At a press conference held shortly before the Nato summit in Madrid, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg announced that NATO would increase its Response Force from 40 thousand to more than 300 thousand in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the threat it poses for other countries.

His speech began as follows.

Our NATO Summit in Madrid this week will be transformative, with many important decisions including on:

• A new Strategic Concept for a new security reality,
• A fundamental shift in NATO’s deterrence and defence,
• And support to Ukraine now, and for the future.

Our new Concept will guide us in an era of strategic competition.

I expect it will make clear that Allies consider Russia as the most significant and direct threat to our security. It will address China for the first time and the challenges that Beijing poses to our security, interests, and values. It will also cover our evolving approach to a number of other threats and challenges, including terrorism, cyber, and hybrid.

At the Summit, we will strengthen our forward defences. We will enhance our battlegroups in the eastern part of the Alliance up to brigade-levels. We will transform the NATO Response Force and increase the number of our high readiness forces to well over 300,000.

We will also boost our ability to reinforce in crisis and conflict.

Read the whole speech plus his responses to journalists questions at https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/opinions_197080.htm

Read about NATO Response Force at https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natolive/topics_49755.htm