Command Post Training II: End of the Exercise

Strasbourg (France), 12th June 2008

Today at 14h00 the exercise ended with a closing ceremony at the parade ground of the Aubert de Vincelles barracks. Lieutenant General Pedro Pitarch, Commanding General Eurocorps, thanked all the participants for the good work and the excellent results obtained during these two weeks.

During the ceremony Lieutenant General Pitarch expressed the following closing remarks:

"This exercise ran also properly because of the numerous and outstanding officers, non-commissioned and troops who came to Strasbourg in order to reinforce us during these two weeks. Therefore I would like to express as well my warmest thanks to the personnel of the French Force Headquarters number 2, to the personnel of the 17th Polish Mechanized brigade, to the personnel of the 7th Belgian Medium Brigade and of the Spanish CEPOEN, all those units being subordinated to Eurocorps for our next exercise in Mourmelon, that is Common Effort 08. Many of you coming from various multinational headquarters did support this exercise as well. These were the representatives of Lille, Heidelberg, Glücksburg, Madrid, Ramstein and many other places."

Some impressions of the leaders of this exercise:

Brigadier General NACHTSHEIM was the Exercise Director, in lead of DISTAFF (Directing Staff), with the task to steer the exercise and conduct it towards a learning experience for the Primary Training Audience.

How did DISTAFF manage this task?

"We use two tools to achieve our goal. The first concerns the role of the Exercise Control in DISTAFF which analysises the Land Component Command's reactions and orchestrates the events and incidents injection. The second is the evaluation team which reports are used as a feedback, and for the Lessons Learnt process."

What is the value of this exercise for the Response Cells (RCs) and augmentees?

"These cells work for DISTAFF and in many parts of our organization. For the MSUs, which are reduced in size, the full spectrum of procedures can not be played, but they benefit from training with our procedures in some main functional areas. For all augmentees it is as well a highly valuable training preparing for operations in challenging scenarios in a multinational environment."

Brigadier General Ramirez was the Commander of the Initial Entry Force (Land) at the Initial Command Post (ICP) in Sevilla, Perseus.

Your Command Post was the Primary Training Area for this exercise. Did we achieve our goals?

"The validation of the ICP concept is achieved. Thanks to the successful tackling of the incidents we could test every detail of the concept"

How did this Command Post cope with the RSOM mission?

"The realistic play permitted us to completely command and control the Reception, Staging and Onward Movement (RSOM) mission."

Was the JEC test a success?

"The Joint Effect Centre, this new functional area worked independently. After the execution of some tasks I can tell you that they are a great help for the commander. Some extra study will result in its final structure."

 

Pictures: OR3 FERNANDEZ

 

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