WORLD : Norwegian to Lead NATO Defenses
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BRUSSELS — Norwegian four-star Gen. Vigleik Eide took over today as chairman of NATO’s military committee, the alliance’s highest military authority.
Eide, 55, formerly Norway’s chief of staff, replaced West Germany’s Wolfgang Altenburg at the end of his three-year term.
The chairman of the military committee acts as a link between NATO political authorities and its military commanders, including Gen. John Galvin, Supreme Allied Commander in Europe.
NATO officials said Eide, an infantryman by training, is relatively inexperienced for the post and was chosen as a compromise after the most popular candidate, Sir John Fieldhouse, formerly British chief of defense staff, was taken ill in December, 1988, and later retired.
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