POLYGONE: The Soviet Hardware That Trains NATO Pilots

What POLYGONE is

The Multinational Aircrew Electronic Warfare Tactics Facility POLYGONE (MAEWTF POLYGONE) is a trilateral training range jointly operated by the German Luftwaffe, the French Armée de l'air, and the United States Air Force under an arrangement dating from 1979. The training area covers approximately 20,000 km² across the Franco-German border — parts of Rhineland-Palatinate and Saarland on the German side, Alsace and Lorraine on the French.

The command centre sits at Bann/Oberauerbach, approximately 12 nautical miles southwest of Ramstein Air Base. French ground sites at Grostenquin and Chevenieres — both former USAFE bases — host Soviet military equipment and missile simulators installed since the 1960s. Up to 30–40 aircraft can operate simultaneously. The US component was redesignated as the 19th Electronic Warfare Squadron (19 EWS) on 11 May 2021, reactivating a unit originally retired in 1970.

What makes POLYGONE unique in NATO's training infrastructure is not its electronic warfare mission — other ranges provide that. It is the fact that the ground segment uses actual Soviet air defence hardware, not electronic replicas.

The hardware: SA-6, SA-8, and the NVA inheritance

The ground threat systems are designated Mobile Bedrohungssimulatoren (MoBS) — mobile threat simulators:

These are genuine former East German (Nationale Volksarmee) equipment, acquired after reunification in October 1990. On 4 November 1991, a detached command was established at Selfkant Barracks in Geilenkirchen consisting of MoBS-1 (SA-6), MoBS-2 (SA-8), MoBS-3 (SPN-30/SPN-40 jammers), and a maintenance unit. Personnel and equipment relocated to operational sites by end of 1993. The systems have been deployed at POLYGONE since 1994.

The critical element was human. The operation and maintenance of Soviet-design equipment over three decades was only possible because of retained former NVA soldiers who brought institutional knowledge of systems they had operated during the Cold War. This was not a matter of reading manuals — SA-6 and SA-8 maintenance requires hands-on familiarity with 1970s Soviet engineering conventions, component sourcing outside Western supply chains, and radar calibration procedures documented in Russian.

The vehicle interiors have been "fully digitalised and constantly adapted" by electronic warfare specialists to simulate more advanced threats beyond the physical platforms' original capabilities. The hardware is 1970s Soviet; the radar emissions can be reprogrammed to emulate modern systems.

MBDA's maintenance role — and the generational cliff

MoBS maintenance was originally conducted at Heinrich-Hertz-Kaserne in Birkenfeld. After that facility closed in 2014, the work transferred to MBDA Deutschland's facility at the former Hochwald-Kaserne in Hermeskeil, Rhineland-Palatinate. Approximately 22 specially trained specialists work there on the SA-6, SA-8, and Roland systems — performing maintenance, calibration, and pre-deployment preparation.

MBDA's Hermeskeil technicians also deploy with Bundeswehr units to exercises beyond the POLYGONE footprint — the systems travel to training events across Europe. Separately, Thales Deutschland signed a three-year contract with BAAINBw in 2024 covering data recording infrastructure, post-mission debriefing systems, and MoBS enhancement — including predictive maintenance and obsolescence management. The joint MBDA–Thales team supporting POLYGONE totals 60–65 people.

The generational problem is now acute. The last former NVA personnel with direct Cold War-era operating experience are approaching retirement. Their institutional knowledge of Soviet-design equipment — maintenance procedures, failure modes, radar tuning intuitions — is not fully transferable through documentation. When they leave, a quiet but irreplaceable capability walks out the door.

Who trains there

POLYGONE's primary training function is SEAD/DEAD — Suppression and Destruction of Enemy Air Defences. The aircraft types that train against MoBS threat emitters include:

Panavia Tornado ECR — the Luftwaffe's primary SEAD platform, using its Emitter Location System to detect radar signals and ride AGM-88 HARM anti-radiation missiles to their source. Italian 6° Stormo Tornado ECRs have deployed from Nörvenich to train at POLYGONE. The Tornado ECR is being replaced by 15 Eurofighter Typhoon EK (Elektronischer Kampf) aircraft, approved March 2022, equipped with Saab transmitter location systems and Northrop Grumman AGM-88E AARGM missiles. NATO certification is expected by 2030. POLYGONE will be the primary European venue for training these aircraft.

F-35A Lightning II — Italian F-35As have conducted SEAD/DEAD training at the POLYGONE electronic warfare range. As more European nations field the F-35 (Germany, Netherlands, Belgium, Denmark, Norway, Finland, Poland), demand for realistic threat emitter training will increase.

Eurofighter Typhoon, USAFE F-16s, and allied fourth/fifth-generation aircraft all use the range. The Bundeswehr's Zentrum Elektronischer Kampf Fliegende Waffensysteme — approximately 130 Luftwaffe personnel — manages the German POLYGONE operations from Oberarnbach and has deployed to exercises as far as Arctic Challenge in Norway.

The modernisation question

Ukraine has demonstrated what realistic air defence environments look like at scale — SA-6, SA-8, Buk, S-300, and S-400 systems operating in layered configurations with modern electronic countermeasures. POLYGONE's NVA-era hardware, however upgraded electronically, cannot replicate the full complexity of a modern integrated air defence system (IADS).

In February 2023, MBDA Deutschland and Israel Aerospace Industries signed an MoU to offer Scorpius-G (ground-based long-range ESM/ECM system) and Scorpius-T (multi-threat EW emulator capable of creating signal-dense environments for fourth and fifth-generation fighter training) to the Bundeswehr. This partnership represents the most plausible modernisation path — replacing ageing physical hardware with software-defined threat environments that can emulate S-300/S-400-class threats at electronic fidelity levels the current MoBS cannot achieve.

Whether BAAINBw contracts it before the institutional knowledge of the NVA generation is lost — or after — will determine whether POLYGONE's transition is managed or improvised.