Allied Land Command

NATO has had a headquarters at Izmir for decades. Initially, the body there was Allied Land Forces South-Eastern Europe (LANDSOUTHEAST), responsible to Allied Forces Southern Europe at Naples. Under this command, with its headquarters in Izmir assisted by the subordinate Thessaloniki Advanced Command Post, were to be most of the Greek and Turkish armies in case of war. LANDSOUTHEAST was commanded by a United States Army lieutenant general:[1]

• Lieutenant General Willard G. Wyman (1952–54)
• Lieutenant General Paul W. Kendall (1954–55)
• Lieutenant General George Windle Read Jr. (1955–57)
• Lieutenant General Paul D. Harkins (1957–60)
• Lieutenant General Harry P. Storke (1960–61)
• Lieutenant General Frederic J. Brown II (1961–63)[2]

In 1966 the first major change occurred when French military personnel were withdrawn from LANDSOUTHEAST, followed by the Greek withdrawal in 1974. On 30 December 1977, SHAPE and Turkish military authorities announced another change in the command structure of LANDSOUTHEAST, to be effective 1 July 1978. The command billet was to be filled by a Turkish Army four star general with a U.S. Major General as his deputy. U.S. General Sam S. Walker took command in 1977, and On 30 June 1978, General Walker handed over the command to General Vecihi Akın, the first Turkish commander. General Akın held command until 30 August 1979.[3]

SHAPE

JFCBS

JFCNP

AIRCOM

LAND-
COM

MARCOM

STRIKFORNATO

HQ SACT

JFC NF

JWC

JFTC

JALLC

School

 JSEC

Locations of NATO's two strategic commands—Allied Command Transformation (ACT; yellow marks) and Allied Command Operations (ACO; red marks)—the latter of which has Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe (SHAPE) as its headquarters. The subordinate centres of ACT and subordinate commands and joint force commands of ACO are also shown.

Construction of a new headquarters facility in Şirinyer, Izmir was completed in March 1994 and LANDSOUTHEAST moved into the facility in April 1994. In July 1994, two German Army officers were assigned to the command for the first time. The headquarters garrison at Şirinyer was named General Vecihi Akın Garrison in March 1996, after the first Turkish LANDSOUTHEAST Commander. Turkish Land Forces General Hüseyin Kıvrıkoğlu commanded LANDSOUTHEAST from c.1993–1996, followed by Hilmi Özkök from 1996–1998.[4]

After the end of the Cold War, for a period the NATO command in Izmir became Joint Command Southeast. After a major NATO reorganisation, the previous southern air component command, Allied Air Forces Southern Europe (AIRSOUTH), in Italy, was disestablished. Thus between 11 August 2004 and 1 June 2013 the new headquarters of NATO's southern air component command, Allied Air Command İzmir, was located at the İzmir site.[5] The next reorganisation merged the northern and southern air component commands into the single Allied Air Command located at Ramstein Air Base in Germany under a United States Air Force general.[6]

In 2013 the 350-person headquarters took over the responsibilities of Allied Force Command Heidelberg in Germany and Allied Force Command Madrid in Spain, which are being deactivated as part of NATO's transformation.[7]

LANDCOM was created through the North Atlantic Council to ensure the interoperability of NATO land forces, and placed directly under the Supreme Allied Commander Europe to be the leading voice on land issues within the Alliance. It is responsible for providing a deployable land command for a joint operation. LANDCOM will also carry out the planning, conduct and direction of such land operations.[8] What this means is that if a single corps land operation is underway, that corps will probably report to either JFC Brunssum or JFC Naples. If multiple corps are being directed, LANDCOM will direct them for either JFC Brunssum or Naples.[9]

On 26 March 2015, Lieutenant General Ed Davis, Deputy Commander, Allied Land Command, arrived at Headquarters Multinational Corps Northeast (HQ MNC NE) to discuss the ongoing transformation of Multinational Corps Northeast.[10] "The main reason I am here is that Commander LANDCOM has given me the responsibility to lead the evolution of MNC NE and Multinational Division South-East as the two new NATO command organisations which are going to be at the centre of the evolution of the NATO Land Forces," said Lieutenant General Davis.[10]

