SIBIU, Romania—The U.S. Army V Corps participated in a Warfighting Symposium at Headquarters Multinational Corps South-East (MNC-SE) from April 17 to April 19, 2024, to provide cross-functional academics for land tactical planning and exercise battle coordination procedures.
“It is a great opportunity for the V Corps to be able to conduct engagement and partner up at the tactical level with our NATO partners and allies,” said Col. Sherman Watson, V Corps chief of fires. “Our focus for these days is to share our spirits in how we fight as a Corps and gain an understanding of how multinational corps conduct their operations as a corps tactical headquarters.”
During the three-day symposium, guests had an opportunity to listen to various subject matter experts from V Corps discuss multiple topics regarding modern-day warfare and to participate in discussions and open dialogue. It is the third time that V Corps has participated in a symposium of this kind.
“I would just ask you to leverage the relationships that we will make over the next couple of days, leverage the Victory Corps, as you move forward – reach out, ask questions, and hopefully, we can keep these conversations going,” said Lt. Gen Charles Costanza, the V Corps commanding general. “Let us help each other get a little bit sharper.”
The symposium centered on one of V Corps’ top priorities: interoperability. Interoperability is not just about systems and technology but is also about people, processes, and relationships that build stronger teams and increase lethality. Guests said that the working groups were one of the most important parts of the symposium. During these groups, guests were divided into teams by warfighting function to discuss their ways of conducting operations.
“During the working groups that V Corps has provided to us, we understood that we are doing things very similarly,” said Lt. Col. Marius Suciu, the chief of targeting for MNC-SE. “In case that we need to work together at any point of time we are more than ready to exchange information between us because we are doing pretty much the same things.”
These working groups helped attendees better understand the commonalities between their nations and the similarities in how they conduct military operations.
“The things that our allies and NATO partners do can sometimes be a little bit different, but they are very similar,” said Chief Warrant Officer 5 Louis Campos, the V Corps targeting chief. “It is always good to exchange ideas, tactics, techniques, and procedures between organizations and that’s what this symposium allowed us to do.”
At the end of the symposium, Maj. Gen. Cristian-Daniel Dan, the commanding general of the MNC-SE, said, “I have seen professionalism, cohesion, dedication, teamwork, and a very consolidated team, and that tells me a message. Whatever is next or whatever tomorrow’s fight is going to be – you are not going to fight alone.”
V Corps maintains a presence in Europe and reinforces NATO commitments with about 30,000 assigned, rotational, and supporting forces in nine countries primarily concentrated along NATO’s Eastern flank. Each unit conducts training exercises with its European counterparts to build readiness and interoperability and deter potential threats.
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