Section III.

The post-Second World War

and Society
CHAPTER 11

Multinational Force Structures in Europe

KRAFT Ina

1. Introduction
European states are engaged in a multitude of military cooperation
arrangements.1 For example, various and numerous multinational relations exist
in different military process areas relating to capability development, military
training and joint doctrine development. Furthermore, since the end of the
Cold War, European states have participated in numerous international military
missions together.2 Military cooperation in Europe, however, becomes particularly
visible in the establishment of standing and non-standing multinational military
structures, both at command and unit level, that are dispersed over the whole
European continent. This chapter provides an overview on these multinational
force structures in Europe and answers questions of how they came about.

2. The Development of Multinational Structures in

Cold War Europe
Many of the multinational arrangements that exist in Europe today were put
in place after the end of the Cold War. The multifaceted nature that we see today,
however, originated from as early as the 1940s. The origin of the institutionalised
and long-term cooperation of the armed forces of various European states as we
know it today dates back to the cooperation of the Allied Forces during World

1
The statements contained in this paper are based on the findings of a research project on multinational
cooperation in the military that was carried out at the Bundeswehr Centre of Military History and
Social Sciences between 2020 and 2021. Parts of this chapter were presented at the 16th ERGOMAS
Biennial Conference in Tartu, Estonia, on 20 July 2021 and at a joint workshop held online by the
National Institute for Defense Studies (Japan) and the Bundeswehr Centre of Military History and
Social Sciences (Germany) on 10 August 2021.
2
For pragmatic reasons, the terms “Europe” and “European” are used in this chapter for NATO
and EU members, as well as for European democracies of Western character that are closely linked
politically to these two organisations. For this chapter, developments within the Warsaw Pact are
excluded. For the purpose of the arguments pursued in this chapter, former members of the Warsaw
Pact become relevant as their armed forces participated in multinational settings after the end of the
Cold War.
200 Sharing Experiences in the 20th Century

War II.3 In 1942, British and US armed forces established a joint headquarters, the
Allied Forces Headquarters (AFHQ). One year later, the Supreme Headquarters
Allied Expeditionary Forces Europe (SHAEF) was created.4 It was the precursor
of NATO’s Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe (SHAPE), established
in 1951.
To this day, SHAPE and the NATO’s strategic and operational headquarters,
which were gradually established in the course of time following the set-up of
NATO’s military structure in the 1950s, represent the integrated NATO Command
Structure (NCS).5 At these headquarters, all of NATO’s operations are planned
and their implementation is supported. Some of the staff working at these
headquarters serve as members of their national delegations and are thus subject
to instructions from their countries’ respective capitals. This is also the case with
NATO’s Military Committee, through which the chiefs of the general staff of
the armed forces of NATO’s member states or their representatives coordinate
with one another while also representing their countries’ positions. However, the
members of the International Military Staff (IMS), as well as the staff of NATO’s
commands and the subordinate headquarters, do not act as representatives of their
respective states, but as members of NATO, even if they continue to wear their

3
During the Boxer Rebellion in China (1900–1901), the so-called Armee-Oberkommando (Army
High Command) of the German Army exercised command over its own forces and, for a short period,
also over British, French, Italian, Japanese, Russian and US troops. However, it had a national, as
opposed to an integrated multinational, staff; R. Leonhard, The China Relief Expedition: Joint
Coalition Warfare in China, Summer 1900 (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University, 2009). The so-
called Supreme War Council, which was created in 1917 to coordinate the operations of the United
Kingdom, France and Italy in World War I, was primarily a political coordinating body and not a
military headquarters; E. Greenhalgh, Victory through Coalition: Britain and France during the First
World War (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), 173; M. McCrae, Coalition Strategy and
the End of the First World War: The Supreme War Council and War Planning, 1917–1918 (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 2019). These military cooperation arrangements can be regarded as
precursors to the highly institutionalised multinational structures that came into existence after World
War II and that are a focus of this chapter.
4
F. Morgan, Overture to Overlord (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1950); SHAEF and Office of the
Chief of Military History, History of COSSAC (Chief of Staff to Supreme Allied Commander), 8-3.6
CA, (Washington D.C.: Center of Military History Manuscripts (CMH), 1944).
5
G. W. Pedlow, The Evolution of NATO’s Command Structure, 1951–2009 (Brussels: NATO, 2009),
<[Link]
<[Link]
Structure_en.pdf> (accessed on 3 May 2021). In the context of European unification, the term integration
designates the transfer of sovereign rights. However, although the NATO Command Structure is referred to
as ‘integrated’, the NATO countries have not transferred sovereign power over their armed forces to NATO.
 Multinational Force Structures in Europe 201

