 Obama to make last trip to Europe Washington (AFP) June 6, 2016 - US President Barack Obama will visit Poland and Spain in July, in what will likely be his final trip to Europe, a continent that has often presented more problems than opportunities during his presidency. The White House said that Obama will travel to Warsaw on July 7-9 for "his fifth and final summit with NATO leaders," before going on his first trip to Spain. During his nearly eight years in office, Obama has at times had difficult relationships with America's oldest allies. For most of his first term, Europe was frustratingly slow to contain sovereign debt crises that were fed by and prolonged the Great Recession. Relations with Europe were further tested by Obama's "pivot to Asia" -- which was widely perceived as capping a decades-long strategic shift from the Atlantic to the Pacific. Obama has publicly said that it was a mistake to depend on European allies to manage Libya's emergence from decades of Moamer Kadhafi's dictatorial rule. Five years after Kadhafi was killed, the country is still in turmoil and is now a base for the Islamic State group. That is likely to be a topic of discussion in Warsaw, along with Russia's continued testing of NATO resolve in eastern and central Europe. The Russian annexation of Ukraine's Crimea region was followed with active support for separatists in the east of the country. The country is today de facto partitioned, posing a significant obstacle for Kiev's reform efforts and plunging the West in Russia into the biggest standoff since the Cold War. Meanwhile Russian aircraft have launched a series of provocative intercepts of NATO, Swedish and other craft. In response to "an aggressive Russia," Obama has announced an increased US troop presence in eastern Europe, with continuous rotations of an additional armored brigade beginning in early 2017. Obama will also hold bilateral talks with Poland's conservative President Andrzej Duda to "reaffirm the American commitment to Poland's security, and exchange views on the broader security environment in Europe," the White House said. Duda's government is deeply controversial, accused by critics of breaking EU norms on democracy by reforming the constitutional court. In Warsaw, Obama will also hold talks with EU leaders, hoping to kick forward stalled transatlantic trade talks, although a breakthrough before he leaves office seems unlikely. In Spain, Obama will meet the country's acting president. Spaniards will go to the polls on June 26, the country's second general election in six months. December 20 elections were inconclusive that put an end to Spain's traditional two-party system. Spain has never had a coalition government and parties tried in vain since the polls to cobble together an alliance which had enough support to be able to pass a parliamentary vote of confidence.
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Poland and its NATO partners on Monday kicked off their largest-ever joint military exercises aimed at shoring up security on the alliance's eastern flank amid the West's worst standoff with Russia since the end of the Cold War.
The two-week long Anaconda manoeuvres are aimed at "checking the alliance's ability to defend its eastern flank," Polish Defence Minister Antoni Macierewicz said at formal opening ceremonies in Warsaw before troops hit the ground on Tuesday.
More than 31,000 soldiers from 24 NATO and former-Soviet "Partnership for Peace" states including Ukraine are taking part in the manoeuvres, held biannually across Poland since 2006.
Some 14,000 US troops will join 12,000 Polish soldiers and around 1,000 from Britain for the exercises involving some 3,000 vehicles, 105 planes and 12 naval vessels.
US Army Chief of Staff Mark Milley said the American presence "demonstrates that we are shoulder to shoulder with the Polish people" and that the exercises would "improve our collective readiness."
They come a month ahead of a "landmark" NATO summit in Warsaw set to seal its largest revamp since the Cold War by deploying more troop rotations in eastern European members spooked by Russia's 2014 annexation of Crimea from Ukraine.
Russia is fiercely opposed to the move, billed by NATO as its "deter and dialogue" strategy.
While NATO cut all practical cooperation with Moscow following Russia's Ukraine intervention, the US-led alliance has said it will hold formal talks with the Russians before the July 8-9 summit.
But just last month Moscow and Washington accused each other of mounting an aggressive military presence in northern Europe as the United States broke ground on a missile shield in NATO allies Poland and Romania.
Russia has vowed to "end threats" posed by the system, despite US assurances that it is intended to ward of potential attacks by so-called "rogue states" in the Middle East.
The Kremlin said it would set up three new divisions in the west and south of the country by the end of the year to counter NATO forces close to its border.
- Hybrid warfare -
Macierewicz said Monday that Polish paramilitary forces will take part in the Anaconda exercises for the first time, part of Warsaw's strategy to counter "hybrid warfare".
That tactic is based on deception rather than a formal declaration of war, NATO strategists say and suggest Russia used it to annex Crimea by covertly deploying unidentified troops.
They also say the same tactic was used to engineer the pro-Moscow revolt in eastern Ukraine that followed.
Macierewicz said last week that Poland will soon enroll the first volunteers in a 35,000-member paramilitary force aimed at parrying a perceived hybrid threat from Russia.
Warsaw will use these new "territorial defence forces" to expand its armed forces next year to 150,000 men from the current 100,000.
Russia has long objected to NATO's expansion in its Soviet-era back yard and in 1997 NATO formally agreed not to install permanent bases in former Warsaw Pact states.
In line with the agreement, the Pentagon said in March it would deploy an additional armoured brigade of about 4,200 troops in eastern Europe from early 2017 on a rotational basis -- not a permanent base.
NATO has been careful to reassure Moscow ahead of the July summit, with its Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg insisting "the Cold War is history and we want it to stay that way."
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