Zaman, Turkey
July 27 2004

US Ties up New Base Structuring in Europe

The US will begin negotiations concerning new “strategic
partnerships” that will assist the redeployment of its military
bases.

General Charles Wald, Deputy Commander for the European Command, told
a foreign policy symposium in the Senate that the US needed to change
its military settlement plan in foreign lands. Wald said that the
Ukraine, Russia, Romania, Bulgaria, the Black Sea region of Turkey,
Georgia, Azerbaijan and Armenia, in the Southern Caucuses, because of
their proximity to oil fields, drug smuggling, terrorism and
instability, were the “‘new geopolitical hot points”.

General Wald noted that the US was not looking for a permanent base
in Southern Caucasian countries, rather, “strategic partnerships.”
American troops settled in Germany could be temporarily shifted to
some countries including Turkey. Last month, an article in The New
York Times claimed that the US planned to move 72 F-16 planes from
Germany to Incirlik Base in Eastern Turkey. The story was denied. 84
percent of 120,000 American troops in Europe are in Germany.