Exercise Reforger

An American M60 Patton moves through a village in West Germany as part of the 1982 Reforger exercise

Exercise Reforger (from return of forces to Germany) was an annual exercise conducted, during the Cold War, by NATO. The exercise was intended to ensure that NATO had the ability to quickly deploy forces to West Germany in the event of a conflict with the Warsaw Pact.

The Reforger exercise itself was first conceived in 1967. The Johnson administration announced plans to withdraw approximately two divisions from Europe during 1968. As a demonstration of its continuing commitment to the defense of NATO and to illustrate its capability of rapid reinforcement, a large scale force deployment was planned that would deploy a division or more to West Germany in a regular annual exercise. The first such exercise was conducted beginning on 6 January 1969. These exercises continued annually past the end of the Cold War, except for the year 1989, until 1993. Reforger 1975 marked the operational presence of the United States Marine Corps in Europe for the first time since World War I when the 2nd Marine Division's 32nd Marine Amphibious Unit (32nd MAU) was deployed from Camp Lejeune, North Carolina as part of that exercise. Reforger 1988 was billed as the largest European ground maneuver since the end of World War II as 125,000 troops were deployed.^[1]

Reforger was not merely a show of force—in the event of a conflict, it would be the actual plan to strengthen the NATO presence in Europe. In that instance, it would have been referred to as Operation Reforger. Important components in Reforger included the Military Airlift Command, the Military Sealift Command, and the Civil Reserve Air Fleet.

The US Army also increased its rapid-reinforcement capability by prepositioning huge stocks of equipment and supplies in Europe at POMCUS sites. The maintenance of this equipment has provided extensive on-the-job training to reserve-component support units.

Operation Bright Star, the biannual deployment of American army and air force units to Egypt, serves much the same purpose as Reforger did.

REFORGER Units

The following units were earmarked to return to Germany in case of war:

• III US Corps, Fort Hood, TX
  • 1st Cavalry Division, Ft. Hood, TX, POMCUS Set at 5 depots in Belgium (Grobbendonk, Zutendaal) and the Netherlands (Brunssum, Eygelshoven) and ammunition depot in Zutendaal in Belgium.
  • 2nd Armored Division, Ft. Hood, TX, POMCUS Set at 4 depots in the Federal Republic of Germany (Mönchengladbach, Straelen, Osterholz-Scharmbeck) and ammunition depot in Kevelaer.
  • 5th Infantry Division (Mechanized), Fort Polk, LA, POMCUS Set at 6 depots in the Netherlands (Ter Apel, Coevorden, Vriezenveen) and ammunition depot in Coevorden.
  • 212th Field Artillery Brigade, Fort Sill, OK, POMCUS Set at 4 depots in the Federal Republic of Germany (Mönchengladbach) and ammunition depot in Kevelaer.
  • 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment, Fort Bliss, TX, POMCUS Set at 4 depots in the Federal Republic of Germany (Mönchengladbach) and ammunition depot in Kevelaer

• V Corps, Frankfurt, FRG
  • 4th Infantry Division (Mechanized), Fort Carson, CO, POMCUS Set at 2 depots at Kaiserslautern.
  • 194th Armored Brigade, Fort Knox, KY, POMCUS Set at 3 depots in the Federal Republic of Germany at Pirmasens
  • 197th Infantry Brigade (Mechanized), Fort Benning, GA, POMCUS Set at 3 depots in the Federal Republic of Germany at Pirmasens

• VII Corps, Stuttgart, FRG
  • 1st Infantry Division (Mechanized), Fort Riley, KS, POMCUS Set at 1 depot at Mannheim.

REFORGER Exercises

References

1. ↑ The Stars and Stripes, Vol. 47, No. 147, Sept. 12, 1988
2. ↑ Marshall Army Airfield (MAAF). GlobalSecurity.org
3. ↑ http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB426/
4. ↑ Reforger 92 – Certain Caravan. M136.de

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to REFORGER.

• REFORGER, GlobalSecurity.org