The Dutch armed forces have a threefold mission: to protect the integrity of the territory of the Netherlands and that of allied countries; to help maintain stability and the international legal order; and to help civil authorities enforce the law, control crises, respond to disasters and provide humanitarian assistance either in the Netherlands or abroad. Crisis management, disaster response and humanitarian assistance have grown as a part of the armed forces’ work in recent years. Every year, thousands of Dutch service personnel are deployed in peace operations around the world, increasingly alongside counterparts from other countries. 1.5% of Dutch gross domestic product is spent on defence.

• Royal Netherlands Navy
• Ships and planes
• Royal Netherlands Army
• Royal Netherlands Air Force
• Royal Military and Border Police
• Schengen Agreement
• National duties

Royal Netherlands Navy
To protect the Netherlands Antilles and Aruba and the waters around them, the Navy has a frigate and a battalion of marines permanently stationed in the Caribbean. The Navy can also be deployed to help civil authorities enforce the law, respond to disasters or provide humanitarian assistance either in the Netherlands or abroad. The Navy commands the operations of the Coastguard around the Netherlands and in the Caribbean. The Coastguard provides a rescue service, inspects fisheries and enforces the rules of the sea. The Navy cooperates closely with the navies of Belgium and the United Kingdom. And Dutch naval vessels are permanently attached to NATO’s standing forces and fleet of minesweepers.

The Royal Netherlands Marine Corps is part of the Navy. It is a versatile and rapidly deployable expeditionary force that can be sent in to defend the territory of NATO countries, control crises, keep peace and provide humanitarian assistance. Since the early 1970s, a number of units of the Marine Corps have formed part of a British marine brigade, together forming the UK/NL Landing Force. Its Special Support Team can be deployed to combat terrorists at the request of the Ministry of Justice.

Ships and planes
The Navy has frigates, supply vessels and an amphibious transporter: the backbone of the Dutch fleet. Other Navy units are the Mine Countermeasures Service and the Submarine Service. The Naval Air Service’s helicopters can operate either from land or from vessels. Helicopters stationed on vessels have anti-submarine equipment, and those stationed on shore conduct transport flights, reconnaissance activities and rescue missions.

Royal Netherlands Army
For the Army, it is becoming increasingly important to make a worldwide contribution to peace, security and stability by providing crisis management, humanitarian assistance or disaster response. The Army often operates jointly with the Navy and the Air Force. For the past 50 years, the Army has worked closely with the armies of our NATO allies – all the more so in recent years. Since August 1995, for instance, all the Army’s combat units have been part of the joint German-Dutch (GE-NL) Army Corps, based in Münster, Germany.

Dutch army units operate increasingly in crisis areas outside NATO territory. Depending on the situation, the Army can deploy specialist units to provide humanitarian aid or respond to disasters. Their duties may include distributing food and medicine, providing technical or logistical aid or giving training in landmine clearance. Troops are also sent in groups or individually to monitor peace settlements and ceasefires.

Dutch brigades and battalions take part in international missions to ensure that peace settlements and ceasefires are observed. Finally, the Army regularly provides troops and materiel to voluntary organisations at their request.

Royal Netherlands Air Force
The Air Force can be deployed rapidly anywhere for various purposes. It conducts peace and humanitarian operations in the Netherlands and abroad. It can also take military action, or threaten to do so, in order to maintain stability and the international legal order. The Air Force assists civil authorities, in the Netherlands or abroad, to enforce the law and respond to disasters. And it helps maintain the integrity of the air space and territory of the Netherlands and allied countries.

The Air Force has advanced equipment and well trained personnel. Its F-16 fighter aircraft can be deployed in advanced air defence, precision attacks on ground targets and aerial reconnaissance. It deploys transport and fighter aircraft and attack helicopters in the Netherlands and abroad for various purposes, including reconnaissance, attacking ground targets, transporting personnel and equipment, evacuating medical patients and others in need, and rescuing persons in distress.

Its air transport and tanker fleet helps keep the Dutch armed forces tactically and strategically mobile. Two Fokker 60 aircraft are temporarily deployed in the Netherlands Antilles to carry out aerial reconnaissance for the Coast Guard of the Netherlands Antilles and Aruba and the Dutch Coast Guard.

Royal Military and Border Police
The Royal Military and Border Police falls under the Ministry of Defence, but performs most of its policing tasks under the responsibility of other ministries, principally Justice and the Interior. It is divided into six districts in the Netherlands. It also operates abroad, protecting embassies and other buildings and accompanying Dutch service personnel on peace missions.

The Royal Military and Border Police is a police force operating in both military and civilian spheres. It serves as the police force for the Navy, Army and Air Force, and also performs police and security tasks at Dutch airports, where it combats drug smuggling together with the fiscal investigation services. In addition, it is sometimes deployed to help civilian police forces maintain public order (for instance in riot squads) and to investigate offences.

It is responsible for guarding members of the Royal House and the Prime Minister’s official residence, and escorts armoured transports for De Nederlandsche Bank (the Dutch central bank).

Schengen Agreement
When the Schengen Agreement came into force in 1994, border controls disappeared between ten countries: Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Portugal and Spain. The Royal Military and Border Police therefore no longer checks the identities of persons crossing the country’s eastern and southern borders, but it does conduct mobile checks on highways crossing the national borders and on international trains.

Its other main task is to check the identity of persons entering the Netherlands from outside the Schengen area at the country’s airports and seaports (except Rotterdam). Arising from this task, the Royal Military and Border Police is also responsible for dealing with asylum seekers on arrival and for deporting undesirable aliens.

National duties
The armed forces are at the heart of Dutch society. In fact, one of their main tasks is to support civilian authorities in crisis management, referred to as National Operations. The role of the military in national security is a matter of particular attention. Because of its experience in conflict zones abroad, the military has the personnel, resources and know-how to deal with a national crisis.

Military personnel are deployed with some regularity to manage local crises. For that reason, the Ministry of Defence maintains good contacts with emergency services and local authorities. Other government bodies also call on the armed forces in situations that they are not adequately equipped or experienced to deal with themselves.

The Explosive Ordnance Disposal Command in particular is often called in to dispose of bombs and other explosives. Troops are also mobilised during calamities such as the floods in Limburg in the 1990s and the outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease and, more recently, avian influenza.