operators," which include approximately 200 NATO troops. Klich added "that NATO has decided to heavily invest in Poland by modernizing military infrastructure including air and sea bases." [17]
This February 27 (the now deceased) Polish President Lech Kaczynski ratified a Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) with the U.S. for the stationing of American troops on his nation's territory. In May approximately 100 U.S. troops and six Patriot Advanced Capability-3 missiles arrived in the city of Morag on the Baltic Sea.
On the same day U.S. and Russian presidents Barack Obama and Dmitry Medvedev signed a Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) II agreement - April 8 - the president of Poland at the time, Donald Tusk, said that "From the perspective of [President Obama] and the U.S. the signing of the START 2 treaty has no influence on the work on the SM3 anti-missile shield." [18] He was referring to longer-range Standard Missile-3 deployments scheduled for Poland and on ships in the Baltic Sea, the main component of what Washington calls its Phased Adaptive Approach to cover all of Europe with interceptor missiles by 2018.
The Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CFE) of 1990 has not been ratified by the U.S. or any of its NATO allies twenty years on. Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania are not signatories to the treaty and as such the U.S. and NATO could feel free to move any military equipment they choose to the three nations. There is nothing to prevent the transfer of American B61 nuclear gravity bombs from air bases in Germany to ones in Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland.
In July Secretary of State Clinton was in Poland and signed an agreement with her counterpart, Foreign Minister Sikorski, on the stationing of U.S. interceptor missiles in the country. The two formalized a pact superseding one signed two years earlier by Sikorski and then-Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.
"According to new missile defence plans, mobile launchers incorporating SM-3 interceptors will be placed in Europe. Poland will probably station the system between 2015 and 2018."
The day before Polish Defense Ministry spokesman Janusz Sejmej made the same point, revealing that "Defense Minister Bogdan Klich said the Americans promised to bring the SM-3s here after 2015 but definitely before 2018."
In Clinton's words, "We're....NATO allies, and the United States is deeply committed to Poland's security and sovereignty. Today, by signing an amendment to the ballistic missile defense agreement, we are reinforcing this commitment. The amendment will allow us to move forward with Polish participation in hosting elements of the phased adaptive approach to missile defense in Europe." [19]
Since U.S. warplanes took over the current four-month rotation of the NATO Baltic air patrol on September 1, America has continued military exercises in the area.
On September 13 thirteen NATO member states and partners began this year's annual Northern Coasts naval exercise in the Baltic Sea. Over 4,000 military personnel, more than 60 ships, and planes and helicopters from the U.S., Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Denmark, Norway, the Netherlands, Poland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Finland and Sweden participated in the largest exercise ever staged in Finnish waters, where last year's Loyal Arrow 2 NATO war games included "the biggest air force drill ever in the Finnish-Swedish Bothnia Bay."
A week after Northern Coasts 2010 began, U.S. Special Operations Command Europe, from where American special forces personnel are to be deployed to Poland, launched the Jackal Stone 10 multinational special forces exercise at the 21st Tactical Airbase in Swidwin, Poland, then moved to two other locations in Lithuania. 1,300 special operations troops from the U.S., Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, Croatia, Romania and Ukraine participated, the first time that special operations units of the seven countries have engaged in joint maneuvers. [20]
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