A Royal Saudi Air Force (RSAF) group participating in the INIOCHOS 2024 air drill arrived at Andravida Air Base in Greece last week. The exercise, which runs over 15 calendar days, involves several countries.
The Commander of the RSAF, Lieutenant General Turki bin Bandar bin Abdulaziz, reviewed the preparations of the air force group participating in the exercise, before leaving the King Fahd Al-Jawha base in the western sector.
His Highness listened to a briefing from the Commander of the participating air force group about the preparations and readiness of human resources and systems. He met with the participants and urged them to make an effort and benefit from the exercise, the Saudi Press Agency (SPA) reported.
INIOCHOS 2024 is one of the largest military exercises in the European continent, where the RSAF participates with six Typhoon aircraft involving all their air, technical, and support crews.
Participating in the drill, RSAF aims to raise its readiness and combat efficiency levels, to exchange and gain experience of air, technical, and support crews to simulate a real war environment, and to train on planning and carrying out complex air operations in an environment composed of various multinational forces.
According to the Hellenic Air Force (HAF), INIOCHOS 2024 will involve a large number of HAF assets, such as fighters, including Rafale and F-16 Viper, Air Defence Systems, helicopters, transport and training aircraft.
Additionally, Hellenic Army, Navy and Special Operations assets and personnel will contribute significantly to the creation of complex and realistic scenarios across the exercise areas which spread over the Greek mainland and seas, HAF added.
Furthermore, in INIOCHOS 2024 a significant number of allies, partners and friends will participate with air assets, such as:
- Cyprus with an AW139 Helicopter
- France with Rafales and E-3F
- Montenegro with an B-414 Helicopter
- Qatar with Rafales
- Romania with F-16s
- Saudi Arabia with Eurofighters
- Spain with EF-18s
- UK with Eurofighters
- USA with F-16s and MQ-9s
Meanwhile, Austria and Portugal are participating with INTEL personnel and Special Forces while Germany is sending a group of Observers.
It is worth mentioning that the number of the fighter aircraft and helicopter of the participating countries is the largest so far in this exercise.
“INIOCHOS” is an annual medium scale exercise (type INVITEX) based on the facilities of the AIR TACTICS CENTER at the Andravida Air Base, located in the Northwest Peloponnese.
The exercise is divided into three phases:
- Phase 1: Detachment Deployment, 01-07 April 2024
- Phase 2: Execution Phase, 08-18 April 2024
- Phase 3: Force Redeployment, 19-21 April 2024
