Exercise Northern Edge 2025
Northern Edge is the largest joint field training exercise held in Alaska, sponsored by USINDOPACOM and executed across the state’s air, land and sea ranges. The 2025 edition ran August 15 to 25 with more than 6,400 service members, roughly 125 aircraft and seven U.S. and Canadian vessels. It was the first Northern Edge to run concurrently with USNORTHCOM’s Arctic Edge, forcing two combatant commands to share the same Alaskan battlespace at the same time.
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Type | Joint field training exercise |
| Sponsor | USINDOPACOM, executed through Alaskan_Command and Pacific_Air_Forces |
| Location | Alaska: Joint_Pacific_Alaska_Range_Complex, Gulf of Alaska, Aleutian Islands, Adak, Dutch Harbor, Joint_Base_Elmendorf-Richardson, Eielson Air Force Base |
| Frequency | Biennial in recent cycles, held in odd-numbered years |
| First held | 1975 as Jack Frost; adopted the Northern Edge name in 1993 |
| Typical scale | 6,400 to 15,000 personnel, 100 to 240 aircraft, six to seven ships |
Overview
Northern Edge is the exercise the United States uses to prove it can fight from Alaska. The Joint Pacific Alaska Range Complex offers more than 60,000 square miles of airspace, and the adjacent Gulf of Alaska adds roughly 50,000 more, which together give planners the only training space in North America large enough to run a high-end air and maritime scenario at realistic distances. The exercise is sponsored by U.S. Indo-Pacific Command and executed with Alaskan Command and Pacific Air Forces. Its stated purpose is high-end, realistic warfighter training and improved joint interoperability, and in 2025 the framing shifted noticeably toward Alaska’s dual role as a homeland defense position and a power projection platform into the Indo-Pacific.
The 2025 edition is styled “Northern Edge 2025” or “Northern Edge 25” in official releases. It does not carry a dash-numbered iteration designator of the kind used for the 2023 event, which was announced as Northern Edge 23-1.
History
The exercise descends from a line of Alaskan joint exercises going back half a century. Jack Frost ran in 1975, 1976 and 1979 under Alaskan Command and later U.S. Readiness Command. When the Jack Frost nickname was found to be prohibited under Joint Chiefs of Staff publications, the exercise was renamed Brim Frost and ran in that form through 1989, growing to 24,000 personnel in 1987 and more than 26,000 in 1989. Alaska Command was reestablished in 1990, and the 1991 exercise ran once as Arctic Warrior, with sponsorship transferring from Forces Command to Pacific Command.
The Northern Edge name dates to 1993, when the event was an internal training exercise for the headquarters and component staffs. It grew through the 1990s to more than 14,000 participants. Beginning in 2004 the exercise moved out of the winter months into June to accommodate worldwide force scheduling. From 2005 through 2009 Northern Edge was repeatedly paired with Alaska Shield, the state’s homeland security exercise, drawing in more than 75 agencies. The 2013 iteration was cancelled under budget sequestration.
In its recent form Northern Edge has been biennial and held in odd-numbered years. Northern Edge 2019 involved approximately 10,000 personnel. Northern Edge 21 ran May 3 to 14, 2021 with roughly 15,000 service members, 240 aircraft and six ships, including the Theodore Roosevelt Carrier Strike Group and the Makin Island Amphibious Ready Group with the 15th Marine Expeditionary Unit. Northern Edge 23-1 in May 2023 added the Royal_Air_Force and the Royal_Australian_Air_Force alongside U.S. Air Force and Marine Corps units.
Northern Edge 2025 broke a longstanding pattern in one respect. It ran at the same time as Arctic Edge 2025, the annual USNORTHCOM and NORAD homeland defense exercise, which ran from August 1 to September 1. The two exercises had never coincided before. Northern Edge emphasizes power projection and Arctic Edge emphasizes homeland defense, and running them together required deliberate cross-combatant command integration.
What happens
Northern Edge is a live field training exercise, not a synthetic one. Aircraft operate from Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, Eielson Air Force Base and forward locations in the Aleutians, including Adak. Naval forces work the Gulf of Alaska and the waters off the Aleutian chain. The scenario exercises air superiority, long-range strike, maritime strike, command and control, intelligence collection, personnel recovery and theater sustainment across distances that mirror the Pacific rather than the continental United States.
