Head of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine Viktor Muzhenko state that the command and staff exercises Unwavering Tenacity will be held within the framework of preparation of Ukrainian Army to conduct "defensive, stabilization and combat operations," and also in connection with the West-2017 drills. This was reported by General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in Facebook.
"Their goal of the exercises is the building up of capabilities by the military command and control bodies to manage troops (forces) in the course of regrouping, conducting defensive, stabilization and combat operations," he said.
Command and staff exercises Unwavering Tenacity will be held on September 12-15.
As it was reported earlier the West 2017 drills are planned for September 14-20; the armed forces of Russia and Belarus are going to perform jointly, involving up to 100,000 military men in total.
Ukraine and member countries of the NATO’s eastern flank are concerned about West 2017, the Russian military exercise slated for September in Belarus. Ben Hodges, the U.S. Army Europe commanding general said.
‘People are worried, this is a Trojan horse. They say, 'We're just doing an exercise,' and then all of a sudden they've moved all these people and capabilities somewhere,’ Hodges said.
