 Colonel Foster is a career infantry officer who began at the Military Academy, spent much of his formative years in the Ranger Battalion to include as a platoon leader and company commander. He was a battalion commander in the 82nd Airborne Division and then back in the Ranger Regiment for his second command, spent a little time at Harvard and also at Joint Special Operations Command leading an inter-agency task force and has been spending his time as the commander of the 173rd Infantry Brigade Combat Team Airborne is the new designation. Keep changing it up to keep it interesting, switch the words around. For the last more than a year, about 20 months, yes, and a particularly interesting time to be there. So he is currently doing some professional military education down in Norfolk and agreed to come up and talk a little bit about what the 173rd has been up to, spending a lot of time in Eastern Europe. So he's going to just tell us a little bit about what the brigade has been doing and his views on what they've learned and what they've seen. And then we'll open it up for a broader conversation with all of you. So again, thanks for coming. If people have phones, if you could turn them to silent, that would be great. And, sir, over to you. Thanks. Thank you, Cynthia. Thanks very much for having me. For a couple of reasons, it is a real big honor to be here and a big deal for me. I'm a huge fan of the Center and that's not a paid political announcement. Somebody that's dedicated their life towards the profession of arms and development. There's a lot of great work that comes out of the Center here that we pull and use. And so I appreciate the opportunity to sit here. And as the least educated guy in the room, it is somewhat intimidating to be up on stage. But what I'd like to do, I've got a little video clip of some video that was taken last spring and early last summer. It's about four and a half minutes long. I'd like to show that as a stage setter and then kind of backtrack and tell you the story of the brigade and to some extent U.S. Army in Europe over the last 12 months and what we've been doing and then a little bit of what we've got coming up over the next three or four months, which may be the most interesting part of everything that's going on right now and then open it up for a dialogue and discussion, but I'm honored to be here. So thanks. If we can roll the video, please. The United States sending Vladimir Putin of Russia a new and unmistakable message back off, stand down. Right now, Russia is pouring more fuel on the crisis in Ukraine, accusing the Kiev government of waging a bloody war on its own people. The first point is Ukraine is not some distant land. It is right in Europe here. We've got Ukraine here. And just a reminder, these countries neighboring Europe, they're all NATO allies, Poland, Slovakia, Hungary, Romania. I'll begin with a quote from a song. Have you heard of the 173rd Airborne Brigade? With boots on the ground and dirt on your face, we'll defend your freedom any time, any place. The US presence in the Baltic countries in Poland represents not only the United States of America and the strength of our army, but it represented NATO to those countries because to them it meant that the US was there and NATO was there, and that was the whole objective behind it, to reassure our allies and to send a message to others that we would be there for them. Half minutes or so of what probably looked like conventional army activity, small unit level partner training, you know, an end of itself, a video that if you watch may not have a lot of, you know, a lot of value to it and understanding what's going on, but there's a back story to that video. So last March timeframe was Russia annexed Crimea, United States European Command got the order to put together options, you know, how do we utilize the military arm of national power, excuse me, to help reassure our allies, and our allies had come up on the net in the March and April timeframe and they had requested US presence and US assistance in many European countries, and so those requests, you know, were kind of all across the gamut in Poland from a very large request that actually if you looked at the total quantity, really exceeded the US Army Europe's total capacity in Europe to much smaller requests in some of the Baltic nations and so as the joint staff and European Command put together some courses of action, the course of action to utilize the 173rd Airborne Brigade to help reassure our allies was put into place in late April and so over the last week of April over the period of four days, we deployed an airborne company to Poland and each one of the three Baltic nations to reassure our allies and the film you saw with some of the training that took place immediately following that that has continued on to this day into what has become Operation Atlantic Resolve and I'll highlight real quick for you if I could, you know, probably the greatest lesson learned from my perspective of what we've been doing over the last year in response to the requests from our allies was how important it was for NATO and for the United States in particular to reassure our allies and to show them you belong to NATO, you are a member of potentially, you know, what's the greatest alliance the world has ever seen and you requested assistance