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This process of gathering information about maritime activities near Allied nations and sharing it across the Alliance is a process of establishing Maritime Situational Awareness or MSA.
MARCOM, as the Allied maritime component, serves as a hub of information regarding MSA. By collecting information directly through use of the Standing NATO Maritime Groups or gathering information from Allied navies, MARCOM builds and maintains a Recognized Maritime Picture as a common source for situational awareness for all Allied navies.
MARCOM works directly with Allied navies through the Allied Maritime Governance framework to provide surveillance coverage of activities like a Russian Navy task group transiting past NATO nations with efficiency while still maintaining superb MSA.
"The Russian Navy is a capable Navy, that’s why their ships are a part of our routine surveillance plans, in the case of the Kuznetsov group, we’ve learned what we can from the group and how it operates,” said Vice Admiral Clive Johnstone, Commander Allied Maritime Command, "we’ll continue to monitor for any changes in behavior and continue to work closely within the Alliance to ensure all Allied navies are comfortable with the level of surveillance and information flowing regarding Russian Navy assets.”
The ship has been monitored since it left Severomosk in October by ships assigned to NATO as well as ships under national control which share information with MARCOM to continue to build MSA. MARCOM serves as a hub of coordination to ensure the appropriate level of surveillance is conducted to provide situational awareness.
As the ships travelled south, NATO ships handed off surveillance duties to national navies and back to NATO assets as appropriate and most efficient for all involved. This same process continued while the Kuznetsov Group was in the Mediterranean and MARCOM continues to coordinate with Allied navies to do the same to ensure coverage on the way back to the Russian Task Group’s home port.
MARCOM includes the Maritime Operations Center where an experienced and trained team from all the Allied navies coordinate and communicate with ships under NATO operational command, national navies and national operations centers to create the best possible maritime situational awareness picture for the Alliance.
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