Troops with the Tennessee National Guard’s 1st Battalion, 181st Field Artillery Regiment, completed an international joint readiness exercise this week at Novo Selo and Koren training areas of Bulgaria.
The mission’s name, Thracian Warrior 24, is the largest exercise of the year for the Bulgarian Armed Forces.
This year’s exercise showcased aerial evacuations, formations, combat firing with mechanized tanks, and more, according to the Tennessee Department of Military.
The final day of the exercise concluded with a large-scale, combined arms demonstration featuring air support, small arms fire, mechanized tank assaults, and long-range artillery, including Tennessee National Guard’s High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems (HIMARS) crews.
The exercise ran from May 28 to June 4 and was hosted and organized by the Bulgarian Land Forces.
Forces from Italy, Albania, Greece, North Macedonia, Croatia, and Montenegro joined troops from Bulgaria and Tennessee in completing the exercise.
More than 2,000 service members and 700 pieces of equipment were featured in total for the exercise, including two HIMARS from Tennessee’s 1-181st unit.
“Getting the chance to come out here and train laterally with their staff was truly an amazing experience,” said Capt. Drew Gentry, commander of Tennessee’s A Battery, 1st Battalion, 181st Field Artillery Regiment. “We were able to integrate and learn from each other on all levels, and all missions and intent were accomplished, resulting in flawless success for all parties involved.”
The Bulgarian Armed Forces and the Tennessee National Guard have worked together since 1993 through the Department of Defense’s State Partnership Program (SPP) shortly after the Soviet bloc fell.
Tennessee and Bulgaria joined the DOD’s National Guard SPP as one of the original 13 pairings. The SPP currently has 92 partnerships with 106 countries around the world.
Bulgaria joined NATO in 2004 and joined the European Union in 2007.
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Kaitlin Housler is a reporter at The Tennessee Star and The Star News Network. Follow Kaitlin on X / Twitter.
