The decision came as Spain and Ukraine each committed to head a brigade of an 8,000-strong multinational division to help stabilize Iraq, which will be led by Poland with NATO's support, officials said.

US officials hailed the agreements as signs that NATO was getting back to business after fierce differences over the war against Iraq pitted the United States against France and Germany.

"What we have today is an alliance that has come together to say we should play a role in the reconstruction of Iraq, NATO should play a role outside of its traditional geographic areas, including as far away as Afghanistan," a senior US defense official said.

"This is a new NATO, a NATO transformed," said alliance Secretary General George Robertson in welcoming the ministers.

"A NATO able to meet its commitments when times are tough from the Straits of Gibraltar through the Balkans to southern Turkey."

The overhaul of the command structure, which reduces NATO command elements from about 20 to 11, aims to move NATO away from a static defense of Europe to missions outside its traditional geographical area.

It puts all NATO operations under a single strategic command led by an American, NATO said.

A second strategic command based in Norfolk, Virginia will focus on training and other efforts to transform NATO militarily into a force capable of deploying rapidly to intervene in far flung crises.

The centerpiece of the transformation effort will be a 20,000-strong NATO Response Force that is ready to deploy within days.

Plans call for beginning training and development of the force in the fall and to have an initial force stood up within a year, officials said.

A senior US official said NATO had undergone a "near-death experience" in February, when three anti-war countries blocked the Alliance from providing defensive support for Turkey ahead of the Iraq conflict.

"I think the alliance is in a much better place than it was in February when we had some serious divisions. As is usual with NATO warnings of its death are always premature," a senior US defense official said.

US officials pointed to recent agreements by NATO to take command of peacekeepers in Afghanistan and to support Poland in leading an 8,000-strong multinational division in Iraq as evidence that the allies are getting back to business.

Spanish Defense Minister Federico Trillo announced that Spain will "co-lead" the division. At a separate press conference, Polish counterpart Jerzy Smajdninsky said the division will have a Spanish officer as its deputy commander.

The division will comprise three brigades: a Polish one with 2,300 troops, a Ukrainian one with 1,700 troops and a Spanish brigade with 1,100 Spanish soldiers, he said on the sidelines of a meeting of NATO defense ministers in Brussels.

The Spanish brigade will also include three battalions from the Dominican Republic, El Salvador and Honduras, the Spanish government said.

The Polish brigade will be supported by troops from Bulgaria, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania and Romania, Smajdninsky said.

The division, whose troops will begin arriving in Iraq in July and August, is scheduled to be operational by September, the Polish minister said.

Rumsfeld and his British counterpart Geoff Hoon will brief their fellow ministers on the situation on the ground in Iraq, where US forces launched a major combat operation against presumed guerrilla strongholds north of Baghdad.

The new command structure dovetails with US plans to realign its forces worldwide, scaling back the heavy US ground forces that have stood guard against invasion in western Europe since World War II.

The alliance agreed in May 2002 that NATO should go "out of area" -- beyond its traditional European theatre of activities -- and culminating in a landmark summit in Prague last November which was dubbed the alliance's "transformation summit."

Regional commands in Europe are expected to be replaced with "combined joint task forces" based in the Netherlands and Italy and a sea-based joint task force in Portugal.

Although based in Europe, they will set up to move to distant theaters in a crisis with troops assigned to them for six month rotations.

The ministers also will be discussing a successor to Robertson, who steps down in December after four years at the helm of the world's premier military alliance.

The frontrunners are Portugal's Antonio Vitorino and Norwegian Defense Minister Kristin Krohn Devold, who if successful would be the first woman in charge of NATO.

Rumsfeld met Wednesday evening with Vitorino, who is currently an EU commissioner.

WAR.WIRE