 As a part of Defender Europe 21, soldiers from 5th Battalion's 7th Air Defense Artillery Regiment are participating in an integrated Joint Combined Air Missile Defense exercise known as Astral Night 21. Astral Night 21 is a U.S. Air Force's Europe and Air Force's Africa-led exercise using simulated and live-fly assets. The operation overlaps with exercise immediate response where the multinational partners will protect air and sea ports and other assets in Croatia and the surrounding region. The main goal behind this exercise is to build strength and readiness through interoperability for air missile defense within participating nations. But most importantly we're achieving interoperability between all of our different systems and that is one of the major goals of Astral Night 21 as we support air and missile defense readiness for the NATO Alliance. It's the relationships that build the foundation of readiness. These relationships we're building with our Croatian Armed Forces counterparts are critical. And what's mostly important too is that we have a common set of values. And a common set of values between our two countries allows us to establish relationships. Defender Europe 21 is a large-scale U.S. Army-led exercise designated to build readiness and interoperability between the U.S. NATO allies and partner militaries. Private Ellison Schumann, U.S. Army Europe in Africa.