Noncombatant evacuation exercise tests Allies during Swift Response 15

HOHENFELS, Germany -- German and U.S. Soldiers conducted a noncombatant evacuation operation (NEO) as part of exercise Swift Response 15 on the Hohenfels Training Area (Germany), Aug. 30, 2015.

This was one of the first times the NEO has been included in a training rotation at the Joint Multinational Readiness Center here, and should feature in future combat training center rotations.

Led by the German Army and assisted by U.S. Soldiers of the 127th Brigade Engineer Battalion, 1st Brigade, 82nd Airborne Division, the mission focused on removing embassy personnel, diplomats and other critical civilians quickly and safely from the town of Kittensee, a replicated village in the western portion of the Hohenfels Training Area.

The civilians were portrayed by role-players and members of the U.S. Army's 1st Battalion, 4th Infantry Regiment.

Swift Response 15 is the U.S. Army's largest combined airborne training event in Europe since the end of the Cold War. More than 4,800 service members from 11 NATO nations -- including Bulgaria, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Spain, the United Kingdom and the United States -- will take part in the exercise on training areas in Bulgaria, Germany, Italy and Romania, Aug. 17-Sept. 13, 2015. Swift Response 15 is designed to integrate multiple Allied nations' crisis response forces into a cohesive team and demonstrate the combined ability to rapidly deploy and operate in support of maintaining a strong and secure Europe.