13,000 troops from 17 nations are participating in the month long exercise. In Estonia, the British Army’s Global Response Force, 16 Air Assault Brigade Combat Team, is leading a force of more than 2,300 soldiers, sailors and aviators from four countries.
The UK’s 3rd Battalion The Parachute Regiment Battlegroup Commanding Officer, Lieutenant Colonel Dave Mans, said that the training had given his soldiers “a huge degree of realism and pressure” and praised their “controlled aggression and focus”.
“From Estonia, we do not need to look very far to see real battles being fought in trenches,” said Mans. “We need to develop, maintain, and excel at operating in these conditions.”
“But also, the more we do at this scale and complexity, the better prepared we are for any environment. Training builds relationships, we learn how we react under pressure, and understand what our capabilities are to make the battlegroup as effective as possible, whatever it is asked to do,” Mans added.
Exercise Swift Response is part of Steadfast Defender 24. Steadfast Defender is NATO’s largest military exercise since the Cold War, which involves approximately 90,000 troops from all 32 NATO nations.