and your membership was honored and that and that request was made good on and I'll share with you a vignette from each one of the countries we deployed to to try to put it into perspective how much I think it meant to some of those folks to be a part of the NATO alliance as I traveled around in Poland and talk to people and say how do you feel about what's taking place in the Ukraine? How do you feel about Russian actions? The most common word I hear from the polls is we're scared. They don't say we're terrified but very, very commonly almost to a person they say that they're scared and if you look at recent Polish history, that makes sense. I mean it is not some distant memory in Poland what Russian aggression means to that region. When I was in Latvia, I was speaking with the Minister of Defense at the airfield and he and as our soldiers, U.S. soldiers were walking off the plane, he said, Mike, you know, this is the greatest national security event in the history of our nation and I said, I appreciate the compliment but don't get a hitter. And he started doing the imaginary weights and balances of options and he looked up in the sky and he said, well, joining NATO, he said, no, this is it. And you could debate how accurate his comment is but you can't debate the sincerity by which he meant it. And I took that to heart because he was trying to articulate how important it was for U.S. presence to be on the ground and how that potentially was going to change the dynamic of the conversation going on the Baltics. As I spoke to General Leica in Lithuania, who is the commander of the land component command, he posed a question to me and he said with all of the Ukraine's military might, if Russia will invade them, then why would we not think we'd be next? A valid question if you just look at the proposition from a military perspective. And then finally and probably most poignantly, the last country we deployed forces to was Estonia and standing on the airfield as the president spoke, who happens to be from New Jersey, which is a very interesting dynamic there in the Baltics. I was standing next to a very, very well dressed lady probably in her mid 80s. And as our soldiers walked off the plane, she was absolutely just sobbing. Not just watery eyed or little tears but sobbing. And I turned to her and said, ma'am, can I help you? Is everything okay? And she said, we've been waiting for the Americans to come for decades. And you're finally here. And it was very, it was very emotional for her. And I didn't understand the backstory. I didn't know everything that she had experienced. And unfortunately, at the time, I kind of set that aside as, you know, that's one person's feelings. But I was flying out of Tallinn early the next morning. And as I checked into an airport at the hotel late that night, I checked in in uniform. And there were two kids behind the counter of the hotel in their 20s, a guy and a girl. And the girl said, were you, were you with the American soldiers that landed at the airport today? And I said, I was. And as she said, thanks, she started crying. And the guy beside her did as well. And you don't typically see 20 year olds break down about national security issues. But there was a motion there if nothing else. And it was touching to realize that in Estonia, US presence had brought emotion out of people's across generational gaps, people who are widely different different backgrounds. And going into that experience, that was absolutely something that I had not expected to appreciate or see and underappreciated at the time. So I think what we have seen in Atlantic resolve is we have seen a very unique utilization of military power before conflict in a non lethal non kinetic way that has since spurred on for about the last 10 months. And it's paying real dividends at a very low cost, not on the battlefield, but in a region where history and kind of the future is being changed before our eyes. And so it's it's very unique to be a part of that. I'll happily give you an honest answer to any question you ask, which you want to talk about the next four months. And thanks. Thanks very much. As we have worked in operation Atlantic resolve, the US Army has brought regionally aligned forces forward to Europe to participate in that and to take part in it. So initially, first brigade, first Cal Re division came over last fall. They relieved us and took up responsibility for Atlantic resolve. They have since been replaced by the other brigade combat team that's in Europe that has the mission right now. And then here, now that we are in the month of March, we are going to change the mission again. First brigade of third infantry division will be picking up some of the responsibility for Atlantic resolve will be putting elements of the brigade back forward towards that mission. And then additionally, as we continue to look forward, we mean US Army Europe and the European Command, we are expanding operation Atlantic resolve further to the south. And so Poland and the Baltic States are what we are now referring to as operation Atlantic resolve north. And here later this month, we will be sending forces to Romania, Bulgaria, and what we were going to be calling operation Atlantic resolve south. And that has the potential through the summer to expand to include potentially Hungary, potentially