NATO To Hold Annual Crisis Management Exercise And Cyber Coalition Exercise
NATO said Wednesday it will hold its annual Crisis Management Exercise CMX between November 12 -16. Accoding to NATO, the exercise is designed to practice Alliance crisis management procedures at the strategic political level and will involve civilian and military staffs in Allied capitals, at NATO Headquarters, and in both Strategic Commands.
CMX 12 will be an internal command post exercise and no forces will be deployed for the purpose of this exercise, NATO said.
The Crisis Management Exercise will this year run concurrently with the NATO cyber defence exercise Cyber Coalition 12. The purpose of Cyber Coalition 12 will be to test Alliance technical and operational cyber defence capabilities.
The two exercises CMX 12 and Cyber Coalition 12 will be conducted based on one single fictitious scenario portraying an escalating threat from chemical, biological and radiological attacks, including large scale cyber attacks affecting NATO and national critical infrastructure.
This exercise scenario will require Allied political direction taking into account the advice of NATO military authorities and technical cyber defence bodies on possible measures to handle asymmetric threats, NATO said.
The CMX 12 will be jointly run by the NATO International Staff, the International Military Staff and the two NATO Strategic Commands, Allied Command Operations and Allied Command Transformation. This is NATO’s 18th CMX since 1992.
NATO noted that Finland and Sweden will participate as Partners alongside Allies in the exercise, as some elements of the scenario play out in their geographical proximity. Representatives of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) will observe the relevant aspects of the exercise and, representatives of the EU European External Action Service (EEAS) will actively contribute to the exercise.
The annual exercise Cyber Coalition (CC) will test the effectiveness and efficiency of collaborative cyber defence procedures and capabilities. Together with Allies, 3 partner nations (Austria, Finland and Sweden) will participate this year as players, and 3 other partner nations (Australia, Ireland and Switzerland) will participate as observers. In addition, EU cyber defence staffs will observe the exercise.