News

June 3, 2016. LITHUANIAN Ambassador to the UK, Asta Skaisgiryte visited the new Standing Joint Force Headquarters in its temporary home at Northwood to learn about the organisation, future opportunities for defence cooperation and to meet the Commander, Major General Stuart Skeates.

The Standing Joint Force Headquarters formed following the Strategic Defence and Security Review in 2015 and is the 2-star deployable headquarters with specific responsibility for commanding the UK’s Joint Expeditionary Force. This UK-led collaboration enjoys strong links with a number of NATO nations and has a number of partner nation staff, including Major Edvinas Zaboras of the Lithuanian Army.

„Lithuania is a proud member of JEF. We will continue to support JEF developments in the future, enhance joint readiness to react to emerging threats“ the Lithuanian Ambassador said.

Major Zaboras is on a 3-year non-reciprocal exchange in the UK and has spent 16 years in the Lithuanian Army – no stranger to working with partner nations, he served within the US led Coalition Force Headquarters Afghanistan throughout 2006.

Major Zaboras said: “It is a great opportunity to serve in the UK with the Standing Joint Force and the Joint Expeditionary Force. The presence of exchange officers can only make the bond between nations stronger.” 

The visit focussed on the role of the new headquarters, which is being developed to provide a permanently established, high readiness headquarters able to command the Joint Expeditionary Force. The organisation also provides a smaller subordinate headquarters and a Standing Logistics Component Commander able to focus on humanitarian, disaster relief and non-combatant evacuation, such as took place in the Lebanon in 2006.

The Ambassador received briefings on the new operating model and discussed warfare in the information age, a concept which acknowledges that success on military operations in the future will be gauged on the basis of dominance of the information domain, as much hard fighting on the battlefield.

The Standing Joint Force Headquarters completes a series of exercises in July 2016 whereupon it will reach Initial Operating Capability. From this period it will be at short notice to deploy in command of the UK Joint Expeditionary Force with multinational components under command and still retain the capability to lead a small scale humanitarian or non-combatant evacuation mission. It will continue to grow during 2017 and following additional exercises it will reach Full Operating Capability towards the end of that year.