The two-day Final Coordination Conference for the upcoming Coherent Resilience 2026 – Northeast (CORE 26-NE) Tabletop Exercise (TTX) concluded yesterday at the NATO Energy Security Centre of Excellence in Vilnius.
The Conference marked the completion of the CORE 26-NE TTX planning and scenario development process, which has been underway since April 2026. Over the past several months, around 50 participants representing various NATO institutions, organisations and other stakeholders have contributed their expertise and dedicated significant time to developing an exercise designed to meet its objectives and support the successful implementation of the TTX.
Welcoming participants to the Final Coordination Conference, NATO ENSEC COE Deputy Director COL Gildas Precheur highlighted the importance of the principle “train as you fight” and the need to prepare for evolving threats to critical energy infrastructure: “The adversary is very close, and recent actions against critical energy infrastructure – such as sabotage targeting Germany’s power grid, attacks on Saudi Arabia’s East-West pipeline, or drones periodically crossing NATO’s eastern borders – remind us of the importance of the CORE 26-NE TTX.”
The CORE 26-NE TTX, scheduled to take place in Vilnius in mid-November 2026, will serve as a strategic exercise aimed at strengthening interoperability and resilience among NATO Allies and Partner nations on the Alliance’s north-eastern flank. The exercise will focus on identifying interdependencies between electricity and gas networks, addressing vulnerabilities in energy supply chains, and enhancing the security and resilience of critical energy infrastructure.
