Luftwaffe under test

摘要

Frisian Flag in the Netherlands, Green Flag-West in Nevada, Trident Juncture in Norway: international exercises like these kept the Luftwaffe busy last year. While it was mainly the surface-to-air missile forces that were in demand during Trident Juncture - NATO's biggest exercise since the end of the Cold War (see NATO in the Far North, February, p56-59) - the service's flying component faced a challenge of its own, almost simultaneously. The goal of the Leistungsvergewisserung 2018 (LVGEx 18, Performance Verification Exercise 2018) held at Laage air base in October was to ascertain whether the Luftwaffe is still capable of mastering its national mission. While defence of Germany was the air arm's daily work up to 1990, the fall of the Berlin Wall and demise of the Warsaw Pact recipitated a shift towards international and coalition missions.