UK: Ships of Standing NATO Mine Countermeasures Group 1 in Joint Warrior Exercise

On Monday, April 15, ships of SNMCMG1 went underway to proceed north to start the sea phase of this year’s first Joint Warrior exercise. After the weekend filled by pre-sail conference, and preparations for going underway, all SNMCMG1 ships left Glasgow (Scotland) and started their transit to area of operations off coast of Scotland. This is the first opportunity for SNMCMG1 this year to cooperate in scenario-based exercise.

Joint Warrior is a multinational exercise coordinated and led by UK that combines land, air and maritime operations in an unstable region of the world. There are 30 ships, 70 airplanes and helicopters and around 12 000 soldiers from Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, The Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Sweden and UK. contributing to this exercise. Mine countermeasures vessels of SNMCMG1 are responsible for preparing (clearing) coastal waters for other units to enter the disputed zone. At the same time the ships are ready for counteracting asymmetric threat and other terrorist activities in the region.

The sea phase of the exercise will be conducted between April 15^th and 26^th in the North Sea between UK and Ireland. The goal of this exercise is to enforce peace in unstable region of the world having UN Security Council Resolution as a mandate to do so. The main focus for Standing NATO Mine Countermeasures Group 1 (SNMCMG1) is to conduct anti-mine operations as well as responding to any other possible situations that are expected to take place during any conflict.

The scenario of Joint Warrior is entirely fictitious although there are similarities with present and future areas of naval operations. It has been designed to support the exercise aims and objectives. Due to conflict escalation between artificial countries UN Security Council has developed a resolution upon which NATO forces are currently getting into the unstable region to resolve the situation.

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Naval Today Staff, April 17, 2013; Image: Polish Navy