US: The US is contemplating changing the nature of its military presence in Europe, moving from a "garrison" system of big, heavily-staffed Cold War-era bases to a more expeditionary posture in which troops will be deployed on a rotational basis, according to members of a US delegation attending a security conference last weekend in Munich.
The current thinking about revamping the US military structure in Europe follows the transformation of NATO politics through the addition of 10 new member nations who are taking pro-US stances.
This reduces the influence of what the US Defence Secretary, Mr Donald Rumsfeld, termed "old Europe" powers such as Germany and France.
If implemented, the change being contemplated would be one of the biggest in the history of US military bases in Europe, which dates back to the end of second World War.
Even discussing the shift sends the signal in Europe that the US is ready to match changes in the alliance's political structure with changes in its military structure.
Disclosure of the move also might be interpreted in Europe, especially in Germany, as a sign that that the US is exploring alternatives to its heavy reliance on Germany as the host of its core military operations in Europe.
The possible change in military structure and the strains with Germany and France were the two main subjects of conversation among the US delegation to the Munich conference.
The weekend's proceedings were marked by an unusual public clash between US officials and officials from France and Germany over the Bush administration's hawkish stance on Iraq.
"It doesn't feel like it's the US and UK isolated from Europe," concluded Democrat senator Mr Joe Lieberman. "It feels like France and Germany are isolated from the US, the UK and the rest of Europe."
The split over Iraq is likely to produce lingering suspicion of the German government in the US. Republican senator Mr Lindsay Graham said the German opposition to the US position on Iraq would "throw people for a loop" in his home state of South Carolina, where German companies have a major presence, including a BMW car plant.
Yet at the same time Mr Graham and other delegate members predicted that a German desire to make amends is likely to encourage the government of the German Chancellor, Mr Gerhard Schröder, to participate in post-war peacekeeping in Iraq, easing the US burden there.
Several members of the delegation spoke enthusiastically at the briefing they were given by Gen James Jones, the new US commander in Europe, on his preliminary thoughts about possible ways to overhaul the US military presence in Germany and elsewhere in Europe.
They said they expect the permanent US military presence to be cut from the current level of about 100,000 personnel, most of them army.
They said Gen Jones and other top Defence Department officials were contemplating something more akin to the US presence in Kuwait, where tanks, trucks and other military gear is stored, with troops flying in to exercise or deploy with it.
Republican senator Mr John McCain, one of those briefed by Gen Jones, said that the commander "envisions a transition to bases with prepositioned equipment and skeleton crews".
In a few years, some of the Pentagon officials said, the US bases in Germany, England and Italy could be what the military calls "power projection" platforms, from which forces could move quickly to hot spots in the Middle East, Africa or Asia.
Some US troops are moving from bases in Germany to the Persian Gulf region, but they are not configured for rapid deployment.
Democrat Congresswoman Ms Jane Harman, who also attended Gen Jones's briefing, said: "He was talking about a different configuration that is more nimble and flexible."
Delegation members emphasised that the contemplated changes in force structure were not related to current US-German strains.
However those tensions could provoke efforts to reduce the US military's reliance on its facilities in Germany, one conference participant predicted.