Posts tagged ‘NATO partner nations’
FRIDAY FOTO (May 20, 2022)
ALREADY THERE.
(U.S. Army photo by Specialist Elizabeth MacPherson) Click to enlarge
Another U.S. Army armored convoy of Stryker armored vehicles transiting a Pennsylvania highway? Nope. Germany? Guess again. If you have trouble reading the blue road sign on the right side of the photo, one reason could be because it’s in Finnish.
This is Outlaw Troop, 4th Squadron of the 2d Cavalry Regiment, leading a convoy from Niinisalo Training Area, Finland as part of Exercise Arrow on May 8, 2022.
Finland is not a member of NATO, yet, but the Finns, and their neighbors the Swedes, have been participating as partner nations in joint exercises with NATO forces for years. Nevertheless, both Finland and Sweden — while not neutral — have been firmly nonaligned with NATO, the Soviet Union or Russia until Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on February 24 “upended their thinking about security,” according to The Washington Post. Both Nordic countries are already members of the European Union.
Moscow has objected to widening NATO’s membership, especially to include countries like Finland that have long borders with Russia. But as this week’s FRIFO shows, troops from the United States and other NATO states are already training on Finnish soil.
Finland and Sweden submitted their applications to join NATO on May 18. “You are our closest partners. And your membership in NATO would increase our shared security,”
Exercise Arrow is an annual, multinational exercise taking place in Finland, where visiting NATO forces from the United States, United Kingdom, Latvia, and Estonia, train together with Finnish Defense Forces.
Training operations include high intensity force-on-force engagements and a live fire exercise. The purpose of the exercise to enhance mechanized units operational and procedural performance, develop interoperability with participating forces and demonstrate the ability to cooperate with partners.
4GWAR 