TNAG-0537-FCO40-632-Strength-of-garrison-in-Hong-Kong-1975 — Page 41

CONFIDENT I AL

2ND DRAFT

The Defence Planning Committee

12.

Meetings of the NATO Defence Planning Committee in Ministerial

Session were held in June and December, 1974. Substantial progress

was made during the year in improving NATO's conventional forces

in accordance with agreed priorities, including the important fields

of anti-armour and low-level air defence. In December, Ministers

agreed that the guidance for NATO defence planning, which they are

due to issue at their next meeting, should include a long-range

defence concept, setting objectives for co-operative efforts within

the framework of existing NATO strategy, in order to obtain maximum

efficiency from the force levels and resources which the Alliance

can reasonably expect to have at its disposal. These co-operative

efforts include studies designed to achieve increased collaboration

and standardisation in the field of defence equipment, on which

progress has already been made with regard, for example, to the

future family of portable infantry weapons; greater rationalisation

of defence tasks, through new co-operative arrangements particularly

in the training and support areas; and improved flexibility in the

use of NATO's forces.

The Nuclear Planning Group

13. As a permanent member of the Nuclear Planning Group ("PG) of

NATO, the United Kingdom has continued to play a leading part in

its work. At their regular half-yearly meetings, NATO Ministers of

Defence have kept under review the balance of strategic nuclear forces

between the Soviet Union and the United States.

Studies are continu-

of possible defensive

ing on the political and military implications

use of nuclear weapons by NATO. The NPG is the forum in which the

discussion of the role of nuclear weapons in NATO's defence is being

actively pursued, and the practical consequences worked out.

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CONFIDENTIAL