1,500 soldiers, twenty helicopters and countless Drenthe ‘objects’ to be conquered from home base Leeuwarden. The large -scale military exercise will start tomorrow Falcon Springwith which the Ministry of Defense wants to train its soldiers on the primary main task of the army: defend the territory of the Netherlands and allies.
Major Mark Bakker of the 13th Infantry Battalion Air Mobile in Assen has been preparing for a year on preparing this military exercise. And according to him this is more important than ever. “With all the developments we experience in Europe, it is important to focus on our most important task.” Bakker refers to the war between Russia and Ukraine.
This conflict is also the basis for the scenarios that Bakker has drawn up for Falcon Spring, An operation in which helicopters play an essential role. “Our specialization is the collaboration between land and air. That is what the three participating airmobile battalions have been trained.”
Offensive and defensive actions towards the enemy are part of those tasks, but there is also an important task ready for these soldiers in terms of logistics. “We specialize in the transport of staff and military loads. The moment we are somewhere on the ground, logistics must also be set up there.”
All those facets are discussed in the exercise that will be held above the three northern provinces from 12 to 23 May. The soldiers collect tomorrow morning at the military airbase in Leeuwarden, the starting point of the exercise. “What we actually simulate is that we are performing a strategic displacement this week.”
The soldiers were warned in advance what operations they will perform, but in Leeuwarden they are presented with the first assignments. The task is: ‘free’ from occupied Dutch areas. “We are used as a unit to perform certain counter -actions against that advancing counterparty,” Bakker explains.
These counteractions consist of, for example, defending or recapturing vital objects, such as buildings or bridges. “We are a slight infantry unit that can come to the scene in a short time. Our way of acting is that we never stay at a location for more than 48 hours, because we have few things with us. These are short, fast actions that we are going to perform.”
International cooperation is sought in the exercise, because some of the helicopters used comes from the American 12th Combat Aviation Brigade from the German Wiesbaden. But the soldiers on the ground are all Dutch.
To make the exercise as realistic as possible, the locations and actions for the soldiers are secret. On an unknown military complex in Drenthe, American helicopters are attacking the enemies. “Of the 1,500 soldiers within the exercise, we have around 150 who simulate the opponents.”
During the exercise, the soldiers have vests and channels on their weapons that indicate whether people have been injured or were eliminated. During the exercise, shooting is shot with loose flodders. “With these resources we can all follow the soldiers and afterwards the maneuvers can be completely dissected, so that we can analyze the implementation. There are also all observators that see how the plans are implemented.”
The purpose of these specific actions is to reclaim the complex. “Then there will be a burglary, which means that we blow out a piece of fence. Then we go inside and we wipe the complex clean. We take that in, set up on the defense and hold on for a certain time,” says Bakker.
After this promotion, the battalion will receive a follow -up assignment and they are picked up by the helicopters for the following actions. “That way we actually go through the Northern Netherlands for two weeks.”