The "Defenders" exercise labor expedition is aimed at Eastern Europe

Recently, NATO's annual major military exercises have been staged in turn. Among them, the most notable is the "Defenders" series of large-scale exercises, including the "Strong Defenders 2021" exercise led by NATO's Allied Combat Command, and the "European Defenders 2021" exercise led by the US Army in Europe. As NATO's most important military training activity this year, the "Defenders" series of exercises is not only a phased assessment and acceptance of NATO's military strength construction in recent years, but also a new attempt to use its military strength in Europe. However, the series of exercises not only made it difficult to fully achieve NATO's political and military objectives, but also intensified the contradictions between NATO and Russia and aggravated the security concerns of allies. The "Defenders" series of exercises is regarded by NATO as this year's flagship exercise, and judging from its organization and implementation, the two large-scale exercises have many common points and show strong correlation. One-piece design, serial drills. Judging from the setting of the exercise, these two large-scale exercises contain a number of interconnected branch exercises. The "Firm Defender 2021" exercise is divided into four parts: a live-fire exercise at sea, a command post exercise, a live-fire exercise on land (i.e., a "noble jump" exercise), and a multinational force joint training exercise; the "European Defenders 2021" exercise includes four sub-exercises: "Agile Response" exercise, "Quick Response" exercise, "Sabre Guard" exercise and command post exercise. The two exercises, which lasted from early May to mid-to-late June, were intertwined not only in time, but also in terms of the content and process of the exercises. The multinational force joint training in the "Firm Defenders 2021" exercise is directly combined with the "Sabre Defenders" exercise under the framework of the "European Defenders 2021" exercise. Revitalize the teachers and mobilize the masses, multi-domain linkage. Both of these large-scale exercises used relatively large-scale troops, and the exercises involved land, sea, air, network and other combat fields. The "Firm Defender 2021" exercise was participated in by 22 countries, using about 10,000 troops, focusing on sea delivery, land maneuvering, rapid reaction and other content of the exercise; the "European Defender 2021" exercise has as many as 26 participating countries, with a total strength of nearly 30,000 people, mainly for land combat equipment live fire, air defense and anti-missile, airborne operations, logistics support and other subjects. The Labor Division Expedition, the sword points to Eastern Europe. From the perspective of the drill area, both large-scale exercises highlight the long-range mobile deployment to the frontier of Eastern Europe. "Staunch Defender 2021" focuses on the rapid movement of Allied rapid reaction troops from many parts of Europe to Romania, and the transatlantic projection of reinforcements from North America to Western Europe; in the "European Defender 2021" exercise, the US military transported more than 1,200 pieces (sets) of equipment (sets) on the mainland and more than 1,000 pieces (sets) of equipment pre-positioned in Western Europe to the Black Sea and the Baltic Sea region through a combination of sea, air and land three-dimensional delivery. The "Defenders" series of exercises have a strong directionality in the exercise attempt, which not only continues NATO's military deterrence and tough posture against Russia in recent years, but also aims to enhance the effect of the alliance's armament warfare since the Ukraine crisis. Create a favorable posture for collective defense. After the Ukraine crisis, NATO escalated its military confrontation with Russia, but its combat forces deployed on the front lines of Eastern Europe are very limited and do not have credible defense and deterrence capabilities. This makes the rapid delivery of reinforcements from North America and Western Europe to the Eastern European front a basic requirement for NATO to strengthen its collective defense and deterrence. Through these two large-scale exercises, NATO not only demonstrated to Russia the will to defend its collective defense and its ability to provide long-distance rapid support, but also injected a shot in the arm for Eastern European member states. Test the operational effectiveness of the newly established command structure. In a new round of command system reform that began in 2017, NATO has added the Norfolk Joint Force Command, which is responsible for maintaining the security of the North Atlantic sea lanes, the Ulm Joint Support and Empowerment Command, which specializes in European land mobility support, and eight land forward command posts in Eastern Europe for forward tactical maneuvers and deployments to receive reinforcements. An important purpose of these two large-scale exercises is to test and improve the effectiveness of the new command structure in organizing command troop projection operations. In the "Firm Defender 2021" exercise, the sea live troop exercise and the command post exercise were organized and implemented by Norfolk Command and Ulm Command respectively; in the "European Defender 2021" exercise, the 8 land forward command posts with full operational capability provided reception and support for mobile troops from many parts of Europe to Eastern Europe. Refine preparations for large-scale expeditionary operations. After the end of the Cold War, NATO's attention briefly turned to extraterritorial interventions. After the Crimean incident, NATO began to re-strengthen its collective defenses within Europe. However, NATO's eastward expansion of the defensive zone has been greatly expanded, and there is no case for large-scale rapid mobile deployment to the eastern front in a crisis state. The two "Defenders" exercises are aimed at testing and accumulating experience in the procedures for cross-Atlantic and trans-European expeditionary operations, familiarizing the troops of NATO member states with the route of travel and deployment location, understanding the pre-positioned materials and equipment that can be used, clarifying the arrangements for the course of campaign and tactical operations, and mastering the support and support provided by the host country, so as to effectively improve the level of combat readiness and strengthen operational readiness against Russia. Although NATO officials have placed high expectations on the "Defenders" series of exercises, and NATO secretaries-general and other senior officials and some league defense ministers personally came to the scene of the exercise to help, the vigorous exercises could not hide the contradictions and crises facing NATO. On the one hand, the defense of Europe remains inadequate. From a military point of view, although NATO allies have demonstrated certain long-range mobile deployment capabilities, it is still difficult to meet the requirements of large-scale expeditionary operations under actual combat conditions. In the "Firm Defender 2021" exercise, the sea delivery of North American reinforcements and the land maneuver exercise of NATO's rapid response force are relatively limited in scale, while the cross-border mobile deployment of large-scale reinforcements in Europe has only been a wargame deduction, so it is not yet possible to fully test and fully verify the ability of cross-sea and cross-border continuous mobile deployment. From the perspective of actual results, there is still a large gap between its power delivery capacity and the need for crisis response. On the other hand, the divisions within the alliance are still difficult to bridge. While NATO claims that the Defenders series of exercises reflects the U.S. commitment to NATO and the determination of allies to unite to meet challenges, the differences between the United States and Europe over the strategic direction of the alliance and the investment of defense resources have become more and more obvious. While the United States continues to exert pressure on Russia, the eagerness to win allies closer to the Indo-Pacific has also become increasingly apparent. For the United States, "defending Europe" is more of a gesture of appeasing allies. Most of NATO's European member states are not only overwhelmed by NATO's nearly 20 years of extraterritorial interventions, but also urgently require NATO to "firmly defend" collective security in the defense zone based on the practical need to maintain its own security. Therefore, although NATO hopes to accurately polish combat deployment and action plans through the "Defenders" series of exercises, and even regain the "muscle memory" left over from the Cold War confrontation, it is inevitable that it will bring real security to Europe. NATO's remnants of the Cold War mentality, and the resulting Cold War cold wind, not only endanger the security situation in Europe, but even affect international peace. (Author Affilications: Joint Operations College of the National Defense University) Above: During the "Firm Defender 2021" exercise, turkey's 66th mechanized infantry brigade, which is on duty with NATO's fast reaction force, crossed the Turkish-Bulgarian border and carried out land maneuvers towards Romania. Profile picture