 Hello, I'm Vice-Abel Jamie Fogo, commander of Baltops 2016. This is the second year I've had the honor of leading Baltops as commander, naval striking and support forces NATO. For the 44th iteration of Baltops, our motto is Baltic unity and strength delivers Baltic security. Forces from 15 NATO countries and two partner nations, Finland and Sweden, operated together for the last two weeks in the Baltic Sea. Forty-three ships, including three submarines, over 60 aircraft and 5,000 personnel, including 700 Marines, trained together to improve our interoperability across the full spectrum of maritime operations. First, the mine countermeasures vessels swept the area to locate and neutralize any mine threats. Not only did they find our practice mines, they found and destroyed unexploded ordnance from the Second World War. The submarines and surface ships conducted anti-surface and anti-submarine warfare to obtain local maritime superiority, which was needed to protect our high-value units. Last year, we had one submarine. This year, we have three, significantly enhancing our anti-submarine warfare opportunities. During maritime interdiction operations, sailors and Marines boarded other surface vessels and searched for prohibited materials. Ships assigned to the surface task units worked with friendly aircraft to provide air defense coverage over the high-value units. Amphibiosity was our main focus during Baltops. Over a period of 10 days, 700 Marines from six nations, Finland, Germany, Italy, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and the United States landed in three countries, which really increased interoperability. Three landings this year, as opposed to only two last year. We stressed the force. In fact, the first landing in Hanko, Finland was only one day after we sailed from Tallinn, Estonia. Sailors, Marines, and Airmen conducted combat enhancement training and force integration training before entering the tactical phase of the exercise. Our second landing took place in Uto, Sweden, where we applied the lessons learned from Hanko. The training intensified as the forces in Sweden re-embarked to the ships and moved toward the final exercise phase in Utskow, Poland. Coming together has been extremely valuable for the Airmen, Sailors, and Marines involved, and I am continually impressed with the amount we achieved in such a short period of time. Each person, regardless of nationality, rank, or specialty, directly contributed to ball tops 2016. We honed our skills in amphibious, anti-submarine, anti-surface, anti-air, and mine countermeasures warfare, and are now better prepared to ensure regional security whenever we are called upon to defend the Alliance.