Franco-British cell to plan air defences

John Major and President Jacques Chirac of France will this morning inaugurate the new Franco-British Euro Air Group - a planning cell to co-ordinate French and British air forces in operations such as humanitarian aid, peace-keeping and crisis management.

The small but important Group is not concerned with defending Nato territory against direct attack. At the moment it is a bilateral agreement between the two countries but may be open to other Western European Union partners later.

The two leaders will meet at RAF High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire, the headquarters of RAF Strike Command, where they will also present decorations to General Sir Michael Rose, the former commander of UN forces in Bosnia, and General Bertrand de Lapresle, who commanded UN forces in former Yugoslavia. General Rose becomes a Commander of the Legion d'Honneur and Gen de Lapresle gets an honorary KCBE.

The presence of the French head of state and the British Prime Minister at the opening underlines the high political importance currently accorded to bilateral military co-operation between the two medium powers. They spend almost exactly the same as each other on defence, their armed forces mirror each other, and they have worked particularly closely in the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda. The British and French navies also co-operate in the nuclear field, but the agreement on the Euro Air Group excludes nuclear matters.

The group will co-ordinate the use of French and British aircraft so as to avoid duplication. The main areas are combat air patrols over areas where peace-keeping and other operationsare in progress, air strikes, search and rescue, reconnaissance, airborne command posts, electronic warfare and setting up and defending forward air bases. The group will also draw up common operating procedures, co-ordinate contingency planning and take in the planning and conduct of exercises and operations.

The Air Group is not an aerial "Eurocorps" and has no standing forces of its own. The idea is to increase efficiency, enabling one nation to provide forces of a particular type if the other does not have them spare. The British might send soldiers to secure an airfield, for example, before French planes arrived to start flying offensive or defensive missions.

The group, known as FBEAG, has a full-time staff of eleven at High Wycombe but the director and his deputy are non-resident. Its first commander will be French Major-General Andre Nicolau, who is Vice-Chief of Air Defence and Air Operations, with his headquarters at Taverny, near Paris. His deputy is Air Commodore Rob Wright, the Air Commodore Operations at High Wycombe. After two years, the posts will be rotated.

The group was announced at the Chartres summit last November. The former Defence Secretary Malcolm Rifkind and French defence minister Charles Millon signed the formal agreement on 27 June.