JOINT BASE LEWIS-MCCHORD, Wash. -- The 62nd Airlift Wing kicked off Exercise Rainier War 21B, Nov. 1, 2021. Exercise Rainier War is a major exercise for the wing, including multiple airlift and fighter assets, joint partners and special operations forces.
“It is designed to evaluate Team McChord’s ability to generate, employ and sustain combat forces in response to a deployment tasking,” said Col. David Fazenbaker, 62nd AW commander. “Exercise Rainier War 21B is truly going to test our capabilities.”
Exercise Rainier War is designed to highlight how the wing executes today’s global airlift mission, develop readiness to win any fight, any time, and invest in Airmen and families. This year’s Rainier War has four lines of effort—Global Air Mobility; Win Any Fight, Any Time; Accelerate Change; and Project Power, Operate the Joint Base.
“This iteration of Rainier War builds on the Agile Combat Employment (ACE) lessons learned from the spring exercise. This time, we are actually demonstrating the Wing’s ability to project combat power into and integrate with Joint Forces throughout the Pacific theatre as we continue to develop ACE,” said Maj. Brett Troutman, 62nd AW Exercise Director.
The exercise will include processing and preparing personnel and cargo for a deployment, specialized fueling operations and other incidents and scenarios that test Team McChord’s responses. Additionally, personnel will operate in a contested, degraded and operationally limited environment, particularly with enemy disruption of the base’s communications capabilities, forcing Airmen to consistently adapt to changing conditions and generate creative solutions.