SCENESETTER FOR THE COMMANDER, U.S. JOINT FORCES

C O N F I D E N T I A L ZAGREB 000721

SIPDIS

CDR USJFCOM NORFOLK VA, EUCOM PLANS AND ANALYSES STUTTGART
GE

E.O. 12958: DECL: 10/16/2018
TAGS: HR KPAO MARR MOPS NATO PGOV PREL DEFENSEREFORM
SUBJECT: SCENESETTER FOR THE COMMANDER, U.S. JOINT FORCES
COMMAND MEETING WITH CROATIAN CHOD AND VISIT TO CROATIA

Classified By: COL Brendan McAloon, DATT, for reasons 1.4 (b) & (d).


1. (C) Sir, you will meet General Lucic (LOOT-Zitch) at your
headquarters the week prior to your visit to Croatia. As of
this writing, the itinerary for your time in Croatia has not
been finalized. I expect, however, that your meetings in
Zagreb will mirror the meetings SACEUR had while he was here
this week depending on the availability of the Croatian
hosts.


2. (C) In addition to the aforementioned visit of SACEUR,
DEPSECDEF, COMNAVEUR, and DCOM, USEUCOM have all visited
Croatia recently. These visits so close to the time when the
Senate ratified the amendments to the North Atlantic Treaty
to allow Croatia,s accession, along with the visit of
President Bush in April, serve as a good reminder that the
U.S. is indeed Croatia,s Strategic Partner. For its part,
Croatia has continued its MAP process with an eye to full
membership soon and increased its ISAF contribution from 200
to a maximum of 300 soldiers on the ground. There are 277
Croatian soldiers in Afghanistan now.


3. (C) Atmospherics. The NATO invitation completed the
first part of Croatia,s goal to be accepted as an advanced
European state. The second more distant step is an
invitation to join the European Union. The Prime Minister
has been a reliable supporter of U.S. positions, for example
in the UNSC, while a sense of nostalgia for the good ol,
non-aligned state days sometimes leads President Mesic to
take what he sees as a more nuanced view of issues and seek
dialogue with states like Russia and Iran. Prime Minister
Sanader is a skillful politician who likes to keep his own
counsel and thus rarely appoints strong ministers, and
Defense Minister Vukelic is no exception to that rule. Of
late, the situation in Bosnia has been the key topic both the
PM and President discussed with senior U.S. visitors. Your
host, General Lucic was unexpectedly reappointed for an
unprecedented second five-year term as CHOD in January of
this year. Lucic is President Mesic,s most trusted military
advisor. Although he participated in three months of
language training in the United States, his ability to speak
English remains rudimentary.


4. (SBU) Defense Reform: Since 2001 Croatia has undertaken
an intensive program of defense reform that continues until
today. At that time Croatia had a conscription system that
produced 47,500 service-members on active duty and 183,000
mandatory reserves and a force structure that included 6
corps, 63 brigades, a fleet of ships and four airbases.
Today the volunteer system produces 20,500 service-members
and 6000 contract reserves that support a force structure of
no corps headquarters, 2 brigades, a naval flotilla that
includes Coast Guard vessels, and two airbases. The
Croatians know that there is still work to do, but they are
justifiably proud of their accomplishments so far.


5. (SBU) OMLTs: Croatia has the only non-NATO Operational
Mentoring and Liaison Team (OMLT) in ISAF, for which it bears
all the costs except the U.S.-provided stratlift. A team from
the Minnesota National Guard was here recently to plan the
deployment of a combined combat-support OMLT next year.
Croatia is working up the Request for Forces through SHAPE to
begin the process of mobilizing the Minnesota National Guard
troops for deployment. There are plans for a third,
garrison-level OMLT to deploy to Afghanistan in 2009.
Croatia continues to express a desire to deploy a PRT in the
future, but we assess that the current focus on OMLTs is the
best use of its capabilities in the near to mid term.


6. (C) KFOR: The Croatian Parliament has authorized the
deployment of two helicopters to Kosovo in 2009. This will
be the first deployment outside of Croatia for the Air Force.
We expect that there will be a need to upgrade the new
helicopters to NATO standards prior to deployment and that
Croatia will ask us for that assistance.


7. (C) Peacekeeping: Croatia prides itself on its transition
from a security consumer with UN Peacekeepers on its
territory to a security provider. With the addition of the
KFOR mission, Croatian Armed Forces (CAF) elements will be
involved in 15 Coalition, UN, and EU peacekeeping operations
around the globe, to include the 3 Croatian participants in
the UN Mission to Georgia. Croatia deployed 15 soldiers to
the EU-led mission in Chad this month. With these
deployments Croatia is in the process of implementing its
plans to increase and sustain its PKO contributions from

around 250 soldiers in 2007 to 600 soldiers by 2010.


8. (C) ASPA: The U.S. FMF and IMET programs were suspended in
July 2003 due to American Serviceman Protection Act (ASPA)
sanctions. As a result, in the past few years the CAF
depended entirely upon national resources to accomplish its
NATO partnership goals and to equip its forces for ISAF.
Croatia is the only ISAF partner and new NATO invitee that
accomplished its transformation and financed its ISAF
commitments without FMF or Coalition Support Funding. The
suspension of IMET during this time has had a telling impact
throughout the CAF. Most notable is the lack of
U.S.-educated staff officers at the senior and mid-grade
officer level to fill critical billets on the MOD, CAF, and
NATO Staffs. Croatia has been identified to receive one
million dollars of Global Peace Operations Initiative funds,
the bulk of which will be dedicated to improve the English
language capability of the CAF.


9. (SBU) FMF/IMET levels. Croatia did not receive any FMF
in FY08, and is projected to receive only 1.8 million dollars
in FMF in 2009. IMET is similarly under-funded for a NATO
invitee with only 309K in FY08 (including the 9K in
end-of-year fallout) and is projected to receive 500K in
FY09. The proposed budget numbers trend better in FY10.


10. (C) Procurement Priorities. U.S. FMF funding will be
directed at obtaining the necessary NATO-compatible radio
equipment, night vision equipment, weapon sights, combat
medical equipment, and GPS required to sustain Croatia,s
forces in ISAF. Croatia currently has no Type 1 radios or
Selective Availability Anti-Spoof Module (SAASM) global
positioning systems in its inventory. We may also need to
direct FMF funds to the upgrades needed to deploy Croatian
helicopters to KFOR.


11. (C) F-16s. The MoD,s Long Term Development Plan calls
for Croatia to replace its 12 soon-to-be post-lifecycle
MiG-21 aircraft with a similar number of advanced fighters
for domestic air policing. Croatia sent requests for
information for Mirage, MiG-29, Eurofighter, Gripen, and F-16
(Block 15 used, Block 15 mid-life upgrade, and Block 50/52
new). Croatia now has all the answers it requested and is
conducting further internal studies. Sticker shock and an
inefficient procurement process means that we may not see a
decision until next year or later.


12. (C) Coastal Radars. The Croatian Navy has had ongoing
problems with its Enhanced Peregrine coastal surveillance
radar system. The Peregrine radar system purchase, from a
private American manufacturer without US government
involvement, began in 1999. To date the Peregrine radar
system has not achieved full operational capability. The
Croatian government and military have invested approximately
80 million US dollars and huge political capital trying to
make the system work. In June 2008, on order of COMNAVEUR, a
team of US Navy radar experts visited Croatia to inspect the
system and offer advice, but not to perform hands on
maintenance. This subject was covered in depth during
DEPSECDEF,s visit and he promised to look into the matter,
thus I don,t expect it to be raised during your visit.
Bradtke