Ahead of the NATO summit in Madrid, Alliance Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said it would begin strengthening its border with Russia following the invasion of Ukraine. This comes when world leaders of the NATO defense alliance Russia declared a “direct threat” to their security at a summit in Madrid.
Mr Stoltenberg said: “We will transform the NATO Response Force and increase the number of our High Readiness Forces to more than 300,000.”
He continued: “Russia has moved away from the partnership and dialogue that NATO has sought to establish with Russia for many years.
“They chose confrontation instead of dialogue. We regret it – but then of course we have to react to that reality. “
Prime Minister Boris Johnson was initially quoted as willing to announce a “substantial strengthening” for Estonia, but that has now changed.
The current rapid reaction team consists of 40,000 troops and the new plan will not only see this figure increase sevenfold, but also warships and plans can be ready for deployment with troops east of NATO’s borders with 24 hour notice.
UK officials have said they will not yet comment on the number of troops deployed as part of the 300,000-troop strategy, but initially thought Britain would send 5,000.
Since Stoltenberg’s announcement, enforcement of the plan has now been delayed after alliance members hesitated about troop promises and has now been described as a work in progress.
Mr Stoltenberg said at the summit on Wednesday that he was “confident” in his strategy and said all allies were required to “contribute the forces they promised to contribute”.
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At the summit, the President warned members that they must defeat Russia within a year to ensure that it would not be seen as a collective failure and he also called for more funding and weapons to help his nation’s defense.
He said: “Next year could be a worse situation – if not only Ukraine but also several other states, possibly members of the alliance, come under fire from Russia.
“And then it will be our general failure – Ukraine and NATO.”