Photo By Spc. Rayonne Bissant | Romanian Army Lt. Gen. Cristian-Daniel Dan, commander of the Headquarters...... read more read more
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SIBIU, Romania – U.S. Army’s V Corps returned to support and train alongside NATO’s Headquarters Multinational Corps Southeast (MNC-SE) and roughly 12 other nations for training evaluation during Loyal Leda 2025 (LOLE25) in Sibiu, Romania, March 4-13, 2025.
LOLE25 is the Allied Land Command’s (LANDCOM) sponsored land domain tactical-level command post exercise/computer-assisted exercise (CPX / CAX) that trains and evaluates NATO Command Structure-NATO Force Structure (NCS-NFS) Corps. It is multinational with MNCE-SE as the primary training audience and NATO Rapid Deployable Corps-Spain (NRDC-ESP) as a secondary training audience/ Combat Readiness Evaluation (CREVAL).
From Jan.20-23, 2025, V Corps and MNC-SE conducted cross-functional academics and staff exercises that created an open dialogue with NATO allies, enabling the team to learn from each other and prepare for the execution of LOLE25.
During the 10-day computer-assisted training exercise, the focus was on planning for and conducting Article 5 (collective defense). The exercise allows V Corps to support more than 500 service members from HQ MNC-SE in building upon their understanding of staff responsibilities through various systems and processes in an operational environment, enhancing their war-fighting capabilities and increasing interoperability through shared understanding among allies.
“Our presence here is very important,” said Maj. Gen. Maciej Jablonski, member of the Polish Army and V Corps deputy commanding general of interoperability. “We were very warmly invited by the Corps commander and his staff. Our goal is to share the V Corps experience as a warfighting Corps with our NATO partners and train with them on the Warfighting functions.”
Warfighting readiness falls under V Corps lines of effort. V Corps is committed to developing the warfighting capabilities of NATO’s national and multinational corps and division forces through realistic scenarios that build capability and capacity along NATO’s eastern flank.
“We start shoulder-to-shoulder and show them how to create staff products that are important to understand how to visualize the battlefield for the Commander,” said Col. Christopher Judge, V Corps G7. “Then we show how to take that vision and apply it so the subordinate units and the staff can clearly understand what he wants done.”
V Corps invests in building readiness, lethality and warfighting capability through collaborative forums and initiatives. The 4th Special Force Assistance Brigade (4th SFAB) from Fort Carson, Colorado is one of units that supported V Corps in the mission of training MNCE-SE on enabling and building warfighting capability.
“We brought advisors that teamed up with senior subject matter experts from V Corps to come and work with MNC-SE and observe their warfighting functions,” said Lt. Col. Drew Rossow, a defensive security operations officer assigned to 4th Special Force Assistance Brigade. “This enables the headquarters to understand the warfighting environment and improve their preparedness to execute large scale ground combat operations.”
Each year, V Corps oversees roughly 30 to 40 exercises like LOLE25, which build readiness and interoperability throughout the European region. This is essential in providing combat-credible land forces that deter potential threats and assure our NATO allies of our dedication to a quick response should deterrence fail.
“A lot of times, we focus only on technical interoperability, but really, it’s three things: technical, human and procedural interoperability,” said Rossow. “To be able to affect all three of those in an exercise like Loyal Leda, we come together as a unified headquarters to understand how our allies fight by developing the rapport, the staff-to-staff coordination and battle rhythm execution to prepare them for warfighting capacity in large ground scale operations.”
Interoperability goes beyond technology and systems. Instead, it demonstrates a focus on building stronger teams and increasing lethality, improving U.S. warfighting capabilities and NATO as a whole.
“It comes back to three things that’ll enable us to win the fight, and that’s allies, allies, and allies,” said Judge. “Every time that we build mutual trust and help an ally in an area where they need assistance, it only makes us stronger because we know to our left and our right, our partners and allies are at the same level that we are.”
Romania joined NATO in 2004 and has remained a steadfast ally with the United States and NATO. LOLE25 has allowed the two countries and other NATO allies and partners to continue enhancing cooperation and strengthening their relationships.
“Loyal Leda 2025 is an exercise planned, organized and led by the Allied Land Command (LANDCOM) in Turkiye through the Joint Forces Training Centre (JFTC) in Poland with the support of V Corps and Alabama National Guard,” said Romanian army Lt. Col. Dobra-Olteanu Alexandru, commander of the Loyal Leda 2025 exercise. “This exercise also aims to enhance trust, transparency, cooperation and interoperability between Allied and partner structures, essential aspects for the success of operations conducted under the support of NATO.”
| Date Taken: | 03.14.2025 |
| Date Posted: | 03.18.2025 04:13 |
| Story ID: | 492997 |
| Location: | SIBIU, RO |
| Hometown: | FORT CARSON, COLORADO, US |
| Web Views: | 108 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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