Post Exercise Discussion in Hungary

On the morning of Tuesday, 24 November, Brig.-Gen. Dr. Imre Pogácsás, Chief of the Hungarian General Staff Logistics Directorate and Col. Jan Husák – the international director of the Capable Logistician 2015 exercise conducted in this summer – welcomed those soldiers and civil subject matter experts (SMEs) who arrived in the Hungarian capital to attend the PXD conference. Brig.-Gen. Pogácsás told us that the aim of the PXD is to provide the representatives of participating nations with opportunities to evaluate the exercise. “In fact, this conference is the closing act of the exercise, as everyone has already analyzed the lessons learned on a national level over the last three and a half months. Based on the evaluations, a Final Exercise Report (FER) will be prepared under the aegis of the Multinational Logistics Coordination Centre (MLCC), and we will send it to the NATO Logistics Committee as a summary document", the Chief of the Hungarian General Staff Logistics Directorate told us.

The brigadier-general said that the CL15 exercise, conducted with the participation of 32 nations, had been special because a number of civil organizations had also represented themselves, like, for example the Smart Energy. “All the energy supply solutions that they introduced here can be used in practice, on foreign missions and military operations, and here everybody could see that these solutions are workable in practice, including the use of thermal solar panels in fuel supply and the Smart Energy solutions that they presented to help with setting up the camps." Imre Pogácsás also underlined the activities and interoperability of different multinational fields of logistics, during which the participants tested key capabilities in realistic situations, adding that on some occasions even 6-8 nations were cooperating in a given task.

We were told that every participant had been satisfied with the Hungarian Host Nation Support, which is a very great achievement, in light of the fact that Hungary had only 18 months to organize the event, instead of the 2.5–3 years usually available for the organization of similar NATO exercises. “We cannot say that the planning period was ideal, but we successfully overcame all obstacles", the brigadier-general said, adding that although each nation brought its own system of supplies and equipment for the exercise, the Hungarians were responsible for providing everything in certain fields such as catering, camp accommodation, medical cover and fuel supply.

In answering our question, Brig.-Gen. Imre Pogácsás revealed that the Hungarian Defence Forces were able to use the CL15 lessons learned during the construction of a temporary security barrier along the border, as they had already practiced some of the necessary tasks in the summer, and in many cases the personnel designated to serve at the border were drawn from the participants of the exercise.

Photo: Veronika Dévényi