NATO Warships Ordered to Aegean to Help With Migrant Crisis

NATO’s European commander on Thursday ordered three warships to move immediately to the Aegean Sea to help end the deadly smuggling of migrants between Turkey and Greece

The warships of the standing NATO Mine Counter-Measures Group ONE with, from front to back, Estonian minehunter Admiral Cowen, Dutch minehunter Makkum, Norwegian minesweeper Otra, and Belgian minehunter Belis set sail from Kiel, Germany, on April 22, 2014. AP Photo/Gero Breloer

BRUSSELS—NATO’s European commander on Thursday ordered three warships to move immediately to the Aegean Sea to help end the deadly smuggling of migrants between Turkey and Greece.

Jens Stoltenberg, the NATO secretary-general, said the warships, now under German command, will conduct reconnaissance and surveillance to help end Europe’s gravest migrant crisis since World War II.

Ships from NATO Standing Maritime Group 2 “will start to move now” on orders from U.S. Air Force Gen. Philip Breedlove, NATO’s supreme commander in Europe, Stoltenberg said.

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg at a press conference before a meeting at the NATO headquarters in Brussels on Dec. 1, 2015. John Thys/AFP/Getty Images