Viespe Detachment receives the visit of the Air and Space Chief of Staff and the Commander of the Operations Command.

• The Air Tactical Detachment, composed of 130 military personnel and eight EF-18s of the Air and Space Army, has been deployed in Romania since December 1st.

The Chief of Staff of the Air and Space Army (JEMA), Air General Javier Salto Martínez-Avial, accompanied by the Commander of the Operations Command, Lieutenant General Francisco Braco Carbó, and the Chief of Staff of the JEMA, Brigadier General Isaac Manuel Crespo Zaragoza have visited in Romania, at the 86th Borcea Air Base, the 'Viespe' Detachment.

The visit was also attended by the military archbishop Monsignor Juan Antonio Aznárez Cobo and the Vicar of the Air and Space Army José Obrador Castro, as well as the GRUMOCA Chief Colonel Manuel María Jiménez Rodríguez and the Chief of the 15th Wing, Colonel Jesús Andrés Margaretto, whose units are deployed in the region.

During the visit, General Salto was received by the Romanian Chief of Air Staff, Lieutenant General Viorel Pana, and by General Catalin Miclos, Commander of Air Base 86 in Borcea, which hosts the Spanish air tactical detachment. During the meeting, the two JEMAs discussed the situation on the eastern flank of the Alliance and the contribution of the Air and Space Army to the NATO mission of contributing to the security and defense of the Romanian airspace. General Salto expressed his appreciation for the support provided by the Borcea Air Base to the Viespe Detachment, which started its mission on December 1, 2022 and will remain under NATO command until March 31, 2023.

The 'Viespe' detachment has exceeded 500 flight hours in air policing missions, mainly in the framework of the reinforcement of the allied presence on the eastern flank of Europe, maintaining the air shield that the Alliance put into practice more than 60 years ago with the aim of preventing and, if necessary, mitigating any attempt of unauthorized overflight over allied countries. This is a deterrence mission that has been reinforced following the Russian invasion of Ukraine, which is now a year old.