New HQ should enable quiker, more coordinated response from Dutch armed forces

The leadership of the Dutch armed forces is undergoing a major overhaul to better anticipate and respond to conflicts and threats. Defense is setting up a new Operational Headquarters where all armed forces units will work together to jointly plan and execute operations, program manager Colonel Peter Loukes announced in the Defensiekrant.

In recent decades, the Dutch armed forces have mainly been used in plannable missions in distant regions - and they’re great at that, Loukes said. But the emphasis must shift back to protecting our own territory. “Wars such as in Ukraine show that conflict can come very close very quickly. In such cases, it is important to be able to act quickly from a single headquarters,” he said.

That will require the separate units like the army, navy, air force, and cybersecurity to work together and for that collaboration to go smoothly. Currently, these units focus almost solely on their own domain. “But that time is also over,” Loukes said. “Conflicts can take place simultaneously in different dimensions. Ship radars are now powerful enough to also detect missiles above land. And enemy communication systems can also be disabled with cyber attacks, instead of bombing from the air.”

In the future, the Operational Headquarters, where all military units are represented, will decide which unit is best to deploy to a certain situation. The headquarters must also better look ahead to predict potential dangers.

It is not yet known exactly what the new headquarters will look like. NRC reported that it will employ 350 to 500 people and will be located in The Hague region in order to maintain quick contact with the central government.