In 2025 the exercise ran fourth and fifth generation aircraft together, including F-35 variants, alongside command and control and intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance platforms, aerial refuelers and mobility transports. The USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN 72) and Carrier Strike Group 3 participated, with Carrier Air Wing 9 flying from the carrier and Destroyer Squadron 21 contributing three Arleigh Burke-class destroyers. Helicopter Sea Combat Squadron 14 worked search and rescue interoperability. Marine Fighter Attack Squadron 533 flew F-35Bs. Army cyber elements participated. The Royal Canadian Navy and Royal Canadian Air Force integrated inside U.S. formations rather than operating as a separate national contingent, contributing the frigate HMCS Regina and a CC-150 Polaris tanker.
Because Arctic Edge was running simultaneously, planners also had to exercise real-time deconfliction and shared sustainment across two combatant commands, which was itself one of the 2025 training objectives.
Why it matters
Northern Edge is the clearest public signal of how the United States intends to use Alaska. The 2025 iteration was explicitly framed by its participants as demonstrating both homeland defense and power projection, which is a change in emphasis from earlier editions that were largely air combat training events. Alaska sits astride the great circle routes to the Western Pacific and the approaches to North America, and the exercise treats that geography as an operational asset rather than a logistics problem.
For an industry reader, Northern Edge is a training and readiness event rather than a technology assessment venue. It does not function as a pathway to a program of record in the way that a dedicated experimentation event does. What it validates is the ability of fielded systems, aircrews and command structures to operate at Pacific distances in Arctic conditions, and it produces the interoperability lessons that shape allied planning. The Canadian integration in 2025 and the British and Australian participation in 2023 are the diplomatic content of the exercise, and they are the part worth tracking.
Participants
- USINDOPACOM, sponsoring command
- USNORTHCOM and NORAD, through the concurrent Arctic Edge 2025
- Alaskan_Command and Pacific_Air_Forces
- US_Air_Force, including units at Joint_Base_Elmendorf-Richardson and Eielson Air Force Base, and the 51st Fighter Wing
- US_Navy: USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN 72), Carrier Strike Group 3, Carrier Air Wing 9, Destroyer Squadron 21, Helicopter Sea Combat Squadron 14, electronic attack squadrons from Naval Air Station Whidbey Island
- US_Marine_Corps: Marine Fighter Attack Squadron 533
- US_Army, including cyber elements
- Canadian_Armed_Forces: Royal Canadian Navy and Royal Canadian Air Force, including HMCS Regina and a CC-150 Polaris
- Royal_Air_Force and Royal_Australian_Air_Force participated in the 2023 iteration
Recent iterations
- Northern Edge 21, May 3 to 14, 2021. Roughly 15,000 U.S. service members, 240 aircraft and six ships, including the Theodore Roosevelt Carrier Strike Group with Carrier Air Wing 11 and the Makin Island Amphibious Ready Group with the 15th Marine Expeditionary Unit. (Wikipedia summary of exercise history)
- Northern Edge 23-1, May 2023. Multinational participation from the U.S. Air Force and Marine Corps alongside the Royal Air Force and the Royal Australian Air Force. (Wikipedia)
- Northern Edge 2025, August 15 to 25, 2025. More than 6,400 service members at kickoff and roughly 6,500 by the close, approximately 125 aircraft and seven U.S. and Canadian vessels, operating across the Joint Pacific Alaska Range Complex, the Gulf of Alaska, the Aleutians and Dutch Harbor. Directed by Air Force Brig. Gen. Rick Goodman. First Northern Edge to run concurrently with Arctic Edge, which ran August 1 to September 1 under U.S. Northern Command. (DVIDS, August 17, 2025; DVIDS, August 25, 2025; Stars and Stripes, September 4, 2025)
Sources
- DVIDS, “Northern Edge 2025 kicks off across Alaska,” August 17, 2025. https://www.dvidshub.net/news/545812/northern-edge-2025-kicks-off-across-alaska
- DVIDS, “Northern Edge 2025 wraps up across Alaska,” August 25, 2025. https://www.dvidshub.net/news/546704/northern-edge-2025-wraps-up-across-alaska
- Stars and Stripes, “Northern Edge 2025 launches in Alaska with another Arctic exercise running simultaneously,” August 20, 2025. https://www.stripes.com/theaters/us/2025-08-20/northern-edge-2025-alaska-concurrent-arctic-canadian-forces-18816545.html
- Stars and Stripes, “Dual Arctic exercises conclude in Alaska,” September 4, 2025. https://www.stripes.com/theaters/us/2025-09-04/northern-edge-2025-arctic-edge-conclusion-alaska-exercises-18975095.html
- Wikipedia, “Exercise Northern Edge,” compiled history of Jack Frost, Brim Frost, Arctic Warrior and Northern Edge iterations. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exercise_Northern_Edge