national uniforms.
Given that during the Cold War, attacks on NATO’s European territory
were expected to occur in any geographic region, from the North Cape to the
Mediterranean Sea, at any time, for the first four decades of its existence, NATO
adopted a comprehensive and regional structure. For that purpose, the Alliance
territory was divided into regions and a Commander-in-Chief (CINC) who
assumed command and control over land, air and naval forces in his or her area of
command via integrated headquarters was assigned to each region.6 This regional
structure shaped NATO until the end of the Cold War.
Besides the integrated NATO Command Structure, NATO was based on
military commands and formations that were provided to the Alliance by its
member states. To this day, they represent the NATO Force Structure (NFS). The
interrelations between the NATO Command Structure and the national formations
were complex and multifaceted. Air defence, for example, was hard to accomplish
at a national level due to geographic conditions and technical constraints. As a
consequence, a large amount of operational elements of the air forces of European
states were integrated into tactical NATO air fleets, which assumed command and
control over them. In the case of the German Luftwaffe, this applied to almost 100
percent of the troops.7
Major land formations, however, mostly retained their national organisation.
There were, however, some exceptions. One was the Allied Command Europe
Mobile Force (Land) (AMF(L)), a multinational brigade with battalions from
various European states that was created in 1961.8 AMF(L)’s mission was to protect
the northern and southern flank of the Alliance in particular. In addition, Germany
and Denmark established the Corps Headquarters Allied Land Forces Schleswig-

6
Pedlow, The Evolution of NATO’s Command Structure, 1951–2009 <[Link]
evolution%20of%20nato%20cmd%20structure%[Link]>, 2.
7
B. Lemke and H. v. d. Felsen, Die Luftwaffe 1950 bis 1970: Konzeption, Aufbau, Integration,
Sicherheitspolitik und Streitkräfte der Bundesrepublik Deutschland (Munich: R. Oldenbourg Verlag,
2006), 65; B. Mende, “Multinationalität - nichts Neues für die Luftstreitkräfte”, in Multinationale
Streitkräfte in der NATO: Gemeinsamkeit verbindet, ed. C. P. M. G. CPM (Sankt Augustin: CPM, 1994).
8
B. Lemke, Die Allied Mobile Force, 1961 bis 2002 (Entstehung und Probleme des Atlantischen
Bündnisses) (Berlin: De Gruyter Oldenbourg, 2015).
202 Sharing Experiences in the 20th Century

Holstein and Jutland (LANDJUT) in 1962.9 In peacetime, approximately 100

officers and noncommissioned officers from Denmark, Germany, as well as the
United Kingdom, Canada and the US served at the headquarters of the corps.
As a naval equivalent to the AMF(L), the Standing Naval Force Atlantic
(STANAVFORLANT) was established in 1967. It was a multinational naval
squadron which is now called Standing NATO Maritime Group 1 and for which
the NATO member states detach destroyers and frigates on a regular basis.10 In
1980, the NATO Airborne Early Warning & Control Force (NAEW&CF), which
many Europeans know by their distinctive aircraft with radar domes mounted on
the fuselage, was founded.11 To this day, multinational crews work together on
board these military aircrafts.
Shortly before the end of the Cold War, another land formation was created in
1989: the French–German Brigade. When it was established, however, the brigade
stood outside the military structure of NATO, which France had left in 1966.
Some other binational cooperation structures also existed during the Cold War,
for example, the joint Belgian–Dutch Navy Command, created in 1948, or the
United Kingdom/Netherlands Amphibious Force, which was formed in 1972.12
To conclude, during the Cold War, a handful of multinational military structures
had been created on the European continent. These structures were already
characterised by a certain degree of differentiation at that time: the AMF(L), for
example, was a loosely coupled land formation composed of independent national
units. The AWACS fleet, on the other hand, had multinational staff working
closely together on a day-to-day basis, and thus exhibited a comparatively high
level of multinational integration. While there have been a few attempts to
establish multinational military structures at the level of a military formation, it

9
W. Gerhard, “What about multinational corps in NATO?”, Military Review, vol. 59, no. 3 (Fort
Leavenworth: Army University Press, 1979).
10
H.-G. Fröhling, Bundeswehr und Multinationalität, manuscript of a talk held at the Mürwik Naval
Academy (Koblenz: Zentrum Innere Führung, 1998), 2; H.-P. Weyher, “Multinationalität auf See”,
in Multinationale Streitkräfte in der NATO: Gemeinsamkeit verbindet, ed. C. P. M. G. CPM (Sankt
Augustin: CPM, 1994).
11
The unit is also known as the AWACS air surveillance force. AWACS is an abbreviation of Airborne
Warning and Control System.
12
See <[Link]
netherlands-navies-under-1-command>, <[Link]
other-countries/british-dutch-cooperation-between-marine-units> (accessed on 3 May 2021).
 Multinational Force Structures in Europe 203

is mainly due to the highly integrated NATO Command Structure that NATO can
be regarded as already having been a multinational military organisation during
the Cold War.

