US Green Berets Drill Polish Forces on Drones

Polish special forces are training under US Army Green Berets in a drone-focused exercise in Germany built directly on lessons from Ukraine's war with Russia, the Associated Press reported after getting rare access to the training ground.

The drill began Friday at the Joint Multinational Readiness Center in Hohenfels, about an hour southeast of Nuremberg. It is the first time a NATO ally has run the scenario, which was designed only months ago for US special forces.

"We're using lessons learned from Ukraine," an Army Green Beret officer assigned to the training complex told the AP on Thursday. "All of those effects that we're seeing either Russia or Ukraine having to overcome — we're doing our best to replicate."

How the drill works

The scenario runs several days across a 1,100-square-mile stretch of Bavarian countryside.

A US Army airborne infantry unit parachutes into the closed training area and sets up a front line playing the enemy. The Polish troops must slip past it, then move roughly 60 miles north through German farms, villages and one city with a large population to a second training area at Grafenwoehr, where they are expected to destroy a simulated target.

Private and government cameras and ordinary German civilians — who largely do not know the exercise is happening — are part of the test. If locals report suspicious people to police, that information gets back to the military and is used to pinpoint the team. In earlier runs, Green Berets took off their uniforms "so they can blend in," a senior enlisted soldier familiar with the scenario said, adding that "blend in also means don't get seen by civilians."

"This is supposed to be Russia and you're going to stand out in Russia," the soldier said.

The US Army hunts the intruders with military police and dogs — and with drones. In previous versions of the exercise, the Army had access to more than a hundred of them. If the Poles are spotted, "now you have the entire Russian arsenal coming at you," the enlisted soldier said. Troops can be "captured or killed" in the training. Both soldiers spoke on condition of anonymity under the military's longstanding policy of not identifying members of special forces units.