Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe was withdrawing from the NATO military structure. SHAPE and all the other NATO installations, including NATO Headquarters and Allied Forces Central Europe (AFCENT), were informed that they must leave French territory by April 1967. Belgium became the host nation for both NATO's political headquarters and SHAPE. General Lyman Lemnitzer, SACEUR at the time, had hoped that SHAPE could be located near to NATO Headquarters, as had been the case in Paris, but the Belgian authorities decided that SHAPE should be located at least 50 kilometres from Brussels, NATO's new location, because SHAPE was a major wartime military target. The Belgian
Structure of NATO Operations retained the title "Supreme Allied Commander Europe", and remains based at SHAPE at Casteau. He is a U.S. four-star general or admiral with the dual-hatted role of heading United States European Command, which is headquartered in Stuttgart, Germany. ACO includes Joint Force Command Brunssum in the Netherlands, Joint Force Command Naples in Italy, and Joint Command Lisbon in Portugal, all multi-national headquarters with many nations represented. From 2003, JFC Brunssum had its land component, Allied Land Component Command Headquarters Heidelberg at Heidelberg, Germany, its air component, Allied Air Command Ramstein, at Ramstein in Germany, and its naval component at