3. Multinational Structures in Europe Since 1990

The end of the Cold War has significantly changed the picture of military
cooperation in Europe, and four intertwined developments deserve attention: first,
NATO streamlined and changed its integrated command structure while preserving
its multinational character. Second, the European Union, an international and
supranational organisation that, for decades, had focussed on economic and
political integration in Europe, also began to develop its own defence identity,
consequently establishing multinational military planning capabilities. Third,
many European states reduced their armed forces, decommissioned many of their
national major formations, and in turn, participated in multinational headquarters
and units. At the same time, the Alliance started to rely increasingly on
multinational force structures. In consequence, the NATO Force Structure became
ever more multinational over time. Fourth, in addition to the establishment of
multinational formations and units in Europe, armed forces of European states
even began to integrate some multinational features into their national structures.
In the following section, these four developments will be studied in greater detail.

3.1 The Multinational NATO Command Structure After the Cold War
After the end of the Cold War, the collapse of the Soviet Union and the
dissolution of the Warsaw Pact, NATO as a collective defence alliance not only
continued to exist, but also saw the number of its members, as well as the size of
its territory, increase through the admission of several former states of the Warsaw
Pact and of the Soviet Union.
During the Cold War, the primary task of the Alliance was to ensure the
preservation of the member states’ territorial integrity. With the imminent threat
of an attack by forces of the Warsaw Pact gone after the end of the Cold War,
the Alliance started to focus on rather diffuse risks, such as terrorism or political
instabilities, that might pose a challenge to the Alliance’s security. Subsequently,
204 Sharing Experiences in the 20th Century

international crisis management and regional cooperation augmented NATO’s

main task of territorial defence.13 As early as 1990, NATO had launched its first
out-of-area operation at the Iraqi–Turkish border (Operation Anchor Guard).14
Following the 11 September 2001 terrorist attacks in the US, the threat of
international terrorism became an even more important factor in the strategic
thinking of the Alliance.15 However, the war in Eastern Ukraine in 2014 and the
concern about a conflict with Russia eventually led to a readjustment of NATO’s
strategy and a revived focus on territorial defence.
The multinational structures of NATO reflect these strategic developments,
with a delay that organisational adaptations of a major organisation generally
require. Against the background of the elimination of the existential threat posed
by the Warsaw Pact and the troop reductions carried out in many NATO countries
for almost two decades, the NATO Command Structure has also been reduced in
several steps from 33 to 7 commands and from 22,000 to 6,800 staff members
between 1990 and 2018.16 In line with this changed strategic orientation focussing
on international crisis management, the remaining multinational headquarters
were furthermore not organised on a geographical but a functional basis, into
strategic, operational and tactical levels.
In reaction to the Ukraine conflict, however, both trends, i.e., downsizing
and functionalisation, were halted, and to some extent, even reversed. In 2018,
the NATO leaders agreed on the establishment of two new commands.17 A Joint
Support and Enabling Command (JSEC) was established in Ulm, Germany, in

13
NATO, The Alliance’s New Strategic Concept agreed by the Heads of State and Government
participating in the Meeting of the North Atlantic Council (Brussels: NATO, 1991), <[Link]
int/cps/en/natohq/official_texts_23847.htm>; The Alliance’s Strategic Concept Approved by the Heads
of State and Government participating in the meeting of the North Atlantic Council in Washington D.C.
(Brussels: NATO, 1999), <[Link]
14
See <[Link] (accessed on 30 September 2021).
15
Comprehensive Political Guidance Endorsed by NATO Heads of State and Government on 29
November 2006 (Brussels: NATO, 2006), <[Link]
htm>.
16
The NATO Command Structure (Fact Sheet) (Brussels: NATO Public Diplomacy Division (PDD) –
Press & Media Section, 2018).
17
Brussels Summit Key Decisions 11–12 July 2018 (Fact Sheet) (Brussels: NATO Public Diplomacy
Division (PDD) – Press & Media Section, 2018).
 Multinational Force Structures in Europe 205

September 2019.18 Its mission is to ensure the quick movement of troops and
military equipment across the European continent. The Joint Force Command
Norfolk (JFCNF), NATO’s Atlantic Command headquartered in Norfolk,
Virginia, USA, was established in July 201919 to protect sea lanes between Europe
and North America. Through that, the number of commands increased, as did the
number of staff. Furthermore, the Joint Force Command Norfolk is a regional
headquarters with a regional military task portfolio, thus it emphasises geography
over functionality.