Georgia, at some point in time, the Czech Republic. And so by the end of the summer, you could very well see an operation that stretches from the Baltics, all the way down to the Black Sea. So geographically, as you connect countries, you know, almost a line of deployed US troops, and then very specifically for the brigade here before this week is up, we will be deploying a battalion minus from the brigade I'm a part of to the Ukraine to train Ukrainian forces for the fight that's taking place in the eastern portion of their country. So very unique, a separate event from Atlantic resolve that kind of certainly tied into deterring Russian aggression. Let me kick off with a question that step back a little bit and ask about the relationship between permanently station forces, and regionally aligned forces, and your thoughts on the relevance of those two pieces of presence going forward in the new security environment in Europe. Because that's a debate I'm, you know, we'll continue to have. Yeah, there are certainly benefits to both. You know, quite frankly, I'm partial to forces that are stationed, you know, the station in Europe. And I did not grow up with a European Army background. This is the first assignment that I've had. In Europe, I think General Mattis may have said at first, or at least most people attribute to him, he says you can't surge trust. And I wish I had a photo of General Yokes, who is the commander of the Polish six airborne brigade. On the day we arrived in Poland, and it's General Yokes and I stand on the airfield. And I think I'm slapping him on the back and we're laughing and clearly not paying attention to the important things that are going on. But it's a photo that got a lot of wide circulation. And that's because he and I have a longstanding relationship, because we're permanently, we're permanently there in Europe. And so Europe is a very, very difficult equation for us to solve and living in that same time zone, and interacting with our European allies on a daily basis, there's certainly benefit in that you can't replicate from a regionally aligned force. The regionally armed forces certainly come over and bring capabilities that we do not possess. And it's not just the capacity, but they come with additional capabilities. They certainly help relieve us of the burden, the burden from a perspective of everything we're being asked to do the capacity from a capacity perspective. And quite frankly, the the uniqueness of the leadership development challenges of what's taken part in Europe, I would hate to see that confined just to, you know, forces station in Europe, the ability to spread that all across our force, I think is hugely valuable. I'm just be the sole focus of all the leader development opportunities. You can let me develop so much. All right, let me I'm sure we've got lots of questions. So here we'll start here and we'll move our way forward. So yep. Wait, can you wait for the mic, please? And I'm sorry, thank you for the Atlantic Council. Could you elaborate more on what your units can be doing in Ukraine? How many people are going to be there? What kind of tasks are going to be training on? Are you going to be training on just medical training, or are you going to be doing combat skills? Do you give us a sense of that? How long will they be there? Yeah, great, great question. You were still working some of that out right now. The Ukrainians asked us to come in and train what is in essence their National Guard. So these are forces that have been fighting in the east. And we have worked with three three elements really to kind of determine what we want to focus on in training these National Guard elements. We have talked to the Ukrainian general staff. We've talked to the ambassador in the Ukraine. But probably most importantly, we have talked with the leadership of these organizations we're going to be working with. And they have requested a handful of capabilities that we assist them with. If you look at the total, the totality of what we're working on, it is very, very clearly small unit skills, whether they're individual skills, leader skills or collective skills. It spans that entire gamut, but it is company and below level operations, whether it be individual medical treatment, or whether it be how to train a battalion staff on, you know, synchronization of operations intelligence or how to conduct a platoon ambush, it kind of spans that gamut, but it is not large unit formations. We are training National Guard companies with our company. So we have got them paired up, you know, a US company with a Ukrainian company is the primary avenue for conducting that training. Initially, the plan is to go for six months. So through the October timeframe, there have been discussions about how to increase, you know, both the duration of that event and the scope, you know, whether other things the US can assist with, from a military perspective, the establishment of training academies or other capabilities. So right now, what we've got laid out is six United States companies that will be training six Ukrainian companies throughout the summer. And we've got three battalion headquarters elements aligned with three Ukrainian battalion headquarters elements to work at that level, but really nothing above, you know, the battalion staff level at all. Hi, Paul