PRAGUE — Exercise Trident Juncture, taking place this fall in Spain, Portugal and Italy, will be NATO's largest exercise for more than a decade. The alliance will use the opportunity to test new training dynamics and to determine methods by which greater training effectiveness can be integrated into future exercises.
Speaking at a NATO roundtable for journalists during ITEC 2015 in Prague on 29th April 29, Wayne Buck of, Future Solutions, Modelling & Simulation for Allied Command Transformation, said, "Trident Juncture represents a shift from operations for the first time in years and offers us an opportunity for significant knowledge transfer, to ensure we retain and act upon the lessons learned from operational experience."
Lt. Col. Lieutenant Colonel Wolfgang Schmidt, head of the Wargaming and Modelling & Simulation Branch of NATO's Joint Force Training Center's Training Support Division, highlighted just how different this exercise will be in terms of its focus and the training objectives.
"We have now more or less come to the end of NATO-related training in Afghanistan, though there are some continuing residual activities," he said. "Trident Juncture gives us the opportunity to return the emphasis to Article Five type training, and to work effectively across the full range of participating national forces by adhering to the process 'train – advise – assist.' We have to reinforce that this is not a concept – we need to get it to reality in very short order," he said.
His statement reflects the challenges facing NATO training in the post-Afghanistan eraworld. While some may argue that there is a potential hiatus in the near future while doctrinal aspects and threat evaluation of the 'new world order' are agreed, Schmidt argues that "the necessity for training for Article 5 obligations has never gone away," and continues to be the driving force behind such exercises as Trident Juncture – in which over 30,000 troops, 200 aircraft and 50 naval vessels will participate.
Within and surrounding the Trident Juncture framework, 18 separate national exercises will take place, according to Buck. "One of the overarching objectives and a theme that will persist is the need to maintain interoperability at the national level post-Afghanistan," he said.
He Buck also stateds that companies in 15 nations have responded to as a result of NATO's invitation to industry to participate in the exercise. , The invitation was an effort to both broaden and deepen industry's understanding of the situations and issues confronting the aAlliance's training regime, responses have so far been received from industry in 15 nations.
From Schmidt's point of view, the future shows one thing to be certain. "The training scope is about to change," he said, adding that the experience coming from Trident Juncture and its innumerable component sub-exercises and allied activities "will have a huge impact on training execution in the future."
Training for NATO, of course, is about training of individuals just as much as it is about training at the unit level. Initiatives aimed at harnessing technology for individual training are being conducted across the alliance, including not least at the headquarters of Supreme Allied Commander Transformation in Norfolk, Virginia.
Salih Cem Kumsal, sStaff officer for Training Technologies Management, told the roundtable that mobile devices are becoming increasingly important in allowing trainees to self-pace their learning – an advance that one of the issues human factors experts have for years pointed to as a potential step change in learning management for some years.
Also important, according to Kumsal, are immersive training environments. The suspension of disbelief and the complete engagement of the individual are is an essential components of a program structure aimed at providing a continuum of training that will be sufficiently flexible to account accout for sudden changes in requirements as threat levels or perceptions changevary.
He points to the near ubiquitous use of Bohemia Interactive Simulations' VBS simulation software and the increasing desire in hunger developing within member nations to add the software's functionality to national-level training.
"Recognizsing this, we have negotiated a license for nations not currently using VBS to be able to use the latest version for two months, which will be helpful in generating better understanding of the growing power of this type of training aid and will accelerate its rollout on an even wider basis," he said.
Trident Juncture represents a major step forward in addressing the multiple layered training situation NATO faces. It is a complex, multi-faceted undertaking and it will be months before analysis of the results and the lessons learned start to filter through to national training curricula. One thing is certain, though: There's a given a healthy dose of pragmatism regarding the potential that for some of the lessons learned will to reveal national or systemic capability gaps.
"The only risk faced by anybody in Trident Juncture is if they're not ready to participate," Schmidt said.
