Russia has accepted NATO’s invitation to be an observer at the latter’s Trident Juncture exercise to be held in Norway from 25 October to 7 November, at a time when relations between the Alliance and Russia are particularly strained (see related item).
“Russia has been invited with all the other signatories of the Vienna document (...) and it has accepted and will be there as an observer under the OSCE regime”, a military source announced on the sidelines of the NATO defence ministers’ meeting. The same source said the observers – two per country – “will be able to visit every part of the exercise if they like”, and will be kept informed of what they see on a daily basis.
The Vienna document, of which Moscow is a signatory, recommends that, in the event of a large-scale exercise – i.e. more than 13,000 military – the organisers should authorise observers to attend briefings on the scenario of the exercise and its progress.
Trident Juncture 2018 will be an exercise under Article 5 scenario, i.e. assistance in the event of attack. The scenario is simple: Norway is attacked by third countries and the other members of the Alliance intervene. In total, 31 countries – the 29 Allies and Sweden and Finland that will make their airspaces and airbases available – will take part in the exercise which is expected to bring together some 45,000 people, 60 vessels from 14 states, and 150 aircraft.
In these times of tension with Russia, Alliance officials have endeavoured to explain that this exercise is not directed against Moscow. “The scenario is not real at all; artificially made up; everything is artificial”, a military source explained, pointing out that the decision to carry out such an exercise was taken before “the change in the security climate”. “Exercise Trident Juncture in Norway was announced in 2013. And it is an exercise planned over the long term”, NATO General Secretary Jens Stoltenberg pointed out when speaking in public. (Original version in French by Camille-Cerise Gessant)