France Rejoins NATO Military : Europe: Reversal of nearly 30-year stance comes as alliance foreign and defense ministers approve details of Bosnia mission. Christopher calls session historic.

In a development rich in potential for the future of both the Atlantic alliance and the larger U.S. relationship with Europe, France announced Tuesday that it will resume an active role in NATO’s military affairs after an absence of nearly three decades.

“The French minister of defense will be able to take part regularly in the work of the alliance alongside his colleagues,” declared Foreign Minister Herve de Charette.

He said France will also retake its seat on the alliance’s key military committee and resume contacts with other North Atlantic Treaty Organization institutions, such as the defense college in Rome and a training academy in Oberammergau, Germany.

The announcement provided a tangible lift to alliance morale on the eve of NATO’s biggest-ever military operation--deployment of a heavily armed force of 60,000 troops, a third of them Americans, to Bosnia-Herzegovina to enforce the peace settlement forged in Dayton, Ohio, last month.

A rare joint meeting of foreign and defense ministers from NATO’s 16 member states Tuesday formally approved the detailed military plan for that deployment.

The ministers also confirmed the appointment of Spanish Foreign Minister Javier Solana as NATO’s next secretary-general and took steps to consolidate a fragile new rapprochement with Russia, which has agreed in principle to supply 1,500 troops to the NATO-led Bosnia Implementation Force.

“For NATO, this is, without exaggeration, a moment worthy of being called historic,” Secretary of State Warren Christopher said.

It was also a day on which Germany prepared for the first time to join its closest allies in a military operation outside alliance territory. German legislators are expected today to back the government’s plan to contribute 4,000 mainly support troops to the Balkan mission.

Germany’s decision to sit out the 1991 Persian Gulf War, claiming constitutional restrictions against overseas deployments, was deeply resented by the country’s NATO partners and reinforced the belief among some that the nation’s clouded past would never allow it to become “a normal country.”

“It is a relief that Germany has become part of the solution and not part of the problem,” said German Defense Minister Volker Ruehe. “There is a new unity, a new decisiveness in the alliance.”

Ruehe also praised the French move back into the military arm, saying, “This will help us.”

De Charette’s announcement effectively restores French involvement in shaping alliance military policy for the first time since March 1966, when President Charles de Gaulle, disillusioned with what he saw as American dominance, launched his nation as an independent “third force” at the height of the Cold War.

While De Charette stressed that French military forces will not be re-integrated into NATO commands in times of peace--at least not immediately--the resumption is extremely significant.

According to political observers familiar with the French decision, the reasoning behind the move, as much as the decision itself, carries critical importance for Atlantic relations. One French government official said the announcement was preceded by a lengthy policy review in Paris that began earlier this year during the final months of Prime Minister Edouard Balladur’s government.

France has consistently challenged American influence in Europe but apparently concluded that keeping the United States engaged on the Continent is an important priority.

“The only real way to do this is through NATO,” explained the official, who said that greater French involvement in the alliance then became inevitable.

The prospect that France may now have, in effect, reduced its efforts to create a separate, European-only defense capability is likely to remove a major source of tension in the transatlantic relationship.

Christopher praised the French return to NATO’s military arm, saying it “will increase the strength and effectiveness of the alliance.”

Rivalries between the two allies will not disappear, however. That quickly became clear as France attempted to re-christen the Dayton accord the “Elysee Treaty,” because the settlement negotiated at Dayton is scheduled to be signed at the Elysee Palace in Paris next week.

Both Christopher and Defense Secretary William J. Perry also stressed repeatedly the importance of the Bosnia peacekeeping mission for the future of NATO.

“This is a moment of truth for NATO,” Perry told a news conference.

Christopher said the deployment in Bosnia “will be a noble mission, unique in the history of Europe. It will be a defining challenge for this alliance. It will have profound consequences for our interests today and for our hopes for the future.”

According to the operational plan approved Tuesday, 14 non-NATO nations will join in the Bosnia mission, including 13 members of the Partnership for Peace program. (The participating partner countries are Austria, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Finland, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Russia, Slovakia, Sweden and Ukraine. Pakistan is also sending troops.)

During Tuesday’s meetings, Christopher and other U.S. officials pointed out repeatedly that the Bosnia peace agreement requires NATO forces in that country to apprehend and turn over anyone they encounter who has been indicted for war crimes. However, the secretary of state also said that NATO forces will not be obliged to search for suspected war criminals.

“It’s not part of the NATO mission,” Christopher said.

Acting Secretary-General Sergio Balanzino reported that NATO diplomats had yet to complete the task of formalizing a verbal agreement about Russian participation in the Bosnia mission but were hopeful of finalizing the arrangement within the next few days.

“It has become very urgent,” commented a senior NATO official.

At a brief news conference Tuesday, Solana said he will begin work at NATO in mid-December, after Spain finishes hosting the European Union’s semiannual summit Dec. 15 and 16.