Saber Guardian 2017 (SG17), the greatest exercise conducted in the region has come to an end. It was an impressive force show in Romania, Bulgaria and Hungary, conducted according to a fictitious scenario, when over 25,000 service members from 22 allied and partner countries with over 3,000 vehicles, of which 90 combat and airlift aircraft, conducted military operations in order to free a part of the territory under the occupation of a hostile force.

SG17 showed the reaction and deterrence capacity of the allied and partner nations according to the collective defence scenario, by exercising force projection.

On the Romanian soil alone, about 70 train sets, over 400 vehicle convoys, about 50 sorties and a cargo ship brought together this impressive force that acted in over 20 firing ranges, training centers and deployment points.

During SG17, the servicemen carried out a wide range of operations in a multinational, combined and joint context: air assault, tactical marches, forcing river crossing, shooting, live maneuvers and fire with equipment from all services, medevac and treating the wounded.

Structures of the General Staff cordinated these personnel, equipment and ammunition maneuvers of the countries involved, of the live fire exercises and other sequences of the exercise.

The Joint Force Command coordinated the activities of all national, allied and partner structures involved in the exercise in our country, from the Forward Point of Command located at Mihail Kogalniceanu. The main task was to synchronize the national integrated exercises associated to exercise SG17 led by USAREUR, which required the permanent coordination with the Point of Command of the Multinational Division in Novo Selo, Bulgaria.

The Communications and IT Command together with the Joint Logistics Command supported the military operations according to their expertise.

The Romanian Armed Forces were represented mainly by the services, through their servicemen: 8.000 from the Land Forces with 1,000 equipment, over 1,000 from the Air Forces with over 40 aircraft and almost 800 from the Navy, with 10 destroyers and logistic support ships, 12 boats and 18 land vehicles.

One of the most complex operations was forcing the Danube river crossing, where about 1,600 troops and over 400 vehicles crossed the river with the support of aircraft and river boats, while under attack.

For the first time during an exercise conducted in our country, they exercised a scenario close to reality in which the wounded were transported and treated in the three NATO ROL 2 military field hospitals (the 212th US Field Hospital, ROL 2 Romanian Medical Formation and the Balkan Medical Formation), an operation coordinated nationally by the Medical Directorate.

The exercise was widely covered, as in the operations conducted in Romania alone participated over 200 Romanian and foreign journalists. The military journalists that joined them took photos and live feed, especially on the social media network, at all times. Almost 100 foto and video posts were published on the official Facebook page of the defence ministry, while the live feed reached almost 3 Millions users.

The Ministry of National Defence promotes constantly a transparent and predictible policy concerning military operations, thus contributing to Romania's pledge as OSCE member related to military transparency.

In order to ensure transparency, 25 delegates from 13 OSCE nations participated in SG17 multinational exercise in Romania, as observers. The delegates had the opportunity to watch the different stages of the exercise and the deployment of the troops in the field, on the ground and from the helicopter.

The observers' activity was organized in agreement with the provisions of the Vienna Document of 2011, on the measures to increase confidence and security in the OSCE space, Chapter VI Observation of Certain Military Activities.

Press Department