Turkey takes charge of NATO’s Very High Readiness Joint Task Force as it confirms Russian arms deal
4,200 Turkish troops, replace the polish 21st Polandia rifles brigade. The Turkish armed forces will take over from Poland an annual duty as a framework state in the land component of the so-called NATO spearheads, i.e., VJTF or very high readiness joint task force. The Turks will be the backbone of the forces with high readiness to react in a crisis, delegating to these tasks, primarily the 66th mechanized infantry brigade’s resources. The Turkish unit will replace the polish 21st Podhale rifle brigade in this role. The NATO communiqué indicates that starting in 2021, Turkey will take over command of the NATO spear from Poland, which provided the backbone of forces in 2020. Ankara will build the Turkish component of the VJTF around the 66th mechanized infantry brigade. That’s about 4,200 Turkish troops, and NATO’s VJTF total has about 6,400 militaries. Thus, we should remember that other soldiers from countries such as – Albania, Hungary, Italy, Latvia, Montenegro, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, Spain, Great Britain, and the United States will also serve under the VJTF. These VJTFs are part of a larger structure known as the----
Turkey to command elite NATO force in 2021
Turkey will take over the command of NATO's Very High Readiness Joint Task Force on Friday. The force was designed to deploy at short notice to confront threats against NATO members. Security analyst Murat Aslan explains how important this is for Turkey.
BY CHRISTINE DOUGLASS-WILLIAMS
republished below in full unedited for informational, educational & research purposes:
Rather than Islamic supremacist Turkey getting booted out of NATO, it is taking over from Poland to lead NATO’s military Very High Readiness Joint Task Force for 2021.
The move is highly questionable, given Turkey’s overt ambition of rebuilding the Ottoman Empire, its constant bullying and threats of war with Greece, its alliance with Qatar and the Muslim Brotherhood, and its interference in Libya to establish the Muslim Brotherhood there.
The NATO news comes at the same time as news of Turkey’s arms deal with Russia.
In mid-December, the Trump administration slapped sanctions on Turkey over its purchase of the Russian S-400 missile system. And now the Turkey-Russian pact has gone farther.
Merely a day before Turkey took charge of the VJTF, it was announced that “Turkey and Russia have pledged to go further on military cooperation despite US sanctions, in a move that risks destabilizing Nato.”
The reason that the VJTF was created makes the NATO news even more bizarre:
NATO heads of state and government decided to create the VJTF at the Wales Summit in 2014 in response to a changed security environment, including Russia’s destabilisation of Ukraine and turmoil in the Middle East.
In early December, Jihad Watch reported that Greece, Cyprus, Egypt, France and the UAE were conducting joint military exercises amid the rising Turkish threat.
“Turkey takes charge of NATO high readiness force, 01-Jan.-2021,” NATO, December 31, 2020:
The Turkish army will take the lead of NATO’s Very High Readiness Joint Task Force (VJTF) on Friday (1 January 2021), placing thousands of soldiers on standby, ready to deploy within days.
Turkey takes over from Poland, which provided the core of the force in 2020. Built around Turkey’s 66th Mechanised Infantry Brigade of around 4,200 troops, a total of around 6,400 soldiers will serve on the VJTF. Units from Albania, Hungary, Italy, Latvia, Montenegro, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, Spain, the UK, and the United States will also serve on the force, which is part of the Alliance’s larger NATO Response Force. Turkey has made substantial investments into the unit – amongst the most mobile in NATO – particularly in its logistics and ammunition requirements planning. The latest models of Turkish armed vehicles, anti-tank missiles and howitzers have been allocated to the force.
NATO heads of state and government decided to create the VJTF at the Wales Summit in 2014 in response to a changed security environment, including Russia’s destabilisation of Ukraine and turmoil in the Middle East. NATO members take turns heading the VJTF. Poland led the VJTF in 2020, Germany in 2019, and Italy had rotational control of the force….