NATO is launching the largest air force exercises since the end of the Cold War

WUNSTORF, Germany — More than 250 aircraft and 10,000 personnel will participate in a two-week military exercise starting Monday involving NATO countries and Japan, in which host country Germany bills as the largest deployment of aircraft in the alliance’s history.

Planning for the training began in 2018. But it comes as fighting escalates on NATO’s doorstep in Ukraine, where Kiev forces, backed by weapons from Western allies, are mounting an offensive to reclaim territory captured by Russia since the invasion ordered last year by President Vladimir V. Putin.

Officials involved in NATO’s 25-nation exercise said it sends a signal of alliance solidarity.

“I’d be quite surprised if a world leader didn’t take note of what this shows, in terms of the spirit of this alliance, what the strength of this alliance means,” Amy Gutmann, the US ambassador to Germany, told reporters last week. reporters. . “The same goes for Mr. Putin.”

The exercise, known as Air Defender, is led by the German government and will bring together the largest number of aircraft from outside Germany for a training mission since NATO’s founding in 1949. The United States flew about 100 National Guard and Navy aircraft to Germany for the exercises.

The 12-day event kicks off with an air show in Wunstorf, in northern Germany, featuring cargo and refueling planes – workhorse aircraft that have been crucial in getting weapons and supplies to Ukraine. Pilots will perform other missions with fighter jets, the show horses of the skies, at five other bases across Germany.

The exercise comes a few weeks after the United States reluctantly agreed to allow Ukrainian troops to train on and eventually acquire US F-16 fighter jets — not only for the current conflict with Russia, but also as part of a longer term. deterrence strategy.

Air Force General Ingo Gerhartz of Germany, who oversees Air Defender, said it was “not directed at anyone” and stressed that no offensive scenarios would be applied. “We are a defense alliance, so this exercise will be of a defensive nature,” General Gerhartz told reporters in Berlin.

But General Gerhartz said when he proposed the exercise, in 2018, “the trigger for me at the time was the conquest, the annexation of Crimea, the Ukrainian peninsula, four years earlier by Mr. Putin. After Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine last year, General Gerhartz said, allies on NATO’s eastern flank, closest to Russia, are asking for “reassurance” that the alliance will defend them in the event of aggression by Moscow.

One goal of the exercise is to test how planes from so many states communicate with each other, said Douglas Barrie, a military aerospace expert at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, a research institute in London.

Mr Barrie said cargo and fuel crews will be closely watched during the exercises because of the important role they play in conflicts, including in Ukraine. But mostly, he said, the exercises are part of a “signaling” campaign – to let Putin know what NATO is capable of launching against Russia, if necessary.

Even if the exercises were planned years ago, Mr Barrie said: “I would be very surprised, shall we say, if the alliance did not consider this part of its overall messaging strategy.”

Christopher F. Schuetze contributed reporting from Berlin.