Poland plans defense shift to east

As reported in 'The Japan News' : The Associated Press, WARSAW (AP) — Poland is planning a major realignment of its military structure because of the conflict in neighboring Ukraine, the country’s defense minister said Monday, a move that could shift thousands of troops to its eastern border. “The geopolitical situation has changed. We have the biggest crisis of security since the Cold War and we must draw conclusions from that,” Polish Defense Minister Tomasz Siemoniak told The Associated Press. Although Poland joined NATO in 1999, most of its 120,000-member army is based along the country’s western border, as a relic of its former status as a Soviet bloc member. That is going to change, Siemoniak said, adding that at least three military bases in the east will increase from the current 30 percent of capacity to almost 90 percent by the end of 2017. That’s a potential increase of thousands of troops, although Siemoniak wouldn’t specify a precise overall figure. Up to 400 jobs would be filled in the air defense unit in Siedlce alone by 2017, he said. “I believe that what happened to the east of Poland does not represent a threat to us for the next months, or two or three or five years. It is a need to draw conclusions for the decades to come,” he added. The announcement follows a visit by U.S. President Barack Obama to Estonia last month in which he urged NATO members to do more to assist Ukraine. There was no immediate reaction in Moscow to the planned Polish military moves. The Russian government may be reluctant to criticize Poland since Russia had insisted on the right to position its forces as it wishes within its own country when confronted by the West over the deployment of Russian troops along the Ukrainian border.Speech