On Sunday, approximately 70 Soldiers and Airmen from the Tennessee National Guard landed in Bulgaria to begin conducting an international joint readiness exercise the next day, the Tennessee Department of Military announced.
Bulgaria shares international borders with Greece, the Republic of Macedonia, Romania, Serbia, and Turkey.
More than 70 military personnel from the Tennessee National Guard will arrive at the Sofia Airport on June 11 to participate in the Thracian Sentry 2023 exercise.
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— Tenn. National Guard (@TNMilitaryDept) June 11, 2023
Beginning Monday, more than 170 military personnel from the Bulgarian Armed Forces, the Hellenic Air Force in Greece, and the Tennessee Army and Air National Guard began conducting the exercise, named Thracian Sentry 2023.
The exercise helps service members “improve skills that include combat medical care, aircraft fire rescue, joint operations, logistics and sustainment, aeromedical evacuation, and weapons training,” as previously reported by The Tennessee Star.
“For three decades, Tennessee and Bulgaria have worked to grow and develop together across a wide variety of military capabilities,” Col. Jason Glass, Tennessee’s assistant adjutant general-air said in a statement. “This year’s Thracian Sentry 23 exercise will display a level of advanced security cooperation and partnership that will further strengthen the regional stability across Southeast Europe and the Black Sea.”
The exercise also allows airmen to practice utilizing the U.S. Air Force’s new doctrine, Agile Combat Employment (ACE), which is currently being implemented to reshape how the Air Force “prepares, positions, and projects its capabilities around the world.”
According to the Air Force, “ACE shifts operations from centralized physical infrastructures to a network of smaller, dispersed locations that can complicate adversary planning and provide more options for joint force commanders.”
“Tennessee and Bulgaria are ready to employ this new doctrine through teamwork that has developed over many years of friendship and cooperation,” Col. Glass added. “There is nothing we can’t accomplish together.”
In 1993, shortly after the Soviet bloc fell, Tennessee and Bulgaria joined the Department of Defense National Guard State Partnership Program (SPP) as one of the original 13 pairings. Currently, the SPP has 88 partnerships with 100 countries around the world.
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Kaitlin Housler is a reporter at The Tennessee Star and The Star News Network.
Photo “Tennessee National Guard in Bulgaria” by Tennessee National Guard.
So when is Bulgaria coming to help secure the borders of TN? The National Guard should be protecting our nation, and TN Guardsmen should be guarding TN. They should not be reinforcements for whatever the latest money laundering scheme D.C. politicians have going in another part of the world. Let the swamp send their sons to “spread democracy.”