YEREVAN — The Defense Ministry of Armenia announced on Friday that frontline and other units of the Armenian army have been put on high alert as part of a “sudden check” of their combat readiness ordered by the Chief of the army’s general staff, Lieutenant-General Onik Gasparyan. The Ministry released several photographs of ballistic missile and long-range artillery systems deployed in various locations.
“The inspection began early this morning and is being carried out in accordance with the combat training plan for 2020. It involves military units of the first echelon and part of the central subordination forces, which are put on a high level of combat readiness,” the press secretary of the Ministry Shushan Stepanyan wrote in a Facebook post.
The aim is to test the combat readiness of the troops, their ability to act quickly in certain situations, to clarify the issues of cooperation between the staff, the supporting forces and means, to conduct fire management exercises and to act out operative-tactical episodes.
The check came amid joint Azerbaijani-Turkish military exercises which began in various parts of Azerbaijan on Wednesday. The Armenian military said earlier this week that it will be closely monitoring the exercises widely linked to the recent hostilities on the Armenian-Azerbaijani border.
