A military exercise called Ground Pepper 2014 with troops of the Visegrad Group (V4) countries, i.e. Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic and Slovakia, together with the US will take place in the second half of 2014 in the training areas Lešť and in Kamenica nad Cirochou. The goal will be practicing for
Article Five of the Washington Treaty on collective defence of the NATO.
It will be biggest event of the nearly thirty military exercises involving foreign troops in Slovakia this year, the Defence Ministry informed the SITA newswire. This was originally planned as exercise of Slovak and Czech troops only. Eventually, also armed forces of Hungary, Poland and the US will join. A total of 700 soldiers will come from abroad to the exercise and together with Slovak forces, there will be about 1,300 soldiers taking part.
The government on June 25 approved the Military Exercise Plan for the second
half of 2014, as well as a plan for sending Slovak troops to similar events abroad. At the Ground Pepper 2014 exercise, a mechanised brigade will practice the completion of tasks referred to in the Article Five of the Washington Treaty.
“Such an exercise is an excellent opportunity for soldiers to practice mutual
harmonisation of their capabilities,” Defence Minister Martin Glváč said in early June. “Armies must be able to cooperate, because armed conflicts know no borders.”
(Source: SITA)
Compiled by Zuzana Vilikovská from press reports
The Slovak Spectator cannot vouch for the accuracy of the information presented in its Flash News postings.