3.2 Multinational Military Planning Structures of the EU

It was not only NATO, but also the European Union, that was the driving force
for military developments in Europe after the Cold War, albeit to a much lesser
extent than the Alliance. The collapse of the Soviet Union, as well as the crises in
Central and Eastern Europe in the 1990s, especially the wars in the disintegrating
state of Yugoslavia, challenged Europeans with regard to their foreign policy
response and revealed that their so far poorly developed cooperation mechanisms
in the field of foreign, security and defence policy were no longer sufficient to
meet the complex difficulties that European states encountered after the end of
the Cold War.
In consequence, the heads of state or government of EU member states
gradually extended the European Union’s competences in the field of foreign and
security policy by the establishment of a Common Foreign and Security Policy
(CFSP) in the early 1990s. In addition, starting in the late 1990s, they established
some military planning and command structures in the frame of the EU’s Common
Security and Defence Policy (CSDP).20 In 2003, the EU launched its first military

18
See <[Link]
declares-initial-operational-capability> (accessed on 3 May 2021).
19
See <[Link] <https://
[Link]/Press-Room/News-Stories/Article/2351970/natos-new-command-in-the-atlantic-
reaches-its-first-operational-milestone/> (accessed on 3 May 2021).
20
For a comprehensive insight into the development of the EU’s foreign, security and defence
policy, see W. F. v. Eekelen, Debating European security, 1948–1998 (The Hague: Sdu Publishers;
Brussels: Centre for European Policy Studies, 1998); From Words to Deeds: The Continuing Debate
on European Security (Brussels: Centre for European Policy Studies; Geneva: Geneva Centre for the
Democratic Control of Armed Forces, 2006).
206 Sharing Experiences in the 20th Century

operation in the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia.

Today, the European Union Military Committee (EUMC) is the highest
military body within the EU.21 It is composed of the Chiefs of Defence of
member states or their representatives. The EU Military Committee provides the
EU with advice on military affairs and directs the planning and conduct of EU
operations. The European Union Military Staff (EUMS) is the working muscle
of the EUMC. Its approximately 200 personnel provide military expertise in the
fields of operations and capabilities. Within the EU Military Staff, the Military
Planning and Conduct Capability (MPCC) is a 30-staff strong planning structure
at the strategic and operational level. As the name suggests, it is responsible for
the planning and conduct of EU military operations.
The EU’s military planning structures are not just a very small copy of NATO’s
Command Structure. On the contrary, unlike NATO, the EU only has limited
means to command and control its own military operations.22 Three command
options are available: first, the use of national headquarters; second, the use of the
NATO Command Structure in line with an agreement between the EU and NATO
dating back to 2003 (i.e., the Berlin Plus agreement)23; and third, the use of its
own institutional resources in the MPCC for the conduct of small missions, e.g.
military training missions.24
Ambitious plans to establish an up to 60,000-strong European response force,
as was outlined in the context of the so-called European Headline Goal in 1999,
have not been realised. Instead, the EU has been implementing the considerably
more modest concept of the EU-Battlegroups since 2004. In accordance with that
concept, two battalion-sized rapidly deployable force packages are established for
a period of six months on the basis of voluntary contributions from EU member
states. The EU-Battlegroups are supposed to be operational within 10 days to

21
See [Link]
committee/ (accessed on 25 September 2021).
22
See European External Action Service, EU Concept for Military Command and Control (Rev8)
EAS/ CSDP/PSDC 194 8798/19, EUMC 44, CSDP/PSDC 194, (Brussels: EEAS, 2019), <[Link]
[Link]/doc/document/ST-8798-2019-INIT/en/pdf>.
23
See [Link]
(accessed on 24 January 2022).
24
T. Tardy, “MPCC: towards an EU military command?”, EUISS Brief Issue, no. 17 (Paris: European
Union Institute for Security Studies (EUISS), 2017).
 Multinational Force Structures in Europe 207

