Terras: Cyber defense must be part of every military operation

Photo: Küllike Rooväli / Postimees

The commander of the Estonian defense forces, Maj. Gen. Riho Terras, discussing NATO developments after the end of the Afghanistan operation and further cooperation at a weekend meeting of the NATO Military Committee in Budapest, said that cyber defense must be a part of all military operations.

Terras underlined the importance of taking cyber defense into account in the planning of every operation. «In the present security situation we have to take cyber defense into consideration in the planning of all exercises and operations and map out measures both to protect our forces from cyber threats and as a part of military operations,» he said.

The general confirmed that Estonia will participate with a battalion-size unit in a large-scale exercise of the alliance to be conducted in 2015. «Cooperation among allied forces has never been at as high a level as at present," he said. "Joint exercises help maintain the achieved level, but at the same time it is necessary to widen the spectrum of exercises, not stick to one type of operations.»

The committee consisting of chiefs of defense of 28 NATO member states decided to embark after the 2015 exercise on a three-year cycle of trainings as basis for planning further training cooperation of NATO countries.

At the committee meeting the challenges facing the alliance in coming years and NATO transformation, making the best use of available resources and joint cooperation projects were under discussion.

Participating in the conference were Supreme Allied Commander Europe Gen. Philip Breedlove and Supreme Allied Commander Transformation Gen. Jean-Paul Palomeros.