Nato command to coordinate Ukraine aid is up and running in Germany, says Rutte

BRUSSELS – A new Nato command in the German city of Wiesbaden has taken up its work to coordinate Western military aid for Ukraine, the alliance’s secretary-general Mark Rutte said on Dec 18.

The command takes over coordination of the aid from the United States, in a move widely seen as aiming to safeguard the support mechanism against Nato sceptic US President-elect Donald Trump.

“The Nato command in Wiesbaden for security assistance and training for Ukraine is now up and running,” Mr Rutte told reporters at Nato’s headquarters in Brussels.

Trump, who will take office in January, has said he wants to end the war in Ukraine swiftly without elaborating how he aims to do so. He has long criticised the scale of US financial and military aid to Ukraine.

The headquarters of Nato’s new Ukraine mission, dubbed Nato Security Assistance and Training for Ukraine (NSATU), is located at Clay Barracks, a US base in the German town of Wiesbaden.

The US-led Ramstein group of around 50 nations, an ad hoc coalition named after a US airbase in Germany where it first met, has coordinated Western military supplies to Kyiv since 2022.

It will continue to exist as a political forum as NSATU assumes the military implementation of decisions taken there.

Diplomats, however, acknowledge that the handover to Nato may have a limited effect given that the US under Trump could still deal a major setback to Ukraine by slashing its support, as it is the alliance’s dominant power and provides the majority of arms to Kyiv.

NSATU is set to have around 700 personnel, including troops stationed at Nato’s military headquarters Shape in Belgium and at logistics hubs in Poland and Romania.

Russia has condemned increases in Western military aid to Ukraine as risking a wider war. REUTERS