Further Areas of Cooperation with the Turkish Defense Forces on the Horizon

General Gábor Böröndi (R) and General Metin Gürak (L) at the Klapka György 1st Armored Brigade in Tata, northwestern Hungary.

General Gábor Böröndi, Chief of the General Staff of the Hungarian Defense Forces, received his Turkish counterpart, General Metin Gürak, who visited Hungary for the first time, at a bilateral meeting of the Chiefs of Staff.

Relations between the two NATO allies’ armies are regular, honvedelem.hu reports. On May 3, General Metin Gürak was welcomed by General Gábor Böröndi, Chief of the General Staff, at Heroes’ Square, where he was paid a military tribute. The Turkish Chief of Staff placed a wreath at the tomb of the unknown soldier.

General Gürak paid a courtesy visit to Kristóf Szalay-Bobrovniczky, Minister of Defense, and held bilateral talks with the Chief of the Hungarian General Staff to strengthen Hungarian-Turkish military relations and explore further opportunities for joint cooperation.

“Within the NATO framework, this is a priority cooperation,” said General Böröndi. “Because there is a war going on along our borders. Building alliances, learning from each other, and working together will strengthen both the Turkish and the Hungarian forces. That is why

we will continue to strengthen joint preparations and training in areas such as high-altitude parachute deployment, special operations cooperation, and cooperation between air forces,”

he pointed out.

The two chiefs of staff reviewed areas of bilateral cooperation. One of these is the Turkish partner’s participation in a battalion battle group, which was demonstrated by the Turkish forces with a deployed battalion during the Adaptive Hussars 2023 multi-national nationwide exercise.

In the framework of the program, representatives of the Hungarian and Turkish military leadership visited Székesfehérvár (central Hungary) where Turkish staff officers are also reinforcing the Headquarters Multinational Division Center (HQ MND-C). The parties listened to presentations on the Hungarian Defense Forces’ National Deployable Communications and Information System Module-E (DCM-E) and met the command staff.

After the visit to Székesfehérvár, they traveled to Tata (northwestern Hungary), where the personnel of the Klapka György 1st Armored Brigade gave a static demonstration of the newly acquired military equipment.

“Of course, we also presented the Gidran combat vehicle, manufactured by Ejder Yalcin, which is now Hungarian and is also used by the Turkish forces. During the course of the day, we looked at the training, education, and other forms of cooperation that we should exploit even more,” said Böröndi, summing up the Hungarian-Turkish Chief of Staff meeting.

Via honvedelem.hu, Featured image: honvedelem.hu