Gephardt from the Cone Group was very pleased to see the first European activity set going into Grafnevere, understand that there's consideration of a recommendation going to General Breedlove for a second set in the March timeframe. Can you comment on that? Yeah, General Breedlove has made the request. You know, there are certainly benefits in doing that. As an airborne brigade, we don't climb into tanks in Bradley's and drive around the battlefield. We move at kind of the pace of our boots. You know, so I'm not really vested a whole lot in, you know, in that process. You know, there are Grafnevere, we two of our battalions are there in Grafnevere. And so I'm familiar with it, but I don't really have an opinion that would be notable. Thanks for your enlightening discussion. Jennifer Chen corresponded with SDMG. We know the Sky Soldier has very rich combat experience. So compared with previous tasks, what's a special and maybe the difficulties your team may have for the upcoming training in Ukraine? Thanks. Thanks. Yeah, great question. Yeah, I wish I had some young soldiers in here to tell you the benefit of what they've been doing. There is certainly our ability to interoperate with our allies is probably the forefront of, you know, the initial benefit of training. Certainly whatever task is at hand for the day, both organizations, you know, get better at that. But we're learning where our deficiencies are with, you know, with working and fighting alongside of our allies, which is incredibly valuable. But we're also gaining that appreciation for, you know, the strengths of our allies and what they bring and, you know, helping to understand the environment in which we operate. Atlantic resolve and like some operations spread across a whole, you know, variety of nations. And so there is, you know, each nation has its own challenges. Each nation has its own environment. And so what our young soldiers are experiencing in Estonia is vastly different than what they're experiencing in Poland. And, you know, and growing richer in that environment, I think is just as valuable and kind of uniquely or interestingly, we just returned to January off holiday leave where we send soldiers away and say, you know, stay out of trouble for a couple weeks. You know, a not insignificant number of soldiers traveled back with their families over holiday leave to the country where they spent the summer. And they spent holidays with, you know, friends that they had made from our allies during the summer. And, you know, to pack your family up and take them to Estonia in December for vacation is not a small undertaking. And I find that fascinating. It's because they want to do that. And they see the value in it. And so incredibly valuable in that regard. Morning, sir. George Nicholson, an aviation force structure analyst for special operations in CT. Last year, one of the briefings from the army was a quick response capability for the army in Europe. And I think they indicated for your assets coming back from Afghanistan, you'd be able to do that with the 173rd. Right now after Benghazi, of course, you're familiar unclassified Marines have set up a force at Marone that can deploy 12 B 22s for KC 130 J's 300 Marines wheels in the well six hours after notification. General Austin was so impressed that now he has that. And in Centcom, General Kelly is so impressed that he wants one down in his theater. We've got the special operation sift on classic up at Stuttgart. What are you all looking at in terms of creating that kind of capability for the army with 173rd? We've actually already created, you know, that a capability similar to that. We received an order back in October of 2013 to stand up an army contingency response force, which we did on the first of October of that year. And the task for that organization is to provide a contingency response force to you calm to Centcom and to Africa. So you know, a fairly wide swath of the globe. And we have a company that all times dedicated to that we increase their readiness posture and the size of that organization based on things that are going on. But they have got a requirement to depart I mean to fly away and, you know, notification plus 18 hours. So we've had them up now for probably, you know, 16 months, 17 months, we routinely conduct emergency deployment readiness exercises with them away from Italy and Germany, you know, and, you know, at the invitation of our allies and other countries. And so it's working pretty well. Thank you. Leander Bernstein, Sputnik international news. I have a lot of questions. So I'll limit it to three. If that's fair. First of all, I've read about plans for obviously the United States, also Great Britain and Canada to send officers or over to Ukraine to train train their military. Are there further plans? Are there other countries who are going to be sending military advisors over in the future? Second, there's been a lot of a lot of talk about whether whether they're going to be whether we're going to be permanently stationed in the Baltic States in Poland or whether it's going to be rotational. So if you could comment on that and then finally, Under Secretary Wormuth told members of Congress last week that the the actual threat of a Russian invasion into into the Baltics was it wasn't on her radar screen. So there was no no intelligence