The Professional Military Education Centre of the Armed Forces Academy became the venue of an initial activity of the Visegrad Group (V4) principal military education institutions’ initiative – the course headed the “Introduction to the Planning on Joint Operations”. The course took place in the ISOC area from JAN 29 to FEB 2, 2018. Altogether, the course attended 26 participants from V4 countries, out of them five from the Czech Republic, five from Hungary, four from Poland and twelve from Slovakia.

    This V4 initiative, called the „COPD Education Enhancement Initiative“, is focused on improvement of education and organisation of courses in the field of planning and decision-making processes at the operational level that are addressed by the NATO Allied Command Operations’ (ACO) Comprehensive Operations Planning Directive (COPD). Execution of the activity was organised in close cooperation with the Bundeswehr Command and Staff College in Hamburg, which delegated three lectors to lead this course.

    The initiative represents a response to the current shortage of military experts (SMEs) in this field and lectors of military academies as well as the deficiency of national COPD courses in respective V4 countries. The aim of this activity is to develop and acquire the necessary capability to provide this type of courses (in respective V4 countries), and, prospectively, to develop and offer similar courses to students from the NATO partner nations – within the “NATO Defence Education Enhancement Programme“ (DEEP).