SVK Minister of Defence Peter Gajdoš meets with Governor of Indiana Eric Holcomb

Slovak Minister of Defence Peter Gajdoš met with Governor of Indiana Eric Holcomb at MOD Main Building on Monday (21 May). The main theme was Slovakia’s bilateral defence cooperation with the United States of America, especially with the Indiana National Guard (INNG), which has been going on for the past almost 25 years as part of the Indiana National Guard’s State Partnership Program with the SVK Armed Forces.

On the partnership with the Indiana National Guard, SVK Minister of Defence Peter Gajdoš said: “The cooperation between us has been at an excellent level for long years, which has been evidenced by a large number of international exercises, with Indiana Guardsmen supporting us with their attendance. I am pleased to say that this will be the case this year too during Exercise Slovak Shield 2018.” He further underlined the importance of the INNG in the transformation process of the SVK Armed Forces.

Minister of Defence Peter Gajdoš and Governor of Indiana Eric Holcomb addressed defence modernization projects in light of the SVK Armed Forces’ systemic and systematic modernization. In this respect, Minister Gajdoš briefly informed Governor Holcomb about the Long-Term Defence Development Plan with an Outlook to 2030. Topics of discussion also included the training of SVK Black Hawk helicopter pilots by INNG instructors, Minister Gajdoš thanked for this assistance to US officials, and the expected deliveries of additional UH-60M Black Hawks in the near future.

Head of the SVK MOD informed Governor Holcomb about Slovakia’s contribution to Iraq, where SVK personnel are training Iraqi Security Forces (ISF) members in mechanical demining and maintenance & repairs of Soviet-era military equipment as part of NATO’s Training and Capacity Building in Iraq (NTCB-I), and the SVK troop deployment with the Resolute Support Mission (RSM) in Afghanistan, where SVK professionals perform SOF tasks. They also talked about the planned deployment of 152 soldiers on NATO’s eFP role to the Baltics, which was approved by Parliament last week (16 May).