NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) is planning to hold the largest military exercises since the Cold War. The exercise, known as Steadfast Defender 2024, began on January 22nd and is expected to end on May 31st. Its goal is to rehearse how the United States could reinforce its NATO allies in Eastern Europe and those that border Russia if a conflict were to flare up.

All 31 member states of NATO and some 90,000 military personnel are taking part in these war games. The last NATO-wide military drill of comparable size was Exercise Reforger in 1988, right at the tail-end of the Cold War, with 125,000 participants. NATO has not specifically stated that the exercises are meant to simulate how to respond to a Russian invasion, only to a conflict with a “near-peer” adversary of the United States.

According to a report by Natural News, the exercises also come as military analysts agree that the Russian special military operation in Ukraine enters a new phase of protracted, attrition-focused warfare. While NATO is officially not directly involved in the conflict, it provides Ukraine with non-lethal support, and its members as individual nations as well as the European Union continue to send weapons and ammunition and provide military training.

Troops will be moving throughout Europe until May 31st in what NATO describes as “a simulated emerging conflict scenario” with NATO’s chief adversaries, which official documents state are Russia and terrorist organizations.

Ukraine Will Need Limitless Assistance From The West

Of these drills, NATO stated that they “will show that NATO can conduct and sustain complex multi-domain operations over several months, across thousands of kilometers, from the High North to Central and Eastern Europe, and in any condition.”

“The alliance will demonstrate its ability to reinforce the Euro-Atlantic area via transatlantic movement of forces from North America,” said NATO Supreme Commander, U.S. Army Gen. Christopher Cavoli. He added that the exercise will demonstrate NATO’s “unity, our strength, and our determination to protect each other.”

NATO’s Largest “War Games” With 90,000 Troops