SLUNJ, Croatia -- More than 1400 participants from Croatia, Slovenia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Albania, Kosovo, Macedonia, Montenegro, the United Kingdom and the United States took part in the opening ceremony for Immediate Response 15, here on Sep. 9, 2015.
Immediate Response 15 is a 13 day multinational, brigade-level, command post and tactical field training exercise running from September 9-22, 2015. The exercise is designed to improve NATO interoperability and spans across Croatia and Slovenia.
During the ceremony at Eugen Kvaternik Military Training Area in Slunj, Croatia, soldiers from the 173rd Airborne Brigade's 54th Brigade Engineer Battalion, the Croatian Armored Mechanized Brigade's Mechanized Battalion, the Slovenian 1st Brigade's 132nd Mountain Regiment, the Bosnian 4th Brigade's 1st Battalion, Albanian 2nd Battalion, Red Forces Brigade and the Macedonian Special Operations Regiment integrated their formations to form a multinational battalion, underscoring partnership and cooperation.
Both U.S. Col. William Glaser and Croatian Col. Denis Tretinjak, the exercise co-directors, addressed the combined formation on building partner capacity to plan, prepare and execute joint and combined training in a real-time, realistic setting. They also spoke of the importance of building strong relationships and interoperability among the forces.
"This exercise started in 2005 as a train up to a deployment in Afghanistan," said Col. Glaser. "It grew from there to incorporate more multinational partners and increasing levels of complexity to get to where it is now. Training in Croatia and Slovenia affords us a unique opportunity to promote regional stability and security while strengthening mutual trust and interoperability."
"[Our] tasks become more complex and uncertain with every day, and the only way to successfully respond to those challenges is to build strong and effective coalitions, especially through security cooperation," said Col. Tretinjak. "In addition to technical interoperability, I am confident that the Immediate Response 15 will successfully continue to influence the human interoperability dynamic."
At the close of the ceremony, Soldiers from the various units met with one another, ate together, and embarked on a cultural day in Slunj to initiate those bonds that will prove vital in the training exercise and future operations.
The 173rd Airborne Brigade, based in Vicenza, Italy, is the U.S. Army Contingency Force in Europe, providing ready forces anywhere in the U.S., European, Africa and Central Commands areas of responsibility within 18 hours.
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