NATO ships recently participated in the French Navy-led multinational mine warfare exercise, Olives Noires 24, which took place from April 8 to April 19 in the area south of Toulon and Sète, France.
The exercise, hosted by the French Navy, aimed to enhance operational readiness and foster interoperability among allied forces in response to the ongoing threats posed by naval mines to maritime security and the global maritime economy.
Standing NATO Mine Counter Measures Group 2 (SNMCMG2), which includes vessels from multiple NATO member states, engaged in a series of mine warfare operations. These exercises were designed to secure freedom of navigation and included mine detection and clearance, shallow water diving to recover dummy mines and collect seabed data, countering improvised explosive devices, and deploying remote operation vehicles in a simulated multi-threat environment.
Participating ships in SNMCMG2 included the Hellenic flagship HS Heracles (A-472), the Spanish minehunter ESPS Segura (M-31), the Turkish TCG Amasra (M-266), the Italian ITS Chioggia (M-5560), the Greek HS Evropi (M-62), and the French FS Capricorne (M-653).
SNMCMG2 operates under the Allied Maritime Command (MARCOM), which is based in Northwood, United Kingdom. As part of NATO’s Very High Readiness Joint Task Force (VJTF), SNMCMG2 is a high-readiness force that plays a critical role in deterrence and defence, maintaining a balanced and credible posture across NATO’s areas of responsibility.
Glad some nato countries still have mine ships to deploy. It’s an area the RN has shrunk dramatically over the past 15 years
There is this program led by Netherlands and Belgium that we (France) joined. May be it is still possible to include UK?
Only a matter say a year or two or few months I really think their is go to start of a war. Every where is itching for one. Sad as no matter which rich countries start it , their never be s winner. As everyone wants to be powerful and revenge. Just hope when government got money for one people will want to go on suicide mission.
Has the threat to shipping shrunk or are we responsible for less of it?
Or is there a step change to unscrewed autonomous vessels so away from specialist crewed vessels?
Unless we consider most defence establishment incompetent, the only benign explanation is that they think they can use anti mine devices in non specialist ships.
So that requires unscrewed autonomous vessels to replace the skills of specialist crewed vessels in practice.
I’m way out of my depth (pun intended) on the reality of that.
We need some nautical nouse..
I don’t suppose we have many MCM to send nowadays