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The 86th Airlift Wing and all tenant units are currently preparing for the upcoming Conventional Armed Forces in Europe treaty inspection exercise, which will take place Thursday on Ramstein.
The CFE treaty compliance inspection is a very demanding and intrusive verification regime that allows foreign inspection teams to conduct on-site inspections of U.S. forces located in Europe.
There are 30 state parties (nations) that participate in the CFE treaty, and each of these parties can send a nine person inspection team to the other 29 state parties’ declared sites where forces are stationed to conduct on-site inspections. The treaty members report the number of military personnel and the numbers and types of treaty limited equipment assigned by location to the other member nations during the annual exchange of information. There are five major categories of TLE that are inspectable under the treaty: battle tanks, armored combat vehicles, artillery, combat aircraft and attack helicopters.
It is our responsibility to properly prepare our assigned TLE, CFE treaty inspectable facilities and containers to allow “immediate access” to the foreign inspection teams. This is the most critical aspect of the CFE inspection, because providing immediate access to inspectable locations clearly demonstrates the U.S. government’s compliance with international laws and mandatory treaty requirements.
To meet this huge challenge, we will need your team’s support if you have any facilities containing doors measuring 2 meters or greater in width. In accordance with the CFE treaty, these facilities are considered as inspectable locations because they could store TLE items. Additionally, all containers 2 meters long-by-2 meters wide-by-2 meters high may be inspected.
Units that control facilities or own containers that meet the inspectable CFE treaty criteria must provide the foreign inspection team with immediate access by having personnel available from 7:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Thursday. These personnel must have the keys or combinations in-hand and be standing by to greet the inspection team anytime during the hours of the declared site inspection. CFE inspection teams are authorized to return to the same inspectable location as many times as they desire, so these locations must be manned until the inspection has been terminated by the 86th AW Command Post.
CFE inspection teams are not allowed to enter facility locations that contain doorways less than 2 meters wide. Even if they can initially enter a facility door measuring 2 meters or greater in width, once they reach a section in the facility that doesn’t have a 2 meter or greater entrance, then they must stop.
Each assigned military organization has appointed group-level CFE points of contact that have received specific training and will provide information to your unit POC’s and facility managers to ensure your unit’s compliance for CFE inspections. All tenant units will be contacted by the 86th AW treaty compliance officer or the applicable group POC (wing/tenant unit liaison) and briefed on their responsibilities concerning CFE inspection operations. This CFE inspection exercise only affects those organizations that are physically located within the base boundary (fence line) of Ramstein. No other locations in the KMC are impacted.
Contact the 86th AW treaty compliance officer at 480-6097 or 480-2772 for any questions concerning this matter.
