Germany to host NATO’s largest-ever air exercise ‘Air Defender 23’

Europe, News June 8, 2023 , by IRIA No Comments

Germany is preparing to host Air Defender 23 Exercise over European skies, the biggest deployment drill in NATO’s history. The 11-day-long show of force would take place from June 12-23, 2023.

More than 10,000 participants and 250 military aircraft from 25 different nations would participate in the Air Defender 23. NATO allies seek to increase their interoperability through large-scale air drills and intimidate potential adversaries such as Russia. The United States alone is sending more than 2,000 personnel from the U.S. Air National Guards and around 100 aircraft to participate in the training drills.

Germany’s Wunstorf air base would play a critical role in the Air Defender 23 exercise and offer logistics support. The air base is the main hub of the transport and tanker planes and is home to the German A400M transport aircraft.

The announcement for the exercise came during a meeting between Lieutenant General Ingo Gerhartz of the German Air Force and U.S. Ambassador to Germany Amy Gutmann on June 7, 2023.

“We are showing that NATO territory is our red line, that we are prepared to defend every centimeter of this territory,” Gerhartz said while talking to media after his meeting with Gutmann. Gerhartz also said that the allied partners do not intend confrontation with Moscow.

#AirDefender23 will be the largest air forces deployment exercise since @NATO was founded. pic.twitter.com/yOvV0iKb2w
— Air National Guard (@AirNatlGuard) June 7, 2023

German Lieutenant General Gerhartz highlighted that during the exercise, NATO pilots would not “conduct any flights toward Kaliningrad. So this is intended to be defensive.” Kaliningrad is a Russian exclave located on the Baltic Sea between Poland and Lithuania.

“This is an exercise that would be absolutely impressive to anybody who’s watching, and we don’t make anybody watch it,” U.S. Ambassador to Germany Amy Gutmann said. “It will demonstrate beyond a shadow of a doubt the agility and the swiftness of our allied force in NATO as a first responder,” she told reporters in Berlin.

“I would be pretty surprised if any world leader was not taking note of what this shows in terms of the spirit of this alliance, which means the strength of this alliance,” Gutmann added.

Director of the U.S. Air National Guard Lieutenant General Michael A Loh also commented on the upcoming exercise. He said that the exercise focuses on “the readiness of our force. It’s about coordination, not just within NATO, but with our other allies and partners outside of NATO.”

^{Germany’s Chief Lt. Gen. Ingo Gerhartz and U.S. Air National Guard Director Lt. General Michael Loh to preview Air Defender 23, a Germany-led exercise to enhance the interoperability of multiple U.S. services and NATO partner nations’ militaries. (Image Credit: Twitter/@USAmbGermany)}

Apart from the NATO member countries, Sweden, which seeks to become a NATO member, and Japan will also take part in the drill. Several speculations had been circulating about Japan’s addition to the NATO alliance following the news of its participation in NATO’s military drills, however, Japan’s Prime Minister Fumio Kishida has rejected the possibility of Tokyo being a full member of the NATO alliance.

Air traffic disruption

NATO had been planning to conduct a large-scale air exercise over the European skies for several years. Large blocks of airspace will be closed down to civil aircraft during exercise. Several civilian flights have been rerouted or canceled following the air drills. Approximately 800 flights will be rerouted daily as a result of the exercise and the associated measures

Civilian pilots have been advised to avoid three main clusters.

North, extending into Danish and Dutch airspace
East, close to the Polish and Czech borders
South, from Luxembourg along the French frontier, as far as the Lake Constance

The South cluster would be most affected by the rerouting of the flights as it is the main route for many commercial holiday flights from Western Europe to Southern Turkey and Greece.