showing that that was that was in the in the in the plans of Russia. So if you could comment on that. Sure. I'll try to take them in order to get off base. Raise your hand. For the first one, the United Kingdom has actually made a commitment to to go to the Ukraine and assist in the training effort. How much will be partnered with them directly is still to be worked out. There's no one else that is doing that right now that I know of that does not mean they're they're not efforts out there. I'm just unaware of them and really don't have any insight into the future of who else may be joining maybe joining in. As far as permanent basing in presence, what I tell you, at least from an Atlantic resolve Eastern European perspective, everywhere we've got forces right now that's at the invitation of our Allied nation. I mean, of the of the partners we are working with, they requested us come in. I wouldn't call it a permanent presence. I would call it an enduring presence right now. You know, when they're ready for us to leave, I'm certain we will pack up and we will certainly leave. So permanent basing I think is a kind of a separate question. You can look at the force structure of the US military in Europe right now and which way that's headed. And it's probably not too hard to deduce the likelihood of permanent basing or permanent presence outside of the current footprint we have got. And your third question was what about whether you'd like to grade the Undersecretary's homework? Oh, we don't want to grade the Undersecretary's homework. I don't know any indicators of an imminent, you know, military attack from Russia on the Baltics. And I certainly think we have got our eyes on what the early warnings indication to that would be. And so I've got nothing to believe that that's impending at all. You talked about reassurance. I think one of the big challenges is understanding the degree to which we're succeeding in our desire to provide reassurance. How do you know when you've pulled it off? So do you have a sense? How do you answer that? I mean, not when you get told what to do when you do it, but how do you think about what are your own metrics? If you have any. Yeah, I probably don't have any that are very good. In the sense that, you know, we asked ourselves how are we being successful? Part of that is a subjective sense that you're welcome and that there is a desire to work with you. Everywhere we have been in the Baltic, Sanin, Poland, we have been able to sit down with the militaries and to carve out more definitive long range plans for training and exercises. And so when our allies say, Hey, let's let's lay out a plan that's three years in scope, four years in scope. I think that is a sense that there's value there and they'd like to keep you. I got a very interesting. I called a Christmas card that was a letter. I got a very interesting letter in December that's got six signatures on it. And I wish I'd brought a copy of it. It's signed by the Minister of Defense and the Chief of Defense from all three of the Baltic nations. And they basically wrote a letter and they said, Hey, Mike, thanks for what you do, not me personally, but you know, from a brigade perspective. We love you. We want to keep working with you. And so thanks for, you know, your efforts and what you did, you know, for the Baltics. To me, that is a tangible, you know, emotional acknowledgement that it does make a difference and that it was recognized. And in a lot of places, it didn't come out necessarily on the video. But as we landed in Poland in the Baltics, we really had no idea what we were getting into. And as the ramps came down and two of the four locations, the president was on the ground. And the US ambassador and they were marching bands and honor guards. And we actually walked off in a couple of places right into parades. And it's a good thing we can fight because we don't march very well. You know, but people certainly rolled out the red carpet. And that really has continued not just for the 173rd, but for all the forces that have taken part in it. Sorry, we'll go over here. First greetings from 70 year old brother 173rd 1969 Vietnam. But how given that the irregular warfare that we're now seeing in the Ukraine, how would the 173rd adjust its tactics to go after little green men and things of that nature? Yeah, I don't know that we've had to adjust our tactics. And I don't know that the fight that's going on right now would cause us to do so. And which may seem a little counterintuitive. I've had the fortune to spend some time in Ukraine. And I'll be back there before the end of the month is out. And when you talk to Ukrainians, the word that I most commonly hear them use when describing what's taking place is it is an insurgency. And they describe most commonly their own activities as anti terrorist activities, which is an interesting discussion. What we have been asked to do and the issue that I think exists right now, primarily in the fight, it's not as as great an issue of, you know, teaching the Ukrainians things they don't know, but helping them refine their processes and then push them forward. And I would say that the fight right now from my perspective only is not a it's not an imbalance of capability, but it's really an imbalance of capacity in some places. Or there may be just a little more