Anakonda-16‬ started today. Is it more than just a dog and pony?

Anakonda-16 started today.  How do I know?  Because on every platform I use to keep track of military events I've been bombarded with the news that over 31K troops, 3K vehicles etc...are participating.  The number of countries participating is pretty large too but I wonder.

This has the smell of being nothing more than a cub scout meeting in the field.  I hope I'm wrong but I notice that all these exercises we participate in with our allies all start off with an opening ceremony.  Troops on parade and all that nonsense.  Then it moves to a couple of weeks in the field and the last stage is some civic affairs project with our troops doing work on a school or cleaning a beach.

How do we do it stateside?  You roll out or ruck out at 3am, you're in the field and you start work.  How did the old REFORGER exercises go?  They'd fly in forces (if they were going hardcore that year) and they'd go to the field.  Team Spirit in Korea?  The same.  Even Bold Alligator (when they were actually working out concepts) didn't have anything but getting on ships, working the exercise, and taking notes on lessons learned.

I'll be watching this one because Army Europe and 3rd Infantry Division (the units I follow that are pumping this news) are telling me I should.  We'll see if it lives up to billing.