Seminar on Military Doctrine promotes transparency, openness

VIENNA, 14 February 2006 - Security challenges to the OSCE region in the 21st century, including international terrorism, and the role of the modern military are being tackled by participants in a seminar that opened today in Vienna.

The two-day event, the fifth of its type, aims to promote transparency and openness among the 55 OSCE participating States and its 11 Partners for Co-operation.

OSCE Secretary General Marc Perrin de Brichambaut said the seminar was an "interactive exercise" involving defence officials, academics and experts.

"We are trying not to have a sequence of national presentations but rather a focused discussion on the basis of stimulating introductions that represent thinking that goes a little bit outside the box," he said during a press conference.

The seminar's chairman, Ambassador Pierre Champenois of Belgium, told journalists, "the main purpose of this seminar is to get a dialogue on military issues started again in this Organization."

Earlier, he told conference participants that the seminar aimed to identify "parameters whose adoption for planning purposes would facilitate the launching of co-operative and timely responses when and where necessary.

"By such parameters, I mean the need for intelligence sharing, for multiple and multidisciplinary response, for interoperability and transparency, for police as well as judicial co-operation, for combining civilian and military instruments."

Austrian Chief of Defence Staff General Roland Ertl said national solutions did not suffice in an increasingly complex and interdependent world.

"Sharing of information about our national doctrines is a prerequisite and an important baseline for multinational co-operation under the umbrella of an international security framework," he said. "In any given multinational operation, doctrinal awareness is essential for the integration of the various participants and the interoperability among national military forces."

More than 300 high-level officials, including chiefs-of-defence staff, senior military personnel, defence diplomats, academics and industry experts are participating in the seminar. Previous OSCE Military Doctrine Seminars were held in 1990, 1991, 1998 and 2001.