Romania is leading the process of creating Multinational Division South-East, which will be established in Bucharest, Romania, in 2015–16.[11] The division in Bucharest will be subordinate to the NATO Force Integration Unit also to be established there. The division will reach partial/initial operational capacity in 2016 and Full operational capability (FOC) in 2018.[12]

An overview of the NATO Military Command Structure (NCS):

Liaison:       Provides advice and support to the NAC

Political strategic level:

North Atlantic Council

Secretary General of NATO Brussels, BE

International Staff Brussels, BE

Military strategic level:

Chair of the NATO Military Committee International Military Staff NATO HQ, Brussels, BE

Strategic commands:

SACEUR (ACO, SHAPE) Mons, BE

SACT (Allied Command Transformation, HQ SACT) Norfolk, US

Tactical commands:

Transformational commands:

Allied Air Command Ramstein, DE

Joint Warfare Centre Stavanger, NO

Allied Maritime Command Northwood, GB

Joint Analysis and Lessons Learned Centre Lisbon, PT

Allied Land Command İzmir, TR

Joint Force Training Centre Bydgoszcz, PL

Misc.:

Joint Support and Enabling Command Ulm, DE

Operational commands:

Communications & Information Systems Group Mons, BE

Naval Striking and Support Forces NATO Oeiras, PT

Joint Force Command Norfolk Norfolk, US

Allied Joint Force Command Naples Naples, IT

Allied Joint Force Command Brunssum Brunssum, NL

Response Force:

Multinational Corps Southeast Sibiu, RO

Multinational Corps Northeast Szczecin, PL

Since August 2022, the Commanding General, United States Army Europe and Africa has been dual-hatted as Commander, Allied Land Command.[13]

No.	Portrait	Supreme Allied Commander	Took office	Left office	Time in office	Defence branch
1		Hodges, FrederickLieutenant General Frederick B. Hodges III (born 1958)	1 December 2012	23 October 2014	1 year, 326 days	United States Army
2		Nicholson, JohnLieutenant General John W. Nicholson Jr. (born 1957)	23 October 2014	24 June 2016	1 year, 245 days	United States Army
3		Williams, DarrylLieutenant General Darryl A. Williams (born 1961)	24 June 2016	29 June 2018	2 years, 5 days	United States Army
-		Ruggiero, PaoloLieutenant General Paolo Ruggiero (born 1957) Acting [lower-alpha 1]	29 June 2018	3 August 2018	35 days	Italian Army
4		Thomson, JohnLieutenant General John C. Thomson III	3 August 2018	4 August 2020	2 years, 1 day	United States Army
5		Cloutier, RogerLieutenant General Roger L. Cloutier Jr. (born 1965)	4 August 2020	4 August 2022	2 years, 0 days	United States Army
(3)		Williams, DarrylGeneral Darryl A. Williams (born 1961)	4 August 2022	Incumbent	1 year, 82 days	United States Army

• John O. Iatrides, 'Failed Rampart: NATO's Balkan Front,' in Mary Ann Heiss (Editor), S Victor Papacosma (Editor), NATO and the Warsaw Pact: Intrabloc Conflicts, Kent State University Press, 2008
• Dionysios Chourchoulis, The Southern Flank of NATO, 1951–1959: Military Strategy or Political Stabilization, PhD thesis, Queen Mary University of London, 2010
• Yiannis P. Roubatis, Tangled Webs (LANDSOUTHEAST was responsible for the land defence of Greece for a period through an advanced HQ in Thessaloniki)
• Simon Duke, Wolfgang Krieger, U.S. Military Forces in Europe: The Early Years, 1945–1970, Westview Special Studies in International Security, Westview Press, 1993

• Official website

38.3903°N 27.1422°E / 38.3903; 27.1422