conduct operations within a radius of 6,000 km around Brussels. However, until

today, the EU has never activated an EU-Battlegroup.
The EU’s planning, command and control structures are much less developed
than equivalent NATO structures mainly because of path dependencies: by the
time Europeans started to develop their Common Security and Defence Policy,
NATO’s comprehensive military structures had long been established. For EU
members, many of which are also members of NATO, the creation of equally
sophisticated EU command structures would have led to a costly and, with regard
to their commitment to NATO, politically sensitive duplication of capabilities.
Instead, the EU developed some features qualitatively distinct from NATO,
that is, a focus on the civil–military aspects of crisis management, which resonates
with the EU’s self-conception as a civilian actor in the field of security policy. The
civilian component of military missions is the EU’s signature trademark, which
is demonstrated by the fact that since 2003, the EU has conducted 11 military
operations but more than 20 civilian missions.25 An example is the European
Union Police Mission to Bosnia and Herzegovina (EUPM/BiH) that was launched
in 2003.
The future development of the EU’s multinational military planning structures
continues to depend on member states’ willingness to promote integration in the
area of security and defence. In that context, the fact that the United Kingdom,
a country that has traditionally played a blocking role with respect to the
development of a common European defence policy, has withdrawn from the EU
may accelerate the further development of the EU Common Security and Defence
Policy.26 At the same time, the United Kingdom was a cooperation partner with
considerable military assets. Its exit from the EU thus leaves a capability and
expertise gap that will require a particular effort by the EU member states to be
filled.

25
See <[Link]
missions-and-operations_en> (accessed on 8 June 2020).
26
J. Howorth, “The European Union’s Security and Defence Policy: The Quest for Coherence”, in
International Relations and the European Union, ed. C. Hill, M. Smith and S. Vanhoonacker (Oxford:
OUP, 2017), 361; Deutscher Bundestag, “Mögliche sicherheits- und verteidigungspolitische Folgen
des britischen Referendums über den Austritt des Vereinigten Königreichs aus der Europäischen
Union”, Ausarbeitung (Wissenschaftliche Dienste des Bundestages) WD 2 – 3000, no. 020/17 (2017).
208 Sharing Experiences in the 20th Century

3.3 Multinational Forces

The establishment of multinational planning and command structures in
NATO and the EU after the end of the Cold War was paralleled by the set-up
of multinational headquarters and units all over the European continent. On
their meeting in London in 1990, the NATO Heads of State and Government
declared that the Alliance “will rely increasingly on multinational corps made
up of national units”.27 Starting with the establishment of the Allied Command
Europe Rapid Reaction Corps (ARRC) in 1992, nine multinational corps have
been created in Europe to date (see figure 1).28 The corps serve NATO as Rapid
Deployable Corps. In that capacity they can be dispatched to lead NATO missions.
Furthermore, on a rotational basis they assume command of the NATO Response
Force, a multinational rotational force system where NATO members commit
military units for a period of 12 months. They may also have additional national
and multinational roles. One state or a small group of states act as the respective
corps’ framework nation(s). The costs for operating the corps are imposed on the
framework nations that also provide the majority of personnel and infrastructure.

Figure 1: The Rapid Deployable Corps

Name Founded Head quarters Participating Nations
Allied Command Europe 1992 Innsworth, Framework Nation: United Kingdom
Rapid Reaction Corps Gloucester, Participants: Albania, Canada, Croatia,
/Allied Rapid Reaction United Kingdom Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, France,
Corps (ARRC) Germany, Greece, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania,
Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal,
Romania, Spain, Turkey, USA
Eurocorps* 1993 Strasbourg, Framework Nations: Germany, France,
France Belgium, Spain, Luxembourg
Participants: Poland, Greece, Italy, Turkey,
Romania, Canada (until 2007), Finland (until
2005), Austria (until 2011)

27
NATO, “London Declaration on a Transformed North Atlantic Alliance” (London: NATO, 1990),
<[Link]
28
M. Meyers, “Grundsätze und Perspektiven der Multinationalität”, Wehrtechnischer Report,
November issue (Hamburg: Report Verlag, 1996); De Decker, European armed forces, Document
A/1468 (Paris: Assembly of the WEU, 1995); Wilkinson, Multinational European forces, Document
A/1804 (Paris: Assembly of the WEU, 2002).
 Multinational Force Structures in Europe 209

1st (German/ 1995 Münster, Framework Nations: Germany, Netherlands

Netherlands) Corps Germany Participants: Belgium, Denmark (until 2017),
(1 GNC) France, Greece, United Kingdom, Italy,
Norway, Spain, Czech Republic, Turkey, USA
Multinational Corps 1997 Szczecin, Framework Nations: Denmark, Germany,
Northeast (MNC NE) Poland Poland
Participants: Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania,
Slovakia, Czech Republic, Romania, Slovenia,
Croatia, Hungary, Sweden, United Kingdom,
France, Greece, Netherlands, Turkey, Canada,
Italy, Belgium, Finland, Norway, USA

