STAVANGER, Norway – NATO’s Joint Warfare Centre (JWC) hosted the first JJJJ Conference on February 11 and 12 to maximize synergies between Allied Command Transformation’s (ACT) four subordinate organizations: the Joint Warfare Centre, the Joint Analysis and Lessons Learned Centre (JALLC), the Joint Force Training Centre (JFTC), and the newly activated Joint Analysis Training and Education Centre (JATEC).
Each Centre is responsible for delivering different aspects of NATO’s collective training, education, warfare development, and lessons learned enterprise, contributing to NATO’s transformation, warfighting readiness and interoperability.
Major General Ruprecht von Butler, Commander JWC, stressed that strengthening relationships across the Centres at the command and staff level was crucial for addressing diverse challenges and achieving shared goals.
Major General von Butler said: “It was an honour to host NATO’s first JJJJ Conference at the Joint Warfare Centre. This allowed us to discuss our collaboration, alignment and mutual support on collective training, warfare development as well as lessons identified, and turn them into lessons learned. Under the umbrella of Allied Command Transformation, together we seek training opportunities to improve our Alliance readiness to which we are all fully committed. This was one of the results of the conference. Together we have one common aim, and it is to make our NATO Alliance better.”
More than 100 representatives attended the JJJJ Conference, which featured detailed presentations by each Centre’s Commander, cross-briefs and collaborative working groups focusing on a range of topics from exercise production, audacious training, and warfare development to artificial intelligence, digital transformation and future-readiness.
Colonel Benjamin, JWC’s Division Head for Exercise Production, who led the exercise production and enablement working group, explained: “Some keys to success are networking, collaborating, and establishing shared understanding. We did this and synchronized how we can continue to work together ensuring that we make NATO exercises better to increase and enhance readiness.”
NATO’s deterrence and defence strategy, supported by the new Allied Reaction Force and family of integrated plans, reflects the changing character of modern warfare, our evolving security environment and rapid technological advancements. This was the theme at the transformation working group.
“Growing requirements placed upon the Centres necessitate better resource sharing and a better understanding of the digital-first solutions,” said Mr Jason, JWC’s NATO 2030 Programme Manager, who led the transformation working group.
He added: “A JJJJ-focused transformation is required to sustain today’s increased outputs, to rebalance our delivery mechanisms to better support warfare development, and to digitize the overall exercise process, from planning to execution. This has an impact on our operating models pertaining to people, organization, processes, infrastructure and technology.”
Led by JALLC, the warfare development and lessons application working group examined the challenges and opportunities relating to the various strands of Warfare Development such as lessons exploitation, academia/industry collaboration, doctrine development, innovation, and experimentation.
Mr Andrew, lessons learned analyst at the JWC, said: “What was clear was that enhanced communication, cooperation and coordination are critical success factors to supporting ACT warfare development. We turn to HQ SACT to seize those three leadership tasks and, in close collaboration with SHAPE, enable the JJJJ to achieve more together.”
“Overall, the conference highlighted our strengths, which derive both from the individual capabilities we bring to the Alliance, and collectively as transformation engines,” he added. “The challenge for each leader of the commands is to maintain our core business with 21st century organization, process and tools, while investing in the value-laden, but discretionary, activities in mutual support of our ACT and ACO partners.”
Other key topics discussed at the JJJJ Conference included operationalization of NATO’s Concept for Deterrence and Defence of the Euro-Atlantic Area concept, the establishment of JATEC – the newest member in the J structure and the first NATO-Ukraine entity within NATO’s Command Structure, NATO’s ongoing adaptation, wargaming capability and future collaborative opportunities.
Addressing the participants at the conclusion of the conference, Colonel Kevin Rafferty, JWC Deputy Chief of Staff Exercise, Training and Innovation Directorate, said: “This conference has done more than discuss our individual and collective challenges. We are all on the journey of operationalizing ACO’s Defence and Deterrence of the Euro-Atlantic Area Concept and ACT’s NATO Warfighter Capstone Concept to deliver readiness, and warfare advantage for the Alliance.”
Colonel Rafferty added: “The focus has been on outputs, not inputs, and how we cut through the excess process. In addition, we have highlighted areas of mutual interest, benefit, and overlap, with the intent on increasing our collaboration, reducing duplication, and increasing integration across the Alliance. This was just the first step; the next one will be to action the outputs of the conference.”
Preparing NATO to address current and future challenges
As NATO’s warfare development command, Headquarters Supreme Allied Commander Transformation (HQ SACT) focuses on delivering warfighting advantage to the NATO Alliance. This headquarters command does so by continuously interpreting the evolving security environment and leading the transformation of the military instrument of power.
Referring to the JJJJ Conference at the JWC, and emphasizing the newest Centre’s role, Admiral Pierre Vandier, SACT said: “Russia is learning fast, and we need to learn even faster.”
The JJJJ Conference underscored the critical need for enhanced collaboration among the four Centres to meet the evolving demands of NATO’s security environment. The increasing scale and complexity of modern warfare, coupled with the imperative for greater realism in training, requires a more integrated and synergistic approach.
“By leveraging shared resources, expertise, and innovative technologies, these four Centres can collectively deliver more impactful training experiences that better prepare the Alliance to address current and future challenges,” Major General Ruprecht von Butler, Commander JWC, underlined.
Under the umbrella of Allied Command Transformation, together we seek training opportunities to improve our Alliance readiness to which we are all fully committed. This was one of the results of the conference. Together we have one common aim, and it is to make our NATO Alliance better.
– Major General Ruprecht von Butler, Commander JWC
The establishment of JATEC demonstrates NATO’s unwavering support for Ukraine. During the Js Conference at Joint Warfare Centre, we focused on a variety of topics related to allied collective training and education enterprise, including lessons learned from the ongoing war in Ukraine.
– Brigadier General Wojciech Ozga, Commander JATEC
As the 4J commands, we each bring valuable contributions to both Allied Command Operations and Allied Command Transformation. The 4J Conference provided a perfect platform to collaborate and engage in in-depth discussions, presentations and exchanges to advance NATO’s lessons learned capability and doctrine, but also to learn from each other to drive innovation forward together.
– Commodore António Neves Correia, Commander JALLC
The 4J Conference gave us an opportunity to meet face-to-face with our sister commands and work together to address common challenges as well as exploiting opportunities. Our security environment has never been more complex, unstable or unpredictable as it is today. Topics like multi-domain operations, digital transformation and wargaming capabilities have thus become more important than ever in the context of NATO training and exercises.
– Major General Bogdan Rycerski, Commander JFTC
