Foreign relations of Belgium (WEU). Both NATO (since 1966) and the EU have their headquarters in Brussels; SHAPE (Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe) is in the south of the country, near Mons. Since January 1993, the WEU has been headquartered in Brussels. Belgium has been one of the strongest supporters of NATO since the inception of the alliance in 1949. Having suffered through two invasions in two world wars, Belgium was aware of its security needs and the limitations of its means for self-defense. As a result, the leaders of that nation began calling for the formation of a defensive alliance shortly after the
Operation Althea additional troops from other countries such as Chile and Turkey. EUFOR's commander is currently Major General Martin Dorfer (Austria), since March 2018. For this mission, the European Union Military Staff is using NATO's Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe (SHAPE) as the EU's Operational Headquarters (OHQ) and is working through the Deputy to the Supreme Allied Commander Europe, a European officer. The EUFOR assumed all the missions of the SFOR, except for the hunt for individuals indicted by the war criminals tribunal, notably Radovan Karadžić, former leader of Republika Srpska, and Ratko Mladić, their former military leader, which remained a mission