With the company Distinguished Visitor Day, organized in the military airport of Decimomannu, home of the Experimental and Standardized Aerospace Department (RSSTA) of the Italian Air Force, the live part of the Joint Stars 2018 (JS18) exercise, a training activity of major national importance, organized and managed directly by the Defense Staff through its "operational arm", has ended, or the Operational Command of Summit Joint Forces (COI).
The Defense demonstrated how the operational capabilities of the Armed Forces are equipped with a high level of interoperability, while maintaining the training purposes of the individual components, as underlined by the Operations Commander of Vertice Interforze, team admiral Giuseppe Cavo Dragone "the main objective was to achieve the highest possible level of interoperability of the Armed Forces, with an intelligent use of all specialties to achieve a common goal thanks to the development and integration of common procedures".
The military and civil authorities witnessed a complex tactical event, which saw all the assets of the Armed Forces and some members of the US Marines Corps operate in synergy. During these two weeks, more than 2000 military exercises, more than 25 between airplanes and helicopters, dozens of land, naval and amphibious vehicles have been engaged in intense daytime and nighttime training activities.
The Joint Stars 2018 was designed to train the commands and forces on the different types of missions that may be the subject of future national, multinational and coalition operations and is a precious opportunity to achieve, through the joint training of the Italian Army, Navy and Air Force synergy and economies, as well as to share resources and maximize interoperability in the defense sector, refining the ability to intervene with an increasingly marked inter-force footprint.
Divided into two parts, the Joint Stars has allowed, in this first phase that has just ended, to federate the concomitant exercises "Golden Wings" of the Italian Army, "Mare Aperto" of the Navy and "Vega 18" of the Air Force Military as well as, on the basis of the need to seek ever more marked interoperability at a multinational level, the "Ramstein Guard 6-2018" exercise conducted by NATO.
Unlike the previous editions, the commands and units undergoing training were faced with further difficulties, since the use scenario envisaged the simulation of intervention in an environment characterized by cybernetic threats and by chemical-biological and radioactive threats ( CBRN). Furthermore, taking into account that the Italian Defense is responsible for the management of the NATO Response Force throughout 2018, the capabilities of the Italian military units included in NATO were also tested. Very High Readiness Joint Task Force (VJTF), that is the rapid intervention force of the Atlantic Alliance, a real "spearhead" of the NATO structure of response to international crises.
The Joint Stars 2018 in the live phase was a test for the Defense also in the field of environmental protection, since the development of training activities of this type allows, thanks to the simultaneous and coordinated execution of exercises involving assets drawn from all the Armed Forces, to optimize the use of training areas, concentrating the activities themselves over time and space and, therefore, significantly reducing the impact on territories and local populations.
