Approximately 1,500 soldiers and civilians across multiple European locations worked side by side to assess the NATO Rapid Deployable Corps – Greece and its capabilities as a NATO Warfighting Corps. With dynamic play, day-and-night operational scenarios, Exercise LOYAL DOLOS stood out as a flagship event in NATO’s 2025 training program, showcasing allied vigilance, readiness, and the ability to respond with speed and precision to any challenge the Alliance may face. The exercise ran from 2 to 11 December.
“This is how we ensure allied forces remain prepared and capable of prevailing against any potential threat,” said Col Andrea Stover, Head of the Training and Exercise Division at the NATO Joint Force Training Centre and Chief Exercise Control for LOYAL DOLOS 2025. “Our Exercise Control team, directing the event from the Joint Force Training Centre in Bydgoszcz, Poland, ensured the exercise was challenging, dynamic, and realistic,” Col Stover added.
More than 600 military and civilian experts formed the Exercise Control team, keeping the training audience fully engaged throughout the event. Under the expert guidance of Lieutenant General (ret.) Leonardo di Marco, Senior Exercise Control Advisor, and the leadership of Major General Bogdan Rycerski, Commander of the NATO Joint Force Training Centre and Director of LODO25, participants faced complex tasks and demanding operational dilemmas.
Designed to refine and validate the Alliance’s ability to operate seamlessly across multiple domains, Exercise LOYAL DOLOS 2025 focused primarily on land operations while also integrating other domains in line with NATO’s commitment to a more interconnected and adaptive force. Lessons drawn from Russia’s war against Ukraine were incorporated to prepare the training audience to fight and win in a rapidly evolving environment. This was also the first time Ukrainian experts were directly involved in the execution phase of this type of NATO exercise.
With Allied Land Command acting as the Officer Scheduling the Exercise—its Deputy Commander, Lieutenant General Jezz Bennett, working closely with Exercise Control—and with support from the Multinational Corps South-East and the 1st United Kingdom Division, all participants received truly rigorous and ambitious training.
Throughout the exercise, the NATO Rapid Deployable Corps – Greece, the primary training audience, demonstrated its ability to plan and conduct multi-domain operations against a peer adversary, reaffirming its readiness to contribute to the defence of the Alliance.
