The Italian Air Force’s 32nd Wing, with six F-35 aircraft, assumes responsibility for the NATO air policing mission in Icelandic skies.
Transcript
We are roughly 130 people. So, basically we are mirroring a wing, an Italian wing, as a structure. Basically we are safeguarding the NATO skies, in particular the Iceland skies, and that’s our mission here. Besides that, we are obviously training ourselves here in the cold operations for the environment, particular environment that we are facing. And we are training with other NATO nations and with our friends of the host nations that are supporting us. It’s a milestone in the steps towards the full operational capability of the jet that started two years ago in Italy with the first delivery of the jets. Our Icelandic friends keep on monitoring the skies, so basically they are looking outside on their area of responsibility. Providing information to us and to the Kalkudum. As soon as they foresee whoever is coming or they do need to intercept someone to identify them in our defense, obviously, posture, we have been triggered basically, they call us to take off in a very short time.
Every day we prepare for this to make sure that we can be efficient in every mission we do and we trained a lot to make sure that we can comply with all this requirement for our policing mission NATO. So the pilot will do exactly what he is trained to do. He will not made up anything new. Even if it’s real, so that’s what is important, the training before is very important to make sure that in real time, you’re ready to response without changing your path, without changing your procedures. The jet is mature and ready to accomplish this type of operation, and it’s proud for us to be the first one that NATO employs as in operation with an omni-roll fighter, so it means I can go accomplish every type of mission, and that’s an example of a mission that we can accomplish with this jet. Fifth-generation fighter means also to have the possibility to get a lot of information, gather all together and distribute, near real time, to all the commander control centers that they’re required to. So, that’s important for us, to integrate this type of asset in the NATO, because it means having more information, have the advantage, the information superiority that can be a game-changer when you have to take decisions. So as soon as we’re in flight, as soon as we get all the information, we gather all that we have and we pass, we transmit those information to NATO Command and Control chain, using the control report center and then all the information will be reported to the Combined Operations Center of Uedem.
The U.S. Air Force was in Iceland from 1951 to all the way to 2006 with fighter aircrafts providing the air policing for Iceland. When they departed in 2006, Iceland and NATO came up with this agreement called Air Surveillance and Interception Capabilities to meet Iceland’s Peacetime Preparedness Needs. It calls for air policing missions in Iceland, three or four times a year, for not less than three weeks, where the Allied Nations are contributing the air policing squadrons to NATO to conduct this mission here. Iceland is providing the air surveillance of the airspace around Iceland or off here in North Atlantic 24/7, 365 days a year. We are operating with the Icelandic civilian personnel, the NATO Control and Reporting Centre operating the long-range radars at the four remote radar sites in Iceland for that capability. And we are producing here in Iceland the recognized air and sea picture for this area and disseminating that among the NATO or Allied Nations.
[Interviewer] Now, if you can—
We are providing the recognized air picture to Kaelutem. And it’s always the decision of the commander Kaelutem to decide whether there is an action needed in Iceland, or whether the fighters in Iceland are scrambled, or fighters in Norway or UK.