READY FOR TODAY – EVOLVING FOR TOMORROW
Lt. Gen. Tim Radford (left), commanding officer of the ARRC, receives an in-brief from the staff of the Baltic Defence College in Tartu, Estonia during his visit there
Sept. 19, 2017.
threats. As with every programme of
change this must be done within the
constraints of time, space, available
resources and the resultant effects to
organisation and outputs. Additionally,
the inter-system considerations of
working alongside NATO headquarters
and forces must be woven into the plan. operational level of command with sub-
tasks of determining the headquarters
construct, its core processes and
designing the command post layout; and
wider development along the combatant
functions to develop the headquarters’
capability. This will be undertaken along
three lines of operations: The ARRC has the ability to observe
an agile organisation that is evolving in
response to a very real and proximate
threat. Equally, there is a lot that the
ARRC can learn about readiness from
an organisation that is constantly poised
to deploy and lead its entire country in
collective defence at any moment.
Estonian C2 has been in constant
evolution, but there is always room
for improvement. Some of the areas
identified for development are: Personnel
limitations, which result in many having
to fulfil dual roles that in turn limits the
headquarters’ ability to run and participate
in exercises simultaneously; how to link
the current headquarters to the future
vision given resource limitations; and
what interoperability with other countries
and allies looks like. a.
Deployable headquarters
development; ABOUT THE AUTHOR
For the ARRC to better understand the
requirement and support the EDF with
this programme, a staff advisory team
led by the ARRC’s Assistance Chief
of Staff (ACOS) G5 was deployed to
Estonia in May 2018 with the purpose
of conducting an initial training needs
analysis of the EDF headquarters. The
analysis focussed on the ability of the
EDF headquarters to command force
elements in executing the Estonian
National Defence Plan.
As agreed in subsequent talks, the
programme will focus on: Identifying
and developing the EDF headquarters’
concept
b. Deployable headquarters collective
development;
c. Deployable headquarters individual
capability development.
In September 2018 the ARRC Chief
of Staff visited Estonia and discussed
the details of the report and agreed the
future direction for the ARRC and EDF
headquarters cooperation. This meeting
was followed by a series of observer-
mentor visits to EDF headquarters
exercises beginning in November, which
provided an opportunity to see the EDF
headquarters operate in a supporting
role to the Estonian government based
in a real-world exercise.
Lieutenant Colonel Mikk Pukk is a 25-
year veteran of the Estonian Defence
Forces and currently serves as the team
lead for the ARRC’s Operations and
Coordination (G35) cell. In his previous
assignment he served on the Estonian
Defence Force’s Joint Staff in Tallinn,
Estonia as the Chief of Operations (J3).
Lt. Col. Pukk holds a Bachelor’s Degree
from the Estonian National Defence
Academy and is a graduate of the Baltic
Defence College.
The relationship between the ARRC
and the EDF is based on maintaining
the Estonian lead in the activity
and supporting, not leading, their
development programme. The benefits to
the EDF in this activity are clear and the
opportunities for the ARRC to learn from
the programme are equally beneficial.
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