US, NATO Allies Launch Biggest Airborne Drills Across Europe Since Cold War

[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Up5MgU28Pc]

• Published on Aug 18, 2015
  The United States says it has launched the biggest allied airborne drills in Europe since the end of the Cold War. Nearly 5-thousand soldiers from 11 NATO member states are taking part in the four week maneuver dubbed Swift Response 15. According to the US army, the simultaneous multinational airborne operations began on Saturday and will take place across Germany, Italy, Bulgaria and Romania. The training event is aimed at helping coordination among allied “high-readiness forces” and boosting their capacity to deploy rapidly. The growing NATO drills and deployments on Russia’s doorstep have drawn Moscow’s criticism. But the Western military alliance has defended the number of its military exercises as a response to what it calls Russian aggression against Ukraine.

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