refinement in one area or another that's given Russia tactical and operational overmatch in a few, you know, specific areas and talking with the Ukrainians, helping to close that gap and even that overmatch so that it doesn't exist as our goal. So from a you know, small unit collective perspective, we're not we're not changing anything up as we train with them. And quite frankly, I don't think they would want us to, you know, changing our tactics right before we go in to share them with somebody else is probably a recipe for not real good results. I guess a point and question. The point I would say is I'm cautious about using the word insurgency, describing what's Ukraine, because this is a foreign invasion. It's led by the Russians. It's armed by the Russians. It's staffed by the Russians. It's equipped by the Russians. So I'm not sure insurgency is an accurate description of what's happening in Eastern Ukraine. That's my opinion. Question I have for you concerns Russia's ability to mobilize forces. And I'm wondering how concerned you are about that. Give you two examples. In Cullinan grad, the Poles woke up on December 5th and had a spot exercise right off the port of Gdansk in Cullinan grad. 10,000 Russian troops, 50 ships, 250 armed personnel carriers and tanks, close combat air support with no notice. And there's yet to have been really a counter demonstration of support on the party alliance, but a quick sudden demonstration of force by the Russians. You mentioned the parades and so I was thinking of the parade in Estonia last week, in which I think elements of the United States participated in the parade along Narva. You know, few vehicles and personnel. The next day the Russians dropped 1,200, 2,000 troops on the border of Estonia and Latvia. How concerned are you about Russia's ability to suddenly mobilize forces, deploy them and essentially execute a fair complete against one of our allies, even if it's a limited territorial gain? It's not something that keeps me up at night. You know, the fact that they demonstrate that capability and their willingness to use that capability I think are two totally, two totally separate issues. And so, you know, the U.S. demonstrates military capability and exercises all across the world. But I don't know that necessarily means that we're going to, you know, suddenly introduce that capability somewhere on the globe, you know, that meets our, that meets our intent just because we can. So is it possible? It is absolutely possible. Is it likely I think that it is unlikely that we wake up one morning and find that Russian troops have invaded, you know, one of the Baltics overnight with no, with no previous warning? The risk in doing that, you know, if you look at it from the Russian perspective, I have a hard time understanding, you know, how they would connect the dots and come up with a, this is a great course of action, given what has worked for them in the past and kind of their standard operating procedure, whether you call what's going on the Ukrainian insurgency or not, if you look at what they have done over years to sow the seeds from that to think that they would, you know, change, you know, that tactic in midstream, something that's worked for something that is incredibly risky, I have a hard time thinking that's, that's likely. One of the things they're, they've done quite effectively is propaganda. And so I wonder, and there's this continuous conversation about the degree to which the Defense Department is constrained by in their activities in that regard. I'm interested in your perspectives on whether or not the propaganda element of what's going on affected anything that you saw. And just your personal views on how well we are equipped nationally to, to address that. I'm going to walk away from the last part of the question. Okay. All right, all right. Some people may debate this, I actually think, you know, President Putin, while he may not have a stranglehold on Russian opinion, he has certainly got an enormous sway on Russian opinion, his ability to explain or explain away what is taking place, whether it's, we think it's true or not, I think he's got a enormous track record for being able to do that. I think we have got a very strong base of actions right now in Eastern Europe from a military perspective that enable our senior leaders to have talking points to say, we are doing X, Y and Z for the following purpose. Telling folks we're present to reassure our allies is a friendly, you know, based kind of discussion saying we're doing the same exact thing to deter Russian aggression. But it's the same activity on the ground, but vastly different statements. And so I think we've got a good plan on the ground. And I think what matters is when our senior leaders, the message that they convey. And so in that sense, I think we're well equipped to do it. You know, from a military perspective, we're not even remotely at the point where we want to start, you know, countering the IO message actively in the region, at least from my perspective, we don't. I'm Jim McDonough. I served with Hun 73rd in Vietnam and had the honor of starting up the Hun 73rd back in the middle nineties. I wanted to follow on one of the things I asked of you, a second general colonel. As much as you can talk about it, I'd like to hear a bit about the command and control