It was signed yesterday, Wednesday 18 January, in Paris, at the Ministry of Defense of the Republic of France, theOperational Memorandum of Understanding (Op. MoU) for the constitution of the NATO Space COE, i.e. of center of excellence (COE) NATO dedicated to space domination.
The Deputy Chief of Defense Staff, Army Corps General Carmine Masiello was present to sign for our country.
Following the recognition of space as an operational domain of the Alliance, France has proposed establishing and accrediting to NATO a center of excellence in the Toulouse headquarters, formerly the headquarters of the new one space command French, of the Space Lab and Space Military Academyand French Space Agencyas well as numerous industries operating in the sector.
The NATO Space COE project involves the development of expertise in the field of Space Support Operations (SSO), Space Domain Awareness (SDA) and Space Domain Coordination (SDC).
The document signed today outlines the provisions and obligations relating to the operation, financing, personnel, infrastructure, administrative and logistical support that will regulate the life of the centre.
After today's signing, the path to openness will continue with accreditation by an evaluation team of the NATO Allied Command Transformation and with the achievement of the IOC (Initial Operational Capability) in the summer of 2023, with the assignment of the first tranche of personnel.
I centers of excellence (COE) are multinational entities (created, financed, supported and offered for accreditation to NATO by one or more Member Countries) which express recognized expertise in the sector of expertise, guaranteeing support to the Atlantic Alliance, to members and partners in so-called 4 “pillars of transformation”: Education, Training, Exercise & Evaluation, Analysis & Lessons Learned, Doctrine Development & Standardization and Concept Development & Experimentation .
To date, NATO has granted accreditation to 28 Centres. Italy is a major contributing country, participating in 19 out of 29 NATO COEs.
