Pedro Sánchez took advantage of his presence at the NATO summit in Vilnius, Lithuania, to verify that Spain is going to deploy “Spanish forces and soldiers” in Slovakia “to reinforce the eastern front”. In 2022, the Organization’s leaders have already agreed to deploy four battalions in Slovakia, Hungary, Romania and Bulgaria.

This is a new mission, since until now Spain had a presence in countries such as Romania, Lithuania or Latvia. Government sources explain that our country has the commitment and capabilities to launch this deployment and assume the leadership of this battalion. They point out that the forces that are going to be deployed represent a ratification of the Spanish commitment. Of course, from the Government they do not provide any data on the deployment and refer to the appearance of Sánchez this Wednesday from Vilnius

This battalion until now was led by the Czech Republic. At its conception, it was expected to have a strength of 2,100 soldiers from the Czech Republic, Germany, the Netherlands, Poland, Slovakia, Slovenia and the United States. Now Spain is also joining, which happens to lead it.

Spain has committed to bringing its defense spending to 2% of GDP in 2029, but it continues to be one of the countries with the least defense spending. A circumstance that is alleviated by compensating for this minor investment within the alliance with their participation in all the missions.

Spain already has troops deployed on the eastern flank, the closest to Russia. Spain contributes to the Bulgaria-Romania eAP with combat aircraft. Together with the air resources, the Spanish Air Force deploys some 130 soldiers within the contingent, who make all the tasks of maintenance, logistics, surveillance and control of the Detachments possible.

The Spanish Air Force has deployed Eurofighter Typhoon aircraft belonging to Wing 11 to Wing 14, located in Seville and Albacete respectively. In addition, a Radar of the Mobile Air Control Group (GRUMOCA) has been deployed in Romania with around 40 soldiers in charge of maintaining the team’s activity. In Romania, Sánchez has also anticipated that Spain “is going to reinforce our contingent with a greater number of troops.”

In Latvia, Spain contributes some 450 troops and means at the forefront of technology such as the Leopardo 2 E battle tanks and the Pizarro Infantry Combat Vehicles (VCI), being the first time that our nation has deployed this type of capabilities in a mission abroad.

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