NATO alliance members still do not have enough guided bombs and missiles to conduct a long-lasting battle, the alliance’s top general said Monday.
“We do not have enough precision-strike munitions to carry on a concentrated campaign, at length, helping all of our allies to be there with us,” Gen. Philip Breedlove, NATO supreme allied commander Europe and head of US European Command told an audience at an Air Force Association-sponsored conference just outside the US capital.
“We need to think through where we are on precision munitions,” he said.
Less than a month into the 2011 Libya campaign, NATO came close to running out of PGMs, which are both advanced and expensive bombs. The situation became sufficiently dire that the U.S. rushed munitions to allies to help feed the campaign, and even kept aircraft on call in case NATO allies needed assistance after the U.S. had ceded major operational control.
Image: SACEUR Gen. Philip Breedlove, July 1, 2014 (photo: Glenn Fawcett/Department of Defense)