More than 6,400 American and Canadian service members, 100 aircraft, and seven naval vessels are in Alaska for this year’s Northern Edge training exercise that began this week.

U.S. Indo-Pacific Command leads the joint training exercise, which began on Sunday and includes the air, sea, and cyber domains.

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“Northern Edge 2025 brings together multidomain capabilities in high-end warfighting to ensure readiness to deter and, if necessary, defeat any adversary,” said Air Force Brig. Gen. Rick Goodman, the exercise director. “Additionally, NE25 allows the joint force to work through posture and sustainment, specifically here in Alaska.”

The Royal Canadian Navy and Air Force will be fully integrated into the U.S. Navy, Marine Corps, and Air Force missions for the training. The Canadians’ Airbus CC-150 Polaris refueler and Halifax-class frigate HCMS Regina and, from the United States’s Carrier Strike Group 3, the USS Abraham Lincoln, Destroyer Squadron 21, Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyers USS O’Kane, USS Michael Murphy, USS Frank E. Petersen Jr., and nine squadrons of fourth- and fifth-generation Carrier Air Wing 9 aircraft are all involved in the ongoing training exercise.

“The mission of U.S. Navy carrier strike groups is to deliver sea control and power projection wherever the nation needs us,” said Navy Rear Adm. Todd Whalen, commander of Carrier Strike Group 3. “The sailors and Marines of [USS] Abraham Lincoln Carrier Strike Group are excited to serve alongside our joint force counterparts to demonstrate our commitment to the region and our combined lethality.”

Alaska is strategically located for the U.S. as both its northernmost and westernmost points within the 50 states, making it the closest part of the country to both the Arctic and the Pacific region, including China and Russia.

Indo-Pacific Command is the combatant command responsible for the Pacific region, while U.S. Northern Command’s area of responsibility is North America. The exercise is meant to improve the coordination between them, Goodman said.

“One of the key objectives of [the exercise] is the cross-combatant command coordination between Indo-Pacom and [U.S. Northern Command],” Goodman explained. “This highlights the criticality of Alaska as a key strategic geographic location important to homeland defense, as well as power projection, should we find ourselves in a conflict” in the Indo-Pacific region.

Russian and Chinese aircraft frequently fly close to but do not directly enter Alaskan airspace. They will fly into Alaska’s Air Defense Identification Zone, which is where sovereign airspace ends and is a defined stretch of international airspace that requires aircraft to readily identify themselves in the interest of national security.

“Over the last year, we’ve seen a significant increase in both Russian air and maritime activity in the vicinity of Alaska, both in the Bering [Strait] and up in the Arctic.” Gen. Gregory Guillot, the head of U.S. Northern Command, told the Senate Armed Services Committee in February, “I do think that [China will] increase their presence both independently and as well as increased cooperation with the Russians in the air, in the maritime, and undersea.”

The Russian and Chinese incursions into Alaska’s ADIZ have increased to levels “not seen since before the Russian invasion of Ukraine” in 2022, he added.

US MILITARY LOOKS TO REOPEN ADAK NAVAL BASE IN ALASKA TO COUNTER PACIFIC THREATS

The training exercise also began just days after Russian President Vladimir Putin visited the Last Frontier for a highly anticipated meeting with President Donald Trump to discuss an end to the Russia-Ukraine war.

Upon arriving at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, the U.S. had a B-2 stealth bomber and four F-35s fly over both Trump and Putin in a dramatic show of the military’s capabilities, with other aircraft along the red carpet that was rolled out for the leaders.