Conducted between January and February in Germany, the exercise represents the first large-scale peacetime deployment of the ARF, a milestone in NATO’s ongoing transformation.
The initial phase involved a significant logistical and organizational effort, with personnel and equipment arriving at key entry hubs across Germany.
Among these, the port of Emden played a central role in Reception, Staging, and Onward Movement (RSOM) operations, hosting the progressive deployment of multinational contingents and testing large-scale military mobility procedures across Europe.
With the start of the execution phase, STEADFAST DART 2026 is now fully underway, integrating multi-domain capabilities across land, air, and maritime, as well as space, cyber, and special operations domains.
The exercise covers the entire force employment cycle, from initial deployment to final repositioning, with the aim of validating response times, interoperability, and decision-making chains in high-intensity scenarios.
Within this framework, the ARF remains the operational centerpiece. As a high-readiness, multi-domain strategic force, the ARF is designed to provide NATO with a rapid and flexible crisis response, capable of operating simultaneously across multiple operational levels and complex environments.
Its multinational structure allows NATO to leverage capabilities from different nations, enhancing component integration and operational coherence under the Alliance’s new defense plans.
STEADFAST DART 2026 is not only an operational exercise. It also serves as a testing ground for evolving command and control processes and for experimenting with new force employment models.
In this regard, the ARF functions as a permanent innovation laboratory, where advanced doctrinal concepts are developed, emerging technologies are tested, and increasingly multi-domain-oriented training models are consolidated.
Italy’s contribution is particularly significant, with command elements and operational units playing key roles within the force structure. This highlights the growing importance of the Italian Army in NATO’s transformation process and confirms Italy’s leading role in high-readiness capability development and force preparation during STDT 26.
The Italian Army is represented by the NRDC-ITA Corps in Solbiate Olona, the Multinational Division South (MND-S) in Florence, and the “Julia” Alpine Brigade.
Within the context of NATO’s new defense plans, STEADFAST DART 2026 is therefore much more than an exercise: it is a large-scale test of NATO’s ability to rapidly project credible and interoperable forces, strengthening collective defense and deterrence in an increasingly unstable strategic environment.
It is a key step in validating not only tools and procedures but also the Alliance’s future vision in terms of readiness, integration, and multi-domain superiority.