13-05-2026, 04:07 PM
![[Image: QPY9rb0.jpeg]](https://i.imgur.com/QPY9rb0.jpeg)
Baatrynsentii - The New Verham Air Force put its first fully trained HF-15 squadron through a sustained operational exercise this month, in what officials at the Defense Ministry have described as the most consequential demonstration of fast-jet capability the service has staged in more than a decade. The exercise, conducted over a fortnight across multiple ranges and involving coordinated participation from elements of the Army and Navy, brought together aircraft, aircrew, ground personnel, and supporting units that had only completed their conversion training earlier in the year.
The HF-15s, the first tranche of the forty-aircraft order placed with Hemlock-Rogway, were delivered to the NVAF over the spring and summer. Conversion training, conducted partly in Lodamun and partly at the squadron's new operating base, ran in parallel with the standing-up of the maintenance, weapons, and intelligence support functions required to operate a heavyweight multirole platform. By the start of the exercise, the squadron was rated by the service's inspectorate as having achieved initial operational capability across its core mission sets.
The exercise lands at the end of a period of sustained investment in NVAF training, infrastructure, and doctrine. Expertise has been rebuilt around the platforms and threat environments the service expects to operate in, simulator capacity has been substantially expanded, and the inspectorate's standards for declaring units mission-ready have been tightened to reflect the demands of the new equipment. The cumulative effect, several senior officers have observed in recent months, is a service that bears little resemblance to the force that emerged from the post-civil-war period in a state of disrepair and limited operational coherence.
The contrast is stark. The NVAF of a few years ago operated a smaller, ageing fleet, with training tempo constrained by funding and serviceability rates that rarely permitted exercises of the scale just completed. The service that conducted this month's exercise is, by any reasonable measure, a different organization.
The HF-15s, the first tranche of the forty-aircraft order placed with Hemlock-Rogway, were delivered to the NVAF over the spring and summer. Conversion training, conducted partly in Lodamun and partly at the squadron's new operating base, ran in parallel with the standing-up of the maintenance, weapons, and intelligence support functions required to operate a heavyweight multirole platform. By the start of the exercise, the squadron was rated by the service's inspectorate as having achieved initial operational capability across its core mission sets.
The exercise lands at the end of a period of sustained investment in NVAF training, infrastructure, and doctrine. Expertise has been rebuilt around the platforms and threat environments the service expects to operate in, simulator capacity has been substantially expanded, and the inspectorate's standards for declaring units mission-ready have been tightened to reflect the demands of the new equipment. The cumulative effect, several senior officers have observed in recent months, is a service that bears little resemblance to the force that emerged from the post-civil-war period in a state of disrepair and limited operational coherence.
The contrast is stark. The NVAF of a few years ago operated a smaller, ageing fleet, with training tempo constrained by funding and serviceability rates that rarely permitted exercises of the scale just completed. The service that conducted this month's exercise is, by any reasonable measure, a different organization.
Further HF-15 deliveries are scheduled across the coming years, with the second squadron expected to stand up within twelve months. Hemlock-Rogway's technical assistance team remains embedded with NVAF maintenance squadrons, and the company has confirmed that block upgrades currently being qualified in Lodamun will be available to the New Verham fleet within the in-service support framework. The exercise's full classified assessment is expected to be completed in the coming weeks. The unclassified picture, however, is already clear enough.
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