"I would say I take it calmly. At the talks in St. Petersburg [last week] US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld informed me in advance. There will be no great movements," Ivanov told journalists.
"We know about the US plans to reconfigure their troops and we understand them," he said.
The plans are mainly concerned with Asia, he said, although Europe will also be touched.
"First of all, this is due to the fact that the USA does not need heavy bases with heavy tanks and weapons," the minister pointed out. Russia is also going over to other types of bases, he added and named the base in Kant, Kyrgyzstan, as an example - it allows quickly increasing efforts in threatened regions.
When asked if Russia's military and political leadership was worried about the reconfiguration of the US troops in Europe, Ivanov said, "I do not see anything alarming in these plans".