NATO Rapid Deployable 2000 Valencia, Framework Nation: Spain

Corps - Spain Spain Participants: Czech Republic, France,
Germany, Greece, Italy, Poland, Portugal,
Romania, Turkey, United Kingdom, USA
NATO Rapid Deployable 2001 Solbiate Olona, Framework Nation: Italy
Corps - Italy Italy Participants: Albania, Bulgaria, Canada,
France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Latvia,
Lithuania, Montenegro, Netherlands, Poland,
Romania, Slovenia, Spain, Turkey, United
Kingdom, USA

NATO Rapid Deployable 2001 Istanbul, Framework Nation: Turkey

Corps - Turkey ** Turkey Participants: Albania, Bulgaria, Germany,
Greece, Italy, Netherlands, Poland, Romania,
Spain, United Kingdom, USA
NATO Rapid Deployable 2003 Thessaloniki, Framework Nation: Greece
Corps - Greece Greece Participants: Albania, Bulgaria, France, Italy,
Poland, Romania, Spain, Turkey, United
Kingdom, USA
NATO Rapid Deployable 2005 Lille, Framework Nation: France
Corps - France France Participants: Germany, Belgium, Canada,
Spain, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Netherlands,
Romania, United Kingdom, Albania, USA,
Turkey

Source: Compiled by the author on the basis of the following links: [Link]
htm, [Link] [Link] [Link]
about-us/organisation/organisational-structure, [Link] [Link]
[Link]/[Link] (accessed on 03 May 2021).
*Under an agreement made in 1993, the Eurocorps can be placed under NATO command. In 2002, the Eurocorps was
certified as a High Readiness Force (Rapid Reaction Corps). See <[Link]
**As of 2014.

Multinational structures in Europe are neither limited to the western part of

Europe, as the location of many of the NATO’s Rapid Deployable Corps might
suggest, nor are they confined to corps headquarters. Starting with the creation
210 Sharing Experiences in the 20th Century

of the Baltic Battalion (BALTBAT) by Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia in 1994,

a variety of units below the corps level were established, in which Eastern
European states participated at the forefront. Today, more than 40 multinational
force structures exist in Europe. Apart from NATO’s Rapid Deployable Corps,
the list of multinational formations comprise, for example, four Multinational
Division Headquarters (Multinational Division Southeast, North East, North and
Center); a number of brigade-sized formations such as the NATO Airborne Early
Warning & Control Force, the French–German Brigade, the South-Eastern Europe
Brigade, the European Gendarmerie Force, the Command Support Brigade of
the Multinational Corps Northeast, the Multinational Brigade Southeast and
the NATO Alliance Ground Surveillance Force, and battalion-sized military
structures such as the TISA Multinational Engineering Battalion, the NATO Force
Integration Units (NFIUs) and the Multinational Multirole Tanker Transport Unit.
In addition to these standing multinational structures, several other multinational
arrangements exist in Europe today which are either only active for a limited
period of time or for which the European states only detach units on a temporary
basis. Examples include the European Maritime Force (EUROMARFOR), the
NATO Response Force and the EU-Battlegroups.

3.4 National Formats with a Multinational Character

Although it might seem counterintuitive, multinational structures can
ultimately also develop in a national context. That happens, for example, in
cases where military units from one country are integrated into the national force
structure of another country by means of military cross-attachments.
One example of the cross-attachment of units and personnel is the close
cooperation between the German and Dutch armies. In 2004, the Dutch
11 Airmobile Brigade was integrated into the German Special Operations Division
(since 2014: Rapid Response Forces Division). In 2016, the 3,000-strong Dutch
43rd Mechanised Brigade was integrated into the German 1 Armoured Division.
At the same time, the German Tank Battalion 141, in which Dutch soldiers serve
as well, was placed under the command of the Dutch brigade (see figure 2).29

29
See <[Link]
niederlande> (accessed on 3 May 2021).
 Figure 2: Organisational Structure of the German 1 Armoured Division (2021)

Division

1 Armoured Division
Germany Brigade Brigade Brigade Brigade
Company Company Company Company
Germany Germany Germany Netherlands
Germany Germany Germany Netherlands

Battalion Battalion Battalion Battalion Battalion

Germany Germany Germany Germany Netherlands

Battalion Battalion Battalion Battalion Battalion

Germany Germany Germany Germany Netherlands

Battalion Battalion Battalion Battalion

Germany Germany Germany Netherlands

Battalion Battalion Battalion Battalion

Germany Germany Germany Germany

Company Battalion Battalion Battalion Company

Germany Germany Germany Germany Netherlands

Battalion Battalion Battalion Battalion

Germany Germany Germany Netherlands

Battalion Battalion Battalion Battalion

Germany Germany Germany Netherlands

Battalion Battalion Company

Germany Germany Netherlands
Multinational Force Structures in Europe 211

Source: Compiled by Catharina Gottschalk and the author based on a chart provided by the German 1 Armoured Division on 27 July 2021.
212 Sharing Experiences in the 20th Century