of your forward deployed units now and what the command and control might become in the event of a crisis and what your contingency plans would be in the latter event. Sure. When the guy that founded the organization, you command, ask a question, the stakes instantly go through the roof. Right now, we have got, you know, primarily with a company deployed each one of these companies, you know, we have looked at that company command team and said, Hey, you're in charge. And we have we have empowered them to make decisions and to establish and own relationships for lack of a better term with their partners and from an allied perspective, we keep a battalion headquarters forward deployed at all time, overseeing those country companies. And then here in March, the brigade or the division tack from fourth infantry division has deployed forward and they will have command and control of operation Atlantic resolve. And some of the other training exercises that are taking place in Europe. And so we have moved it up to a division level command and control element that's forward deployed to oversee that. As far as what's going to take place, you know, from a plan's perspective, we've had some great discussions on what do we do in case of Russian aggression, in case of kinetic or lethal activity in the vicinity of our soldiers. I think we've got a good plan in place that will always continue to go back and look at. But I'd be wrong if I told you what it was. So let me ask you a question about, as I mentioned to you earlier, I had the opportunity to be over in Germany and Poland a week before last. And I was really struck by the difference in sort of the difference in focus and at mental. So I'm just interested in your observations now having come back in the US for a month or so. Are there sort of strains of the conversation here that you think are misguided or that don't comport with the reality of so, for example, one of the things that I came away from my trip with was the perception that I think we're still sort of treating the situation as if it's a temporary phenomenon in Europe. And I definitely did not get that sense there that, you know, in six months everything will calm down and we can go back to pivoting and rebalancing and all the rest of that. But so anyway, I just wonder if you have observations about disconnects between the perspectives. I don't know if I've been back in the States long enough to get a good sense for, you know, what the overall perspective here. I absolutely think the overall perspective in Europe is certainly, you know, this is a long term proposition. No one, no one that I've talked to thinks that there is a push button solution for this. And, but as we debate, you know, I think part of the great dialogue where I see differences between what's thought in commonly, you know, thought in Europe and what's thought back here is what's Putin's long term intentions, you know, and what is kind of the long end game for him. And I think there is a disconnect in that, in that perspective, there are certainly a lot of people in Europe that have got a much more dire sense of his long term intentions. And I think that I think some of the stuff we're seeing back in the United States. And with President Putin, he, you know, he says what he is going to do. And typically does what he says. I mean, he is not in that sense, he is not incredibly hard to figure out if you'll listen to what he says. He has come out and said that fracturing the NATO alliance is part of the agenda. Pulling the Ukraine back into the geopolitical orbit of Russia is part of the agenda. How much further that will continue to play out? Will it spread to the Baltics? Will it spread to, you know, the Black Sea region? I don't think anyone knows. But if you look at what he is doing, he has been able to, you know, worst case scenario, he has been able to pull, you know, the Eastern Ukraine back up underneath his spear and bottom line, he can use it as a bargaining chip. I mean, so he has made huge, huge strides in that regard. And with annexing Crimea, he redrew the, potentially redrew the map of Europe. And one failed swoop. And so if that's a disconnect from what's commonly, you know, viewed back in the United States ever certainly, but that's what I see. That's what's taking place in Europe. That's the discussion that people have. Okay. Two back there. Can you get so that we can get it? Hello, I'm Margaret Cope, Independent Consultant in National Security. Question with regard to the cyber domain. In the event that there's a challenge to this domain, do you have good calm out procedures in the event we don't have computers and GPS, etc.? At the tactical level, at the brigade level. Okay, I'll address my level, because I was trying to steer that question and you didn't bite. We have got procedures. They are certainly, you know, they're still being developed. The army has become proficient over the last 14 years, deploying to establish theaters of war. And we have to deploy to an immature theater. And if someone turns the power off, you know, that instantly becomes an immature theater. And so we've got procedures to deal with that. But we are certainly going to lose some effectiveness along the way as we do that. Above our level, that's a better question for somebody else to answer. Hi, I'm Meg Kolingalski with