Meeting of Minister with senior leadership of MOD and CAF

Topics on the meeting were fundamental plans and priorities in the work of the MOD and CAF in the next period.

In a media statement after the meeting, Minister Kotromanovic presented the Deputy Minister Visnja Tafra. Speaking about the meeting, the Minister said that the Ministry of Defence and General Staff have a lot of work in developing a series of strategic documents, of which Strategic Defence Review and the CAF Long-Term Development Plan were priorities. It was decided that in future the Ministry of Defence and the CAF must be faster, more efficient and more operational. Furthermore, Kotromanovic reminded that the plan of integration into NATO was not yet completed and that it must be done so before the 2014.

Speaking about the future, the Minister stressed that the CAF should be a small and well-trained armed forces, adding that he was satisfied with the reforms made so far. Croatian soldiers have proven themselves in the Homeland war, and have been proving it today, especially in international peace support missions such as ISAF and UNDOF. These experiences will be used for reforms and raising the overall image of the Croatian Armed Forces to an even higher level. “We still have plenty of room for improvement and I think that we can do it with people we have”, Kotromanovic said.

Regarding the budget, the Minister concluded that he found a solid financial state, but the true picture he and his associates would have sometime in early February. Considering the overall economic situation, with the budget at the current level we can perform our set tasks.

Regarding the future of fighter component of the Croatian Air Force and Air Defence, the Minister considers that, if possible, we should retain current capabilities, but this primarily depends on available financial assets.

The Minister, together with the Chief of General Staff Lieutenant General Lovric, talked about the return of the MOD and CAF to the location on Kresimir Square. On this subject the Minister and Chief of Staff and their associates concluded that the return of the Minister’s and Chief’s Cabinets was best and most economical option. Most of the component, about 75 percent, is still located on Kresimir Square, and a lot of them, as well as the communication system and the archive is not possible to move in the required time. Money invested in the renovation of facilities in the “Croatia” Barracks was not thrown away, since the newly renovated facilities will be used by organizational units located in the barracks.