Start of Preparations for Exercise Vigorous Warrior 2017
Szöveg: Szabolcs Nyulas | 2017. február 23. 9:00More than 100 participants gathered to attend the main planning conference of Exercise Vigorous Warrior 2017 on Tuesday, 14 February in Budapest. The training event, which is the largest-scale medical exercise in the world, will take place in Germany in September.
Speaking at the opening of the three-day conference, Col. (MD) Dr. László Fazekas, Director, NATO Center of Excellence for Military Medicine (MILMED COE) said that the exercise – to be directed by the Joint Medical Service of the Bundeswehr – will be held in the Lehnin training area near Berlin, and involve more than 20 participating nations. The main objective of the event is to exercise and evaluate the use of the medical support system of the Alliance during an Article 5 military operation, including a medical response to a biological-nuclear contingency, civil-military cooperation in the field of military medicine and the deployability of multinational medical capabilities. The participants will demonstrate the applicability of multinational solutions in military medicine, and test the doctrines and concepts developed by the NATO MILMED COE and the medical community of the Alliance, which provide lessons learned for further research.
In answer to a question from the press, the colonel said that the training event has been organized every second year since 2011 – for the first time it took place in Hungary, in Germany in 2013, and in the Czech Republic in 2015, with increasing interest. He added that this year, 600-650 participants are expected to come, as besides the NATO member states, the partner nations also receive invitations to participate. A special feature of this year’s two-week exercise is that the task execution will involve not only military but also civilian medical capabilities, in an effort to make them compatible with NATO’s system. Hungary will be present with military medical units which are assigned duties in the field hospital, and the mobile biological laboratory will also be set up.
In his opening speech, Brig.-Gen. Dr. Andreas Hölscher, Deputy Commander, Bundeswehr Operational Medical Support Command, the officer scheduling the exercise (OSE) of Vigorous Warrior 2017 pointed out that more than 100 attendees gathered at the Budapest conference with the aim of planning the details of the exercise. The high number of Hungarian and foreign guests guarantees the success of the exercise, which will be the largest-scale of its kind in the world.
Photo: László Tóth
