International exercise is back
After two years of absence, the international military trainings exercise Frisian Flag was back in the air over north-west Europe early spring. With a fierce grip of the covid-19 pandemic and all its accompanying uncertainties on the global society, there was less interest of all potential involved air forces to gather in large groups, resulting into cancellation of the Frisian Flag editions of 2020 and 2021. With an improving health situation the planning for a new edition in 2022 went on and despite a new critical situation with the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the exercise was finally live! From 28 March a variety of international fighter jets had gathered for two weeks at Leeuwarden Air Force Base in the Dutch province of Friesland. In fact all the participants had already arrived the week before. With an initial morning mission planned for the exercise start on Monday, it was essential for flight crews to do their team and individual planning the weekend before. Aircraft that arrived at Leeuwarden AFB to participate included Italian Eurofighters and Tornados, American F-16’s, French Rafale’s and Mirage 2000’s and Canadian CF-18’s. The Dutch air force contributed with F-16’s, F-35 Lightning II’s, a C-130 Hercules and some AH-64D Apache helicopters. The aircraft deployed to Leeuwarden AB included additional samples for back-up reasons and secure the exercise flight operations. Fighter aircraft that only participated occasionally and mostly limited for 1 or 2 days flying from their home base, included USAFE F-35’s from RAF Lakenheath, RAF Typhoons and German Eurofighters. Other aircraft in support for Frisian Flag were mainly for transport of equipment and personal, like with USAF Hercules and Canadian CC-130, CC-150 and CC-17 and for liaison duties with Italian P-180, French TBM-700 and also a Finnish PC-12 to bring observers. That Frisian Flag 2022 could continue per late March was far from certain in the weeks before the exercise. The earlier rising regional tensions, when Russia built up a large military presence near its borders with Ukraine, became a new threat for complete Eastern Europe when Russia moved its forces into the sovereign Ukraine state. NATO forces immediately responded to secure the situation more or less, by strengthening its forces at the east European borders. As a consequence NATO aircraft started a 24/7 presence with patrolling fighter aircraft, as well as radar and intel surveillance aircraft to monitor the frontier areas, all supported with tanker aircraft for aerial refuelling. The sudden extra need of aircraft for this NATO mission, affected countries programmes for scheduled exercise planning. In the early hectic and uncertain days it caused the cancellation of the UK organised Cobra Warrior exercise at RAF Waddington and Coningsby planned for early March. Also the annual European Aerial Refuelling Training (EART) exercise had to be cancelled due to the requested tanker capacity need for the new joint NATO effort. The EART training, organised by the European Air Transport Command (EATC), often runs in parallel with the Frisian Flag exercise bringing European and NATO tanker aircraft together to share knowledge and improving skills while working closely together. The EART 2022 training was scheduled to take place at the German air base of Wunstorf, home of Air Transport Wing 62 (LTG 62) flying the transport and tanker capable A-400M aircraft.
Moving in time, it became clear that Frisian Flag which is organised by the Dutch Air Combat Command (ACC), still had changes to fulfil its ambition in to run the exercise. Other exercises, which followed a similar path, were Cold Response in Scandinavia and Iniohos at Andravida Air base in Greece, all in the March-April time frame. Nevertheless it was also obvious that for Frisian Flag the exercise could not continue in the original set-up. Countries that initially had confirmed their presence were forced to alter their plans by reducing the number of aircraft and others deciding to fly from their home base or in a worse case they even had to withdraw from their intended participation completely. Such a final decision had to be taken by the Polish air force, which had originally agreed to join with several Mig- 29 Fulcrum and F-16 aircraft. With their border directly connecting with Ukraine, the Polish AF felt the immediate need to have their fighter aircraft available for the NATO surveillance flights. Although the unavoidable last minute changes, Leeuwarden base commander and F-35 pilot, Cmdr Johan van Deventer was pleased that the exercise still could continue in a quickly adapted way and expressed the importance of an exercise like Frisian Flag. Cmdr van Deventer explained that fighter pilots need their ongoing training to be ready for whatever situation one never hopes it will come. However the current reality at Europe’s eastern flank showed that training remained essential to be prepared and defend the freedom of the NATO members. Cmdr van Deventer, with combat name “Cake”, further explained that it is in the normal daily flight operations hardly possible to train with large aircraft formations all kinds of complex scenarios in a mission and therefor it is good for pilots to join exercises like Frisian Flag to develop these skills as well.
Frisian Flag exercise leader and Dutch F-16 pilot “Joker” told journalists that a normal exercise day was composed out of a morning mission, taking of at 9.30 AM and another mission scheduled to take of at 13.30 PM. Each mission, with an ove rall duration of about 2.5 hours, consisted out of 30 jets which were divided in to roughly 20 aircraft for the friendly -blue- forces, and the remainder flying assets were acting as offensive and opposing -red- forces. “Joker” furthermore explained that the first week of the exercise had a defensive focus, mainly with aerial fights between blue and red aircraft over the North Sea. The Frisian Flag exercise location over sea is ideal, while located very close to Leeuwarden AB and avoiding useless transit time for the aircraft. The second week had additional exercise air space available over the northern landscape of The Netherlands where other elements were added to the mission scenarios, like slow mover protection and attacking ground targets. The exercise included no practice of live weapons and although the bombing range “The Vliehors” was nearby, weapon use was only simulated. During this last week the Frisian Flag fighter aircraft also worked together with B-52’s from Minot AFB, USA, currently on a temporary European deployment at RAF Fairford, UK. Although tanker and radar warning capacity for the exercise was scarce due to their move priority to the NATO contribution at Europe’s east flank surveillance operation, such aircraft could occasionally join a Frisian Flag mission. Tanker involvement was mainly provided by Airbus A-330 MRTT (Multi Role Tanker Transport) aircraft from Eindhoven AB, The Netherlands, or from Cologne, Germany. Radar warning capacity was provided by Boeing E-3A AWACS from NATO Air Base Geilenkirchen, Germany as well as a French L’Armée de l’air (air force) E-3F from Base Aérienne (Air Force Base) Avord, France.
Frisian Flag missions are organised in repetitive fixed patterns. The appointed pilots for a morning mission have their large briefing and planning the day before. Short before their mission another small briefing takes place to fine tune on details and get the latest info on the weather and exercise area status. The crews participating in the afternoon wave do the same only during the morning prior to the mission. For each mission a leader is appointed and while it is a rotative role, a reasonable number of experienced pilots can get the opportunity to fulfil this responsible task. When a mission is completed it is finished with an overall mission mass-debrief, to do analyses and conclusions with all involved to see if goals have been achieved and to learn of the things which may have be done better. Participants who flew the Frisian Flag mission from their home base, joined the mass-debrief via video link. The ability to react and adapt to the recent international crisis and in parallel making efforts to continue with large and important trainings initiatives like Frisian flag, Cold Response and Iniohos are important and effective indicators contributing to the public need of security. Initial preparations for a new edition Frisian Flag in 2023 has started as planned.
Text and photos by Peter ten Berg