COVER STORY
Exercise BRILLIANT JUMP 24
Since 1 Jan 2024 , HQ ARRC has been on standby as the Land Component Command of the NATO Response Force ( NRF ). The NRF has the overarching purpose of being able to provide a rapid military response to an emerging crisis , whether for collective defence purposes or for other crisisresponse operations 1 . Exercise BRILLIANT JUMP 24 ( BRJU24 ) gave the NRF the chance to rehearse their actions should the force be activated . It was one of the contributing exercises to Exercise STEADFAST DEFENDER 2024 , NATO ’ s largest military exercise since the end of the Cold War .
The first part of BRJU24 took place within barracks , and tested HQ ARRC ’ s response to an alert message sent by our higher HQ ; once the alert was received , the message was cascaded to all HQ ARRC personnel , who had to respond within a certain timeframe . This rehearsed the first step that would take place should ARRC be activated as the NRF Land Component Command . Thanks to everyone ’ s quick responses , ARRC passed its ALERTEX with , as the saying goes , time to spare .
The second part of the exercise , known as the DEPLOYEX , picked up where the ALERTEX finished . In the scenario everyone in ARRC had received the message that they should be ready to deploy to a crisis in eastern Europe at very short notice . Then the HQ received
a new message : the deployment to Poland would commence in two- or three-days ’ time . The first to depart were the Operational and Liaison Reconnaissance Team ( OLRT ). Their key task was to get to Poland as quickly as possible and establish a Command Post with communications , and sufficient working space and
accommodation for the arrival of the Forward Coordination Element ( FCE ). Once in Poland , the OLRT set up secure communications so it could send data back and forth and run video conferences with the Operations Centre back in Imjin Barracks . Once everything was in place , the FCE left Innsworth and joined the OLRT at the Command Post in Poland , where they established a comprehensive working area and added even more types of communications .
Meanwhile a few kilometres from ARRC ’ s Command Post , thousands of troops and hundreds of vehicles from the Very High Readiness Joint Task Force ( Land ) ( VJTFL ) were making their way from home locations in the UK , Türkiye , Spain , Albania and Poland , to assemble in Drawsko Pomorskie , in western Poland . Once all troops had arrived at their designated locations and their communications established , integration training began . This started with a demonstration day to which all the nations on the exercise brought their vehicles and equipment to one place . This allowed all the
troops to learn about the capabilities and roles of the different units . A very impressive sight , from main battle tanks , to artillery , drones , engineers and everything in between . The following days saw the different nations training together and provided some good opportunities to learn how each other do their business , not to mention the chance to compare ration packs !
The exercise was a huge success . The opportunity to practise the deployment process we would follow if we were activated as the NRF , or as a high readiness warfighting corps , as well as the opportunity to work with our allies from across NATO , has been invaluable . Important lessons were learnt , and the number of VIP visits to the exercise was testament to how important ARRC ’ s part is in the bigger plan .
1 https :// www . nato . int / cps / en / natolive / topics _ 49755 . htm the imjin SUMMER 2024
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