Other cases of national structures with multinational features are those national
headquarters at which a larger number of foreign soldiers work on a permanent
basis as foreign officers (as opposed to liaison officers who represent their sending
nations). One example of this is the Multinational Joint Headquarters, established
in Ulm, Germany in 2013, which is tasked with the planning and conduct of
military operations for both the EU and NATO. Legally, the Multinational Joint
Headquarters is a German national military headquarters.30 Yet, it employs soldiers
not only from Germany, but also from Bulgaria, Italy, Croatia, Luxemburg,
Austria, Poland, Romania, Slovenia, the Czech Republic, Hungary and the US.31

4. Motives for Establishing Multinational Structures

Why do European states pool and integrate military planning, command and
control capabilities? Why do they establish multinational force structures? For
what purpose do they open their national commands to foreign military personnel?
These questions will be discussed briefly in the remaining part of this paper.
One motive for creating multinational command structures in the early stages
of the Cold War was the expected increase in the defence capability of armed
forces in Europe. The presence of NATO forces on the European continent during
the Cold War in the face of the threat posed by the Warsaw Pact made it seem
necessary to place them under a unified command.32 By that, defence plans,
the determination of the required force strength, as well as necessary training
standards, were to be regulated centrally, and thus more effectively, for all NATO
members.33 The principle of an effective organisation of military force remained
one of the main motives for multinational cooperation in Europe even after the
end of the Cold War. In 2006, to give an example, NATO referred to its own
role in European defence as “a catalyst for generating the forces needed to meet

30
M. Sadlowski, Handbuch der Bundeswehr und der Verteidigungsindustrie (Bad Neuenahr-Ahrweiler:
Bernard & Graefe in der Mönch Verlagsgesellschaft mbH, 2020), 412–13.
31
See <[Link]
kommando-operative-fuehrung> (accessed on 5 May 2021).
32
BMVg, Weißbuch 1983. Zur Sicherheit der Bundesrepublik Deutschland (Bonn: Bundesministerium
der Verteidigung, 1983), 146.
33
Deutsche Bundesregierung, Die Organisation des Nordatlantikvertrages NATO (Bonn: Presse- und
Informationsamt der Bundesregierung, 1956), 57.
 Multinational Force Structures in Europe 213

requirements and enabling member countries to participate in crisis management

operations which they could not otherwise undertake on their own”.34
In addition to the operational advantage of pooling military resources in
common structures is the strategic advantage of the deterrence effect. The
aggregation of military capabilities may increase the deterrence potential of the
countries involved. Common doctrines, command and control structures and
a joint military structure might have a greater potential for action than single
contributions made by respective individual armed forces. What is more,
multinational structures concentrate military personnel locally in one place.
Allied forces stationed in West Germany during the Cold War would have not
only made an operational contribution to defence in the event of an attack—their
mere presence on the border of the Warsaw Pact also had a strategic deterrence
effect, given that an attack on West Germany would have not only meant an
attack on abstract Alliance territory, but also an attack on Danish, Dutch, Belgian,
British and American soldiers present in that area. The consequence would have
been that these countries at the very least would potentially have participated in
a counterstrike.
This ‘trip wire’-logic of deterrence is once again being applied today, as the
presence of a larger number of multinational headquarters and foreign armed
forces in the Eastern Alliance territory illustrates. Common structures thus increase
the deterrence potential of an alliance. Also, in respect to multinational forces in
Europe, it can be argued that deterrence is not only based on a contractual defence
commitment in an alliance framework, but also on the physical collocation and
regional presence of allied armed forces.
Another operational motive for increased multinational cooperation in Europe
is that multinational structures might make it easier for NATO to master the
challenge of generating forces for operations.35
However, the multitude of multinational force structures in Europe is not only
a result of strategic or operational considerations. It also has a political rationale.