Namastar. I'm not a former 173rd, but a former 101st officer and have a son-in-law who's finishing jump week this week, and we'll sign in next week. So I'm my trailer. So one parochial question for Namastar, as their army has chosen to divest a great number of MRAP vehicles, we made the Max Probe. And yet we see Ukraine reporting here in DC that they had casualties as a result of IEDs. It is somewhat frustrating that we are either sitting in Kuwait or sitting in Afghanistan and being given to countries who like Uzbekistan is one who may have less of an urgent requirement than Ukraine or some of the other Eastern European NATO countries. But that being said, another broader question is, are we fully leveraging our National Guard state partnership relationships and that maybe we could surge those forces in and that they do already have an established relationship? Yeah, great question. Fully is a subjective term. So it probably depends on who you ask. We are in communication with California, who has got the National Guard partnership with the Ukraine. We're in contact with the state of Illinois who's got the partnership with Poland and so forth. And so we're talking to them. I think we're doing a pretty fair job of leveraging their long-term expertise and relationships. But to some extent, too many cooks spoil the soup. And not from a sense of ownership of we want credit, but from a sense of ownership of let's produce the best results possible. In some places we have asked the state partners to come in and provide assistance. And in some places we've said hey, we think we've got the resident expertise, subject matter expertise, you know resident in Europe and we're going to do this ourselves. So we're talking to them and we're leveraging them. You know, I don't know if this is something if we kick to them that we'd necessarily get, you know, the same results as we're getting with the forces we've got committed right now. The capabilities and the expertise that we have dedicated to the upcoming training mission that you can't crane is pretty impressive. I don't have an opinion on the MRAF issue. We don't have any in the brigade. Okay, Ivan Mikus from Embassy of Slovenia. You mentioned that the beginning that you were responsible was also part of NATO. NATO is now standing up a new NATO readiness forces at a very high level, while you are already at the higher level, plus you are already raising up at the division level. Are those two aligned now? They're aligned in the sense that the capabilities of what exists right now and what can exist, the two thought processes are the same. How that very quick reaction forced, the one I'm assuming you're talking about the one that was announced at the Wales Summit back in September, how that will be manned and eventually stood up is, I think we were still waiting to see how that's going to take part in what the U.S. role potentially as part of that quick reaction force is still to be determined. So the opportunity is there to marry those two efforts up and to take advantage of the capabilities that exist. But I haven't seen a definitive plan to do that. If you look across all of the NATO countries with some exceptions, but the majority of them have got a light airborne and or rapidly deployable capability that exists. And so you could stand them up and part and partial, put them together to create that quick reaction force. But I haven't seen a definitive plan to do so. And if you see General Scrivence, please tell him we said hello, he's a phenomenal partner. Okay, let me ask one last question if I could about the degree to which you see challenges in the still different, different focuses and threat concepts within NATO. And and the degree to which you think that may impede a coherent NATO response going forward, the East South split. I'm going to give you an answer. Since you since you live in one of the South countries or sometimes at least you your family is there. My family is there. You know, over the past year or 10 months, what we have really gained is an appreciation for what all of our allies bring to the table. And this isn't the, you know, paid political response. You don't understand electronic warfare until you're working with our Baltic allies who absolutely are masters at understanding, you know, rushing capabilities and that arena and really, and really digging them with them. If you think you understand massing of artillery fires until you're on the ground with the Hungarians, and you're working through those exercises and you understand their expertise. You know, that's really the event in which you learn everything else we have. We have to know. My personal opinion is if we find ourselves in an article five situation, we will end up with some form of a coalition, you know, taking action and not necessarily a 28 member alliance taking action. Some of these places you don't want 28 countries necessarily involved in contributing to the solution. So there's a lot of discussion in Europe that if it comes to that, what will that alliance, you know, what will it do to the alliance? I certainly would not be surprised to be surprised to see that put through the test, you know, in the next 18 to 24 months. I probably didn't answer your question. Oh, that's good, thanks. Colonel Foster, great to have you. Thanks very much. Thank you very much.