U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is expected to sign a defense cooperation agreement with Bulgarian authorities this week that could lead to the stationing of American troops in the East European country as early as next year.
For almost 18 months, the United States has been negotiating for access to military bases in new NATO member states Bulgaria and Romania to help guarantee security in the volatile Black Sea region. In December, Washington clinched a deal with Bucharest that will establish an Eastern European Task Force headquarters at Mihail Kogalniceanu Air Base near the port of Contanta.
U.S. State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said Rice was expected to sign a similar agreement in Sofia, where she will be attending a meeting of NATO foreign ministers Thursday and Friday. According to reports in the Sofia Echo newspaper, bases at Novo Selo, Bezmer Airport and Graf Ignatievo will be covered by the agreement, which will be signed for a 10-year period. U.S. Ambassador to Bulgaria John Beyrle said the he first American troops would arrive in 2007 and 2008. The bases are expected to be placed under Bulgarian command, with the U.S. soldiers under American commanding officers.
Navy Cmdr. Joe Carpenter, a Pentagon spokesman, hailed the agreement as "not solely to the benefit of the United States. It allows us to train and operate together (with the Bulgarians), who are a NATO ally. It will help them transform their military and improve their capabilities within NATO."
The U.S. military presence in the region is not likely to be big. State Department officials say only 100 soldiers will be stationed in Bulgaria and Romania on a full-time basis, with up to 2,500 American troops on short-term deployments and training missions at any one time. "This will certainly not be a World War-II type footprint, but a lighter, more expeditionary footprint from which we can build on either NATO or U.S. missions," Gen. James L. Jones, the Commander of U.S. European Command and NATO's military chief told Brussels-based reporters last month.
The sharing of bases in Bulgaria and Romania, which are due to join the European Union next year, is part of a larger reorganization of U.S. overseas forces that is expected to see as many as 70,000 American soldiers relocated to bases within the United States. The U.S. European Command, based in Stuttgart, Germany, plans to trim its military presence from 112,000 troops to about 68,500 over the next several years. Those forces remaining in Europe will focus on being available for swift deployment to trouble spots in the Balkans, the Black Sea region, the Caucasus and the Middle East. Pointing to Western Europe's crowded airspace and difficulty finding training camps away from urban areas, Jones says: "The center of gravity may still be in this part of Europe, but the center of activity is certainly moving to the east and south."
The move to boost ties with Bulgaria and Romania also reflects a heightened awareness in The United States of the potential security threat posed by instability in the Black Sea region. Shipping traffic into and out of the Black Sea has more than doubled since 2001, with 150 ships a day passing through the Turkish Straits, including an average of 25 oil tankers per day.
A terrorist attack against shipping or port facilities "would directly threaten the interests and economic security of the United States, and of all the nations which use the energy from the region," Amb. Beyrle said at a recent conference in Sofia.
Aside from maritime security, U.S. officials also cite drug and weapon trafficking, people smuggling and illegal immigration as potential threats.
"It is no exaggeration to state that the Black Sea region represents a potential front in the global war against terrorism," said Beyrle. "We agree with our allies and friends in the region that the threat of terrorism on the Black Sea may be small today, but we also agree on the potential risks. If we ignore or minimize these risks, they can turn into real dangers to our security and prosperity."
One of the possibilities being considered in Brussels and Washington is a Black Sea equivalent of NATO's Active Endeavor operation, which controls vessels transiting the Mediterranean Sea to prevent terrorist attacks. "Hopefully we can work together with nations around the Black Sea to see if we can do what we did there in the Mediterranean to make it a safer and more secure environment," said Gen. Jones.
