- NATO is set to begin its largest military exercise in decades, with around 90,000 participants.
- The purpose of the exercise, dubbed Steadfast Defender 24, is to demonstrate NATO's ability to defend its entire territory up to the Russian border.
- The exercise is aimed at deterring Russia from targeting NATO members and involves complex operations spanning thousands of miles.
NATO is scheduled to begin its largest military exercise in decades next week, with around 90,000 people expected to take part and aimed at demonstrating that the alliance can defend all its territory up to its border with Russia. They will participate in several months of training, senior officials announced Thursday.
The exercise took place as Russia's war with Ukraine reached a stalemate. NATO as an organization is not directly involved in the conflict, other than providing non-lethal support to Kiev, but many member states individually or collectively send arms and ammunition and provide military training.
In the months before President Vladimir Putin ordered the advance of Russian troops into Ukraine in February 2022, NATO began strengthening security in Russia's eastern flank with Ukraine. This is the greatest strengthening of the alliance since the Cold War. This war game aims to prevent Russia from targeting member states.
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The exercise, dubbed Steadfast Defender 24, “demonstrates that NATO is capable of conducting and sustaining complex multi-domain operations in any situation, over several months and over thousands of miles, from the Highlands of the North to Central and Eastern Europe. 31-National Organization revealed.
Admiral Rob Bauer (center), Chairman of the NATO Military Commission, General Christopher Cavoli (left), Supreme Allied Commander Europe, and Supreme Allied Commander, speaking at a press conference at NATO Headquarters in Brussels, January 18, 2024. Public reform general Chris Badia. NATO will next be established on January 18, 2024. The biggest military exercises in decades will be held each week, with around 90,000 people expected to take part in months-long military exercises.
Troops will be moving back and forth across Europe until the end of May in what NATO describes as a “simulation of new conflict scenarios with near-peer adversaries.” Under NATO's new defense plan, the main adversaries are Russia and terrorist organizations.
“This alliance will demonstrate the ability to strengthen the Euro-Atlantic region through transatlantic troop movement from North America,” U.S. Army Gen. Christopher Cavoli, NATO's supreme allied commander, told reporters. Ta.
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Cavoli said this would demonstrate “our unity, our strength and our determination to protect each other.”
Admiral Rob Bauer, chairman of NATO's military committee, said this is “a record number that we can mobilize and exercise within that scale, across the alliance, across the oceans, from the United States to Europe.”
Bauer said the number of troops was a “huge change” compared to the exercise just a year ago. Sweden, which is scheduled to join NATO this year, will also participate.
British Defense Secretary Grant Shapps said the London government would deploy 20,000 troops, supported by state-of-the-art fighter jets, reconnaissance planes, warships and submarines, many of them to Eastern Europe between February and June. He said it would be done.
