On June 7 Lithuanian soldiers were completing joint assignments in one of the largest NATO exercises, Anakonda 2016, in Poland alongside Croatian, Polish and U.S. troops. The exercise is attended by a platoon assigned to the Mechanised Infantry Brigade Iron Wolf, one more platoon from the Lithuanian Grand Duke Kęstutis Mechanised Infantry Battalion, and a combat engineer squad with Juozas Vitkus Engineer Battalion. Among the Lithuanian participants there are also continuous mandatory initial military service conscripts.
The exercise trains cohesion between Alliance forces as they respond to military, chemical and cyber threats on land, at sea and in the air.
The day before Lithuanian soldiers underwent a Polish-conducted NBC training in a decontamination facility installed by their Polish colleagues. The training event honed procedures and personnel actions following contamination of a unit with chemical and biological weapons.
Lithuanian soldiers are also training movement from concentration area and to prepare for an allied operation.
Exercise Anakonda is attended by roughly 31 thousand troops from 24 NATO and Partnership for Peace countries. The exercise runs until June 16 in Poland's military training areas and will wrap up at a formal closing ceremony in Warsaw on June 17.
Credits: Lithuanian Armed Forces
