U.S. Army Europe and Africa’s first Multidomain Task Force was activated on Sept. 16, but the new unit has already cut its teeth in the theater at a long-range, precision-fires exercise in Norway, where officials experimented with high-altitude balloons for targeting.
At the first-ever Thunder Cloud exercise in Adenes, Norway, beginning Sept. 9 and wrapping up Sept. 20, the task force and the 41st Field Artillery Brigade exercised an entire sensor-to-shooter operation showcasing shooter targeting and strike capabilities.
The MDTF is the second of its kind. The first has spent several years in the Indo-Pacific theater helping to inform the U.S. Army’s Multidomain Operations warfighting concept as it morphs into doctrine. The service plans to set up five MDTFs that will align with the Army’s global operational needs. Another MDTF will stand up in the Pacific and another in the Arctic in the coming years.
The MDTF in structure will look similar to the MDTF in the Pacific, based out of Joint Base Lewis-McChord in Washington state, Col. Jonathan Byrom told Defense News in a Sept. 16 interview, but will be much more focused on land operations due to geographic differences.