34
NATO, NATO Handbook (Brussels: NATO Office of Information and Press, 2006), <[Link].
int>, 16.
35
J. R. Deni, Alliance Management and Maintenance: Restructuring NATO for the 21st Century
(Aldershot, Hampshire, England; Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2007), 6–7.
214 Sharing Experiences in the 20th Century

To start with, multinational structures are visible symbols of political cohesion

between contributing nations. This motive becomes particularly visible with the
French–German Brigade, which was referred to as “a signal and role model for
European Armed Forces”.36 Consequently, the main rationale for its establishment
had not been a military one but a “successful French–German integration”.37
From the 1990s onwards, the motive of political integration through military
cooperation can also be found in other instances of multinational force structures,
albeit in a modified form, when the integration of the armed forces of Eastern
European states into NATO is concerned. The Multinational Corps Northeast in
Szczecin, Poland can serve as an example. During the 2000s it was referred to
as the “integration corps”.38 It mainly served the purpose of improving Poland’s
integration into NATO. Only later did the corps assume an operational role in
crisis management and, following the Ukraine crisis, the defence of Allied
territory. Multinational military structures thus may also serve the objective of
politically binding together their participating countries.
Multinational structures are furthermore an expression of the Alliance’s
solidarity with its member states and burden sharing. Following a deterrence logic,
they may represent an external strategic communication to military adversaries;
however, multinational force structures also represent an internal political
communication addressed to their allies: with their commitment to multinational
structures, powerful states express that they are willing to assist in crises faced by
partner states that have less military power; smaller partners, on the other hand,
signal their willingness to participate in efforts towards a successful common
defence.
Being part of multinational structures might also promise international
prestige. In his case study on the establishment of the Rapid Deployable Corps,
John Deni explains that the formation of such a corps on one’s own national

36
P. Klein and E. Lippert, Die Deutsch-Französische Brigade als Beispiel für die militärische Integration
Europas, ed. S. I. d. Bundeswehr, SOWI-Arbeitspapiere, no. 53 (Strausberg: Sozialwissenschaftliches
Institut der Bundeswehr, 1991), 2.
37
Alain Carton quoted in ibid., 3.
38
M. Wróbel, “Das Integrationskorps”, Österreichische Militärische Zeitschrift, vol. 39, no.1 (Vienna:
Bundesministerium für Landesverteidigung, 2001).
 Multinational Force Structures in Europe 215

territory augments international perceptions of credibility.39

Not only strategic, operational and political motives are at play when the
establishment and continuance of multinational formations and command
structures are concerned. A third cluster of motives can be found at the
organisational level of the armed forces. Membership of major multinational
formations and higher command structures provides smaller countries with the
opportunity to assign their military personnel to posts that do not exist at the
national level due to the small size of their armed forces. This applies to the
level, as well as the diversity, of assignments, with military advancement being
the focus of the assignment level and the transfer of knowledge being the main
purpose with regard to the diversity of assignments. Furthermore, participation
in multinational headquarters in some cases ensures access to joint sources of
funding and training capacities.40
The establishment of multinational structures is often also a way for European
armed forces to preserve some of their size and capabilities in times of force
cuts. Many of the current multinational forces emerged from military structures
that had initially lost their original purpose: the British I Corps of the British
Army of the Rhine stationed in Germany was the nucleus of the Allied Command
Europe Rapid Reaction Corps, the Headquarters Allied Land Forces Schleswig-
Holstein and Jutland was the core of the Multinational Corps Northeast and the
Multinational Division North, established in 2019, emerged from the Danish
Division based in Haderslev, Denmark. Multinational cooperation may therefore
contribute to the survival of military structures. Despite their strategic rationales
and political impetus, multinational cooperation might also have a self-referential
motivation based on an organisational interest in the survival of national military
structures.

5. Conclusion
The institutionalisation of military cooperation in Europe originated in
US–British cooperation during World War II. During the Cold War, NATO

39
J. R. Deni, Alliance Management and Maintenance: Restructuring NATO for the 21st Century, 50, 70.
40
Ibid., 50, 75.
216 Sharing Experiences in the 20th Century

member states engaged in the establishment of a highly integrated multinational

NATO Command Structure. Since 1990, there has been a sharp rise in the number
of military cooperation structures in Europe. Furthermore, representations of
military cooperation have become more diverse. Today, the NATO Command
Structure is just one type of multinational military structure in Europe amongst
many others. The EU has seen the creation of some of its own multinational
military planning structures, and its EU-Battlegroups could be regarded as a form
of multinational force structure. In addition, European states are engaged in the
set-up of numerous and diverse multinational headquarters and units. Additionally,
they have also established sophisticated cross-attachments and multinational staff
integration with respect to national commands.
The rationale for committing to multinational cooperation in Europe is not
always necessarily a strategic or operational one. As this paper has demonstrated,
the pooling and integration of national military capabilities has also sometimes
followed a political logic. Even the organisational interests of the armed forces
might have contributed to the close-knit web of multinational force structures
present in Europe today.