Vigorous Warrior 2017: NATO Medical Exercise in Germany

This time, led by the Joint Medical Service of the Bundeswehr, a multinational 1000-strong exercise directing headquarters and primary training audience gathered in Lehnin training area near Berlin. Troops from a total of 26 nations – including the specialists of the Hungarian Defence Forces – have deployed five ROLE-2 and two ROLE-1 medical treatment facilities (MTF) in the field, which are being supported by five fixed-wing aircraft, three helicopters, a frigate, 11 ambulances, a biological laboratory and a radiological decontamination unit.

The deployed forces are tasked with demonstrating the applicability of multinational solutions in military medicine, and with testing doctrines and concepts developed by the NATO MILMED COE and the NATO medical community, in the interest of providing lessons learned for further development.

The overall aim of VW ’17 is to exercise and evaluate the NATO Military Medical Support System in an Article-5 operation scenario, including medical response to a potential biological contingency, civil-military medical cooperation and the deployability of multinational medical capabilities.

The exercise series Vigorous Warrior is organized every second year, and the current one is the fourth iteration. For the first time, Hungary (Várpalota and Budapest) hosted the exercise in 2011, Germany (Feldkirchen) in 2013, and then the Czech Republic (Hradec Kralove) in 2015.

You can find further information about the NATO Centre of Excellence for Military Medicine and the exercise on the MILMED COE facebook page and on its website.

Photo: NATO MILMED COE facebook