Gioia del Colle (Italy) – NATO Tiger Meet 2023
Table of Contents
Introduction
After 35 years of absence – last time was in 1988 at Cameri – Italy has returned to host the multinational Nato Tiger Meet 2023 (NTM 2023) air exercise.
Reserved only to the squadrons having a tiger as their emblem, this exercise is famous for the goliardic spirit among the crews and personnel, as well as for the presence of several aircrafts wearing eye-catching and gaudy tiger-themed paint schemes. This year the NTM runned from 3 October until 13 October at Gioia del Colle Airbase, home of the 36º Stormo (36th Fighter Wing) of Aeronautica Militare (Italian Air Force – ItAF).
“It was a very special coincidence to host the NTM 2023 in Gioia del Colle in conjunction with the Centenary of the ItAF. We started preparing this complex exercise a year ago and here now we have over 1300 people, seventy planes and around ten helicopters belonging to nineteen Tiger squadrons from fourteen Countries” stated Major Emanule F. Project Officer of NTM 2023 and commander of XII Gruppo Caccia (12nd Fighter Squadron), one of the two “Tiger squadron” of the ItAF.
“As hosting nation we are responsible to create the scenario. Being an exercise tailored to different needs we must taking into account the needs and peculiarities of each participant and therefore it is essential to work and plan face to face with all of them, exchanging experiences and sharing tactics and procedure between different air assets, identifying the points of greatest and worst learning, correcting any gaps and improving day after day”.
Participants
Responsible for organizing the NTM 2023 and in addition to ensuring logistical support to the participants, ItAF deployed its two Tiger squadrons and other external air assets.
The homebased XII gruppo, on Eurofighter Typhoon, and the 21 gruppo with AW-101 helicopters.
Beside the “Tiger Units” ItAF provides a pair of S-208 from 60th Stormo of Guidonia, a C-130 operating from Pisa while, a single KC-767A for air refueling and a G-550 CAEW which provided the battlefield situational awareness.The latters operating from Pratica di Mare.
As usual, the most numerous type was the F-16, brought by the Belgian, Portuguese, Greek, Polish and Turkish Air Forces. Czech and Hungarian Air Forces were both present with the Swedish-made JAS-39C/D Gripen multirole fighter.
The French presence was varied and saw the presence of air assett belonging all the three Armed Forces: Armée de l’Air et de l’Espace brought the latest version of its Mirage 2000D/RMV and Rafale F4.1 both belonging ECE 1/30 “Côte d’argent”. The Aviation légère de l’armée de Terre (ALAT) was present with SA-342M Gazelle and EC-665 Tigre HAP attack from EHRA 3.
As “non-tiger unit” Aeronavale sent a pair of its E-2Cs belonging Flottille 4F which provided Airborne Early Warning. The latters were joined by a single NATO’s E-3A Sentry (operating from the AWACS’s Forward Operating Base Trapani), and by a Learjet 35A owned by the German company GFD tasked with Electronic Warfare duties.
Among the non-NATO countries present, Switzerland brought the F-18Cs from Fliegerstaffel 11, while Austrian Air Force was present with the EF-2000s from 2.Staffel, making their debut in the NTM after obtaining full member status in 2021. Austrian worked closely with their German Luftwaffe’s colleagues from TakLwG74 (which won the Silver Tiger Trophy Nato Tiger Meet 2023). The large German contingent (in total around 200 personnel and 12 aircrafts) was completed by the Tornados ECR from 51 TakLwG51.
Exercise
“The NTM exercise was born in the 1960s as an air exercise focused on air dominance and therefore focused on air-to-air missions, in accordance with the military doctrines of that time” explains Colonel Vito Cracas, Director of the exercise. “Clearly nowadays it is no longer like that, because we are facing new challenges operating in a multi-domain environment including air, land, sea, space and cyber and so this exercise must evolve accordingly.
Although the primary task are still air defense operations, implying the achievement and maintenance of air superiority, interdiction we are also including assets and personnel from other Armed Forces, in order refined procedures relating to different tasks such as cooperation with the joint terminal attack controllers (JTAC), troops support on the ground (Close Air Support – CAS),
insertion and exfiltration of Special Forces with helicopters or search and rescue of personnel in a hostile environment (Personnel Recovery – PR).
We believe that interoperability between fourth and fifth generation assets is important. Unfortunately, both due to operational needs and various training commitments, in this edition we were unable to use the F-35 but we plan to do so in the next edition, as well as the use of satellites for IMINT activities. But, let me say that even if they are not designed to be stealth, the 4 and 4.5 generation aircraft, which represent the bulk of NATO and allied fighting forces, remain key assets and thanks to the latest avionics upgrades and the integration of new weapons, maintain relevant performances.
I had the honor of bringing the first Typhoon here to Gioia del Colle and, believe me that today, thanks to the latest software package, the aircraft’s performance has grown exponentially.
Furthermore, many of the participants here brought aircraft with the latest software updates, allowing us thus carrying out extremely profitable training activity.
Regarding UAV, however, their use has not currently been considered useful for a simple reason: despite their importance, they are vulnerable, as they are slow and lack self-defense capabilities and therefore would have forced us to focus on their use, for example by providing for an air escort and specific planning, diverting resources from the training goals that interest us most”.
The intense flight activity – with an average of around 110 sorties per day – was mainly structured on two daily waves: a morning main wave, with all assets involved in a complex COMAO (Composite Air Operation) mission, and an afternoon shadow wave, where participants carried out complementary missions, Basic Fighter Manoeuvring (BFM), Air Combat Manoeuvring (ACM) and Slow Mover Interceptor (SMI), using S-208 liason aircraft as target. Operations took place in the enormous airspace of Puglia, Calabria and Basilicata, in Southern Italy, extending up to the Tyrrhenian airspace located east of Sardinia island, also involving the local EW range of Salto di Quirra.
“This has allowed us to expand the number and type of anti-air threats simulated, introducing also land assets (the SIRIUS anti-aircraft system), naval assets (the ITS Caio Duilio destroyer of the Italian Navy), allowing us to also carry out BVR simulating the new long range missiles (Meteor), suppression/destruction of enemy air defenses (SEAD/DEAD), Anti-surface warfare (ASuW) missions, increasing the difficulty of the scenario created for this exercise”.
The availability of such large airspace was a strong point of NATO Tiger Meet 2023: “Thanks to coordination with national civil airspace control agencies, we can operate over an area as large as the Netherlands,” says Colonel Cracas. “We received positive feedback from our Allies’ delegations during their visit here, and I must say that Italy could soon host another edition” he concluded.
The upcoming NTM 2024 will be hosted by TakLwG51 at its Schleswig-Jagel Airbase, Germany.
Read about other Exercise hosted at Gioia del Colle on 2021: Gioia Falcon 2021.
The author would thanks Aeronautica Militare Italiana for the opportunity, SMA Public Information Office and the personnel of the 36° Stormo of Gioia del Colle, particularly Ten. F.Mallardi, for their friendly hospitality.