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not only upon the totality of our contribution but also upon its oomposition in detail and upon how we consult our allies and present our proposals. Among the points to which they will attach the most importance are the maintenance of our undertaking to make no reduction in the Central Region except as a result of BFR negotiations, and our readiness to make our contribution in terms of balanced allied forces, which they would regard as far more important than a contribution based upon a balance within the British forces, They will be particularly concerned with what happens. to our teeth units, especially those forward based on Continental Europe. If we are to meet their concern in these matters our consultation must be gonuine and responsive, and not merely formal. We must take their reaction into account and be prepared to modify our programme in the light of their views, so far as it is possible for us to do so, This would not necessarily mean that we would need to increase the total level of expenditure, but we might need to change the pattern of expenditure and to adjust the timing of some of the changes we intended to make.
55.
It is our judgement that if we approach consultations inthis way we would have a reasonable chance of persuading our allies that reductions corresponding to our military Critical Level would not destroy the credibility of NATO strategy, ie the critical level in political terms and the critical level in military terms oould be brought olose together.
56. Our allies and the major NITO Commanders would be likely to take the view that reductions we envisage as necessary to meet the First Level would invalidate MATO strategy. The proble of maintaining our force levels in the Central Region, with the necessary back-up in the United Kingdom, could become particularly acute and it is unlikely that they would be sufficiently eased by any agreements under MBFR. In view of the importance attached to avoiding reductions in force levels in Europe except in the context of MBTR agreements, we would need to consider disproportionate reductions in our other contributions to NATO and to take an exceptionally stringent view of our commitments outside NATO. Until we have had consultations in NATO we cannot tell whether any reshaping of the pattern of our contribution to achieve the savings required by the First Level would There would be a be consistent with the politically critical level.
serious danger of beginning the process of unravelling the Alliance
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