Chairman WARNER. The problem with that is that this is being transcribed for use by many others.

General RALSTON. Let me talk to colors. The country in orange is Macedonia, that is what we are talking about.

Now, if you would come down to the southeast there, in Greece, at the top of that border, you will see Thessaloniki. Point out Thessaloniki, right there. That is where all of our supplies going into Kosovo come into that port. They then go overland, up through the orange country of Macedonia, into Kosovo, which is right at that point, right there.

Now, as I said before, we have about 5,000 of the KFOR forces, mostly supply troops, mostly logistics troops that are in Macedonia.

One of the things that is of concern when we have the instability there is our supply route, so I have recommended to NATO, and NATO is looking at alternate ways of making sure that we can supply our forces that are in Kosovo.

One way to do that is through Albania. Another way is through Montenegro. Another way is through southern Serbia, as our relationships with Belgrade have improved, and we are doing the prudent planning now that would allow us to have alternative supply routes.

The problem in Macedonia itself-let me go to the next chart. On this same map, you see where Kosovo is there, and notice the area in blue that goes into southern Serbia and down into Macedonia. Those areas in blue are those areas in Serbia and in Macedonia where there is a majority Albanian population. Even in Serbia, that area in blue, they have greater than 50 percent Albanian population there. In Macedonia itself you have about a 65–35 split. About 65 percent of the population is Slavik, about 35 percent is Albanian.

The Government of Macedonia is a democratically elected Government, and it is a coalition Government, including members of the Albanian population. We have encouraged the Macedonian Government to give political access and economic opportunity to the minority Albanian citizens that are there.

The extremists that you hear about in the paper, right now I believe this is not something to be alarmed about. It is something always of concern when you have potential violence, but we believe that there are approximately 100 extremist Albanians that are involved in the hostilities.

My advice to NATO has been that we need to condemn extremism wherever it comes from, and in this particular case from the

Albanian extremists. We need to encourage the Macedonian Government to give political access to all their citizens, and I do believe that we can bilaterally, the nations can help the Government of Macedonia. They can help them diplomatically, politically, economically, and we in NATO and in the Kosovo force need to do our part inside Kosovo to make sure that there are not armed extremists coming from Kosovo into Macedonia. We can talk more about that in detail in the closed session.

Chairman WARNER. The Secretary-General said he needed 1,400 additional troops. Now, could you speak to your military judgment as to that request, and most specifically, how it would affect the U.S. and our U.S. response? As a participant we wish to bear our share of the burdens and the risks in this operation.

General RALSTON. Yes, sir. Unfortunately, if I could say this, when the Secretary-General made his comments it was in a news conference that was associated with Macedonia. In fact, the two battalions that we asked for several weeks ago are to replace some Portuguese troops that are leaving. They have not left yet, but two companies to do that, and for some of the activities there.

Now, some of the nations have come forward and said that they will provide additional troops to back-fill. My judgment right now is, we do not need additional American forces. I think we are carrying our proper share of that at this time, and I think we are going to be OK.

Now, what we have done, we have taken forces out of that 37,000 that are in Kosovo, and we have moved more forces down to the border to do a more effective job of patrolling the border.

Mr. Chairman, I would also like to point out that this is an enormously difficult border to police. It is very mountainous terrain. It is wooded. There are trails that have gone back and forth across for centuries. The people there do not know there is a border there. I mean, they have brothers and sisters and uncles and aunts that live on either side of that. They have traded back and forth for centuries, and so it is enormously difficult to seal that border. I think that would be a mistake for us to set that as the goal, or the mission.

Now, we can do, I think, a good job of making sure that there are not armed extremists that are going back and forth, and that is what we should be concentrating on from a NATO perspective on our side of the border.

Mr. Chairman, I would like to spend a moment talking about Africa. We have significant problems in Africa in terms of economic, political, humanitarian issues. We are working with many of the countries in Africa to address this. We have just recently trained two battalions of the Nigerian Army for their further employment in Sierra Leone. We are about to undertake training a Ghana battalion in Ghana, and a Senegalese battalion in Senegal, and then the plan is to go back and train some additional Nigerian battalions.

This is, I think, a proper role for us to try to help the African nations deal with the problems that they have there. I do not want anyone on the committee to be surprised if you hear that we have American soldiers in Ghana, or Senegal, or Nigeria. What they are

there doing are training the local battalions for their employment in support of the United Nations in Sierra Leone.

Mr. Chairman, in conclusion, there are two issues that I have worked hard with the Pentagon in terms of resources for the EUCOM area, and only two issues. I had two major budget issues that I worked with them, and that was for real property maintenance and for military construction in the European theater.

Mr. Chairman, I know you know this, but 10 years ago we had about 360,000 troops in Europe, and we drew them down to just a little over 100,000. Now, it was a proper decision back in 1991 to not spend money on military construction and real property maintenance until we knew what we were going to keep in Europe. Mr. Chairman, unfortunately, we went for the better part of a decade without any military construction or real property maintenance, and as a result, the soldiers, sailors, airmen, and marines that are living and working in EUCOM are in facilities that I am not very proud of. Here are some pictures, for example, of barracks problems that we have in EUCOM. Next slide, please.

Military family housing is a problem. Let me outline the standards that we have for our military housing, and I believe the American people would understand this. If you have a family that is big enough that entitles you to a three-bedroom apartment, we believe that you ought to have two bathrooms for that apartment. We believe you ought to have a stove and a refrigerator in the kitchen, and we believe you ought to have a washer and a dryer in that apartment.

Many of these are three-story walkup apartments. We have young mothers that have two or three young children. For her to wash the clothes she has to go down three or four flights of stairs to the basement. What does she do with the young children while she is doing that? She has to carry them along with the laundry downstairs to do that.

I do not believe that is asking too much for these standards, and I must tell you, Mr. Chairman, even with these very modest standards, 69 percent of our Army families in Europe are living in conditions that do not meet those standards of a washer and a dryer, a stove and a refrigerator, and two bathrooms.

Mr. Chairman, when I worked this with the Pentagon, I briefed the Joint Chiefs, I briefed the Defense Resources Board, I talked to the Secretary of Defense, and I believe that I have a sympathetic ear. I do not know what will be in the budget when it comes over. I have not seen that, but if it comes over the way that I hope that it does, I would encourage the support of the committee.

Mr. Chairman, thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today.

[The prepared statement of General Ralston follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT BY GEN. JOSEPH W. RALSTON, USAF
INTRODUCTION

Mr. Chairman, distinguished members of the committee, it is my privilege to appear before you as Commander in Chief, United States European Command (USEUCOM), to discuss the posture of U.S. Forces. First, however, I want to make a few comments about the area in question.

The U.S. European Command encompasses American military activities in over 13 million square miles of the globe and includes 91 sovereign nations. It stretches