REUTERS•PA Units from NATO allied countries take part in the Dragon 15 military exercises

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The significant military build up along Poland's frontier with the former Soviet nation is part of a planned Nato training exercise. Around 900 UK personnel and 350 vehicles - part of the British Army's Lead Armoured Battle Group - crossed Europe to take part in Exercise Dragon 15 on the plains of north east Poland, just 60 miles from the border with the Russian state of Kaliningrad Oblast.

They joined 6,000 Poles, Germans and Canadians on the seven week training exercise, aimed at improving the way the allies worked together. Britain's war machinery took part in battle scenarios, firing rockets and shells in a simulated attack, with red tracer fire ripping through the air. British troops fired two Javelin anti-tank missiles, which cost £100,000 each, and multi-million pound Challenger II tanks were also involved.

PA Members of the First Battalion the Yorkshire Regiment pose on their armoured vehicles

PA Lance Corporal Daniel Ford from Moston, Manchester

PA The First Battalion the Yorkshire Regiment carry out repairs to a Warrior armoured vehicle

The war games will be seen in Moscow as a direct challenge to the Russian military, which has been flexing its muscles in Syria with a build up of troops and weaponry and an aerial bombardment campaign that has come close to wiping out ISIS in parts of the country. Lieutenant Colonel Andrew Garner, Commanding Officer of the First Battalion, The Yorkshire Regiment, said: "I think our proximity to the Russian border will be noticed, but I think the exercise is really all about exercising closely with our Nato allies and the assurance that that brings, especially to our Polish allies - obviously for them, the threat is very real and credible.

"I think it shows the UK is committed to Nato. "It shows with our high readiness forces, now, we can deploy readily around the world at short notice."

Major Peter Perowne of the King's Royal Hussars said the exercise demonstrated Britain's support of the Nato alliance. He added: "It shows to the world the British Army can deploy an armoured battle group, in this case to eastern Europe, but as we have seen, if required, to anywhere in the world."

REUTERS Paratroopers taking part in the Nato exercise

REUTERS Helicopter hovers overhead in a dramatic training scenario

REUTERS Two soldiers carry a small-scale aircraft

Earlier this month Defence Secretary Michael Fallon announced Britain was to station troops in the Baltic states amid growing tension with Russia in the wake of President Putin's military intervention in Syria.

The deployment of a company size detachment - numbering around 100 personnel - was part of a "more persistent presence" by Nato forces in eastern Europe, Mr Fallon said. But there has been consternation in military circles about the meagre size of Britain's deployment compared with the estimated 150,000 Russian troops that President Putin is preparing for war in the Middle East.