TAPA, Estonia – In a demonstration of international cooperation and medical readiness, the Colorado National Guard joined forces with their State Partnership Program counterparts from the Slovenian Armed Forces to participate in Exercise Vigorous Warrior 26, June 10-18, 2026.
The major multinational medical exercise tested the combined team's ability to save lives in a complex and realistic operational environment.
Vigorous Warrior, organized by the NATO Centre of Excellence for Military Medicine, is the alliance's largest military medical exercise. This year's iteration brought together over 3,500 participants from 38 NATO and partner nations. The exercise is designed to test and improve medical readiness and interoperability under realistic scenarios rooted in NATO’s founding treaty. This includes Article 3, which mandates that member nations maintain peacetime resilience and develop self-help defense capabilities, and Article 5, the collective defense clause stating that an armed attack against one member is treated as an attack against all.
The CONG’s participation was spearheaded by its specialized Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear Enhanced Response Force Package (CERFP). This rapid-response unit, comprised of members from the 140th Medical Group, Colorado Air national Guard and Colorado Army National Guard Soldiers from multiple units, CERFP is designed to support civilian authorities during large-scale emergencies.
For VW26, the CONG team brought its unique decontamination capabilities to enhance the Slovenian medical forces' Role 1 field hospital. A Role 1 facility is the most basic, frontline medical treatment capability in a combat zone. It provides immediate life-saving care, triage, and basic primary healthcare designed to quickly stabilize patients so they can either return to duty or be safely evacuated to a higher tier of medical care.
"We have brought CBRN decontamination to pair on the front end of their Role 1, and we have completely intermixed and integrated teams," said U.S. Air Force Maj. Dylan Bryant, VW26 officer in charge for the CONG. "We have both Americans and Slovenians all the way from casualty collection and point of contact through decontamination and fully integrated medical teams on the trauma units."
This seamless integration is the result of a 33-year relationship between the CONG and Slovenia through the National Guard's SPP. This enduring partnership has built a foundation of trust and shared understanding that allows for effective collaboration despite differences in language or standard procedures.
For the CONG medical technicians on the ground, the exercise required a significant tactical shift from their standard stateside mission.
Stateside, the team typically enters "hot zones" to conduct triage alongside Army extraction units. At Vigorous Warrior 26, the workflow was adapted for a combat environment.
"Here, the mission has been a little bit different, where we're assisting patients through decontamination," said U.S. Air Force Staff Sgt. Benjamin Leavitt, aerospace medical technician with Detachment 1, 140MG. "We're triaging the patient through decontamination and then passing them off to medical personnel for higher levels of medical care."
Beyond the tactical simulations, the exercise provided the CONG with invaluable exposure to the NATO MILMED COE and current battlefield realities. Personnel received a specialized briefing from Dr. Travis Kaufman, a physician assistant with World Extreme Medicine, who has worked directly with Ukrainian forces in the field.
Kaufman delivered a comprehensive training session built on the harsh, real-world lessons learned in modern combat medicine. His curriculum provided CONG members with critical updates in Tactical Combat Casualty Care, Medical Evacuation, and CBRNE response, directly tying the simulated exercise scenarios to current global conflicts.
Bryant emphasized the unique value of participating in a large-scale NATO field exercise. Unlike the CONG’s domestic mission, which focuses on disaster response, the tactical environment of VW26 forced the team to adapt and innovate.
"Participating in exercises like VW26 gives us the opportunity to take our knowledge and skill sets of CBRN decontamination and trauma triage to the front lines of the battlefield," Bryant explained. He noted that the team had to operate with limited equipment, leveraging local resources, and innovating to maintain their life-saving capabilities in a concealed, tactical setting. "It makes us think outside the box and really work on concept development, innovation, and find out how we can still provide the function we need, using assets that we may have to find in a real-world wartime environment."
The collaboration was a success, demonstrating that a shared mission can transcend cultural and linguistic barriers.
"Even though we come from different backgrounds and we speak different languages, we speak a common language of medicine," Bryant said. "We all have a common goal of taking care of the people in front of us."
The partnership between the CONG and their Slovenian counterparts at VW26 not only enhances the medical capabilities of both nations but also reinforces the strength, agility and unity of the NATO alliance.