New Delhi, June 14 -- losing fighter jets is something the alliance can work around. Losing everything else is where it gets difficult.

NATO is already developing a plan to offset the reduction of American capabilities under what the alliance calls its Force Model - the framework that governs how national militaries make forces available to the Supreme Allied Commander in Europe. A full compensatory package is not ready yet, because Washington only recently disclosed the precise scope of the reductions. But alliance sources speaking to ANSA on Thursday framed the jet component as the easier problem. "The good news is that the US strategy has clearly been designed with Europe's future ability to defend itself in mind," one diplomatic sour...