State Partnership Program

Video by Michael Muhlberger

Dutch Patriots, Soundbites

Natochannel

Jan. 7, 2013 | 4:21

The Dutch military has begun the deployment of two Patriot missile batteries to Turkey as part of the NATO mission to augment Turkey’s air defenses. On Monday the 7th of January a convoy of 160 vehicles left a military base near Eindhoven. The Patriots are set to arrive in the Turkish city of Adana around the 22nd of January. The mission is purely defensive to protect the Turkish population from the threat of ballistic missile attacks from neighboring Syria. Transcript: Lt. Col. Marcel Baus – Commander of the 1st Netherlands Ballistic Missile Defense Task Force 00:00 We are the only country together with Germany and the United States who have the Pac 3 capability. Patriot advanced capability. That is a missile that can directly hit a ballistic missile in its course. So it’s like hitting a bullet with a bullet, it’s the hit to kill principle. We’ll be defending the people of the city of Adana against a possible tactical ballistic missile threat from Syria. We’ll be deploying around Adana, and it’s about 120 km from the Syrian border. The fact that that’s been chosen has been done on a political level together with Turkish authorities and within NATO. There is a threat, in fact within Syria several Scuds have been launched, so the threat is there and we’re there to prevent that it’s going to be a threat for Turkey. (01:17) -Well that’s not a main concern for me. I’m there to protect the people and territory of and around Adana. That’s what NATO has asked me to do and that’s what the Dutch politicians have decided to do, and that’s what I’ll be doing. Lt. Col. Eric Abma – Base Commander 01:34 One Patriot fire unit includes a radar Sat. and engagement control station, the fire control station, and six launching stations, including all command control equipment, communication equipment, logistical support. So in total we’re going with about 260 soldiers to Turkey for over a year. If there is a threat it will be recognized through our satellite information. We will have early warning information, so if there will be a ballistic missile fired the system will see it, the radar will pick it up and we’ll automatically intercept those tactical ballistic missiles. We are under command and control of Ramstein from the ballistic missile defense operation cell, we will have the green light if there something is going on and if there is a green light the ballistic missiles will be shot. Q: How much time to react? (02:48) -Well it depends on the range from the ballistic missile, which has been fired, but normally you can imagine about three minutes. We are able to intercept ballistic missiles with a distance of about 3,000 km. They need about three minutes from launch to intercept, so that’s how much time we have to intercept ballistic missile. It’s a NATO-led operation. It’s led by our air command Ramstein, which has its ballistic missile defence operations center operational and we will be directly under their BMDOC and they are commanding our units over in Turkey. (03:29) -This is their daily life, this is what they train for; this is what they have been choosing to do. So the unit is, the last deployment was in 2003, also to Turkey and since then the people have been trained for missions like this. So this is what they do and they are eager to go.