NATO Holds War Games 30-Second Jet Flight From Russia

Russian Information Agency Novosti
November 1, 2013

NATO to Kick Off Military Exercise Near Russia

WASHINGTON: The United States and its European allies are set to begin military exercises near Russia’s western borders Saturday, a training operation that has raised hackles in Moscow but will be observed by a Russian Defense Ministry delegation.

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) will hold its Steadfast Jazz 2013 exercise primarily in Poland and the former Soviet republic of Latvia, a training that will include some 6,000 troops from the Western military alliance and partner nations.

The exercise, NATO’s largest since 2006, is based on a “fictitious scenario in a fictitious country” and will include land, air, maritime and special operations forces, according to the alliance.

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Officials in Moscow have long opposed NATO’s eastward expansion, which has brought former Warsaw Pact countries into the alliance’s fold along with former Soviet Baltic republics Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia.

In late July, Russian Deputy Defense Minister Anatoly Antonov criticized what he described as the “Cold War” spirit of the NATO exercise.

The Polish newspaper Rzeczpospolita reported in June that parts of the planned exercise would take place in areas that are a 30-second jet flight from Russia’s borders.

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North Atlantic Treaty Organization
Allied Joint Force Command Brunssum

Steadfast Jazz 2013

Scope of the Exercise

NATO Response Force training for 2013 will culminate with Exercise Steadfast Jazz, which takes place in early November in a number of Alliance nations including the Baltic States and Poland. The event involves about 6,000 personnel from many Allied and partner nations. Around 3,000 of these troops will participate in a live exercise and an additional 3,000 headquarters personnel will be involved in a command & control exercise. Air, land, maritime and special forces components will all be involved, as well as the headquarters staff from Joint Force Command Brunssum, who will lead any NATO joint operations in 2014.

Aim of Steadfast Jazz 2013

The purpose of the exercise is to train and test the NATO Response Force, a highly ready and technologically advanced multinational force made up of land, air, maritime and Special Forces components that the Alliance can deploy quickly wherever needed. The NRF must be able to respond to the full-spectrum of potential missions, including high-intensity combat. This requires exercising complex capabilities employed by interoperable and multinational forces in a demanding environment. Exercise Steadfast Jazz is designed to test both live forces and those involved with the command and control of NRF troops using a fictional scenario.

The NATO Response Force is essential in maintaining and enhancing the ability of forces from across the Alliance to work together, which will be increasingly important as the ISAF mission in Afghanistan winds-down and NATO prepares to meet future challenges.