Defence Ministers Meeting (DPC) Brussels, 11 June 1998

1998 Target Force Goals Proposals For Poland Statement by H.E. Janusz ONYSZKIEWICZ, MoD of Poland Mr. Chairman, Your Excellencies, Dear Colleagues, After a series of discussions and consultations, Poland fully accepted 50 Target Force Proposals, and partially accepted the rest of them. Let me stress a tremendous support and assistance we received from NATO countries and different NATO bodies in this field. I would like particularly to commend the assistance provided us by International Staff, International Military Staff, and SHAPE. By accepting the Target Force Goals, Poland assumes a firm commitment on contribution to the Alliance's collective defence and other operations led by NATO or WEU. Having this in mind we have decided to adjust our 15-year plan of development of Polish armed forces to the requirements brought by the Target Force Goals. On the basis of this plan, the Polish Ministry of Defence under my personal guidance is now developing the Programme of Integration with NATO and Modernisation of the Polish Armed Forces for the years 1998-2012. The programme envisages maintaining of defence expenditures on a level sufficient for effective integration of our armed forces with the Alliance. Poland has developed a comprehensive programme of implementation of the proposed Target Force Goals. The wide range of activities already initiated in the Polish Armed Forces focus: first - on achieving short term goals of first priority (not later than by the end of 1999); this applies to the by basic elements of the Polish defence system and the designated part of the Polish Armed Forces, second - on creating conditions to achieve mid- (by the end of 2001) and long term (by the end of 2003) goals by the entire Poland's defence system, including the core of the Polish Armed Forces. We have selected priorities and grouped them into six main areas that comprise an overall effort towards interoperability of the Polish armed forces with those of the Allies, namely: NATO common doctrine, Command, Control and Communication (C3), Integration of the Polish Air Defence with that of NATO, Host Nation Support (HNS), Logistics, and modernisation of the weapon systems and other equipment. Further Poland is already prepared to discuss questions of Polish participation in the NATO military structure. We strongly support the Alliance concept of creating multinational units. Consequently, we have decided to take the active part in creating Danish-German-Polish Corps which we expect to be assigned to an appropriate NATO regional command immediately after admission of Poland to the Alliance. We express our will and interest in establishing other multinational formations with participation of Polish units as well as units in the PfP framework. Ladies and gentlemen, This undoubtedly ambitious programme can be achieved if we may still count on the Alliance's assistance. In particular, we are interested in access to common-funding possibilities under NATO Security Investment Programme in order to adjust our infrastructure to standards set by Host Nation Support requirements. The NATO's advisory assistance in our efforts to achieve interoperability with the Alliance's armed forces will be greatly appreciated as well.