STANAG 2630 NATO military correspondence agreement

What it is

STANAG 2630 is a NATO Standardization Agreement, currently Edition 1, dated 29 March 2018. It is not a technical specification. It is the agreement by which NATO nations commit to implement AAP-56, Edition A, the Allied Publication covering military correspondence. The document's own aim is to respond to an interoperability requirement: "to standardize for use within NATO the layout of military correspondence and the rules for the use of abbreviations and acronyms." Read on its own, STANAG 2630 requires nothing of a supplier or contractor. Its obligations run to nations and to NATO's own bodies, and the correspondence rules themselves sit in AAP-56, not in this cover.

Who it binds, and how

STANAG 2630 is explicit that it binds nations rather than organisations. Its letter of promulgation describes the enclosed agreement as one "which has been ratified by member nations, as reflected in the NATO Standardization Documentation Database (NSDD), is promulgated herewith." Under "Agreement," participating nations agree to implement AAP-56, Edition A - a national commitment, made by ratification, not a duty a supplier signs up to by reading this document. Ratification and implementation are kept separate: nations that have not already done so are invited to advise the NSO of their intention regarding its implementation, while partner nations are separately invited to adopt the STANAG. So "is STANAG 2630 mandatory" has no single answer: it depends on whether a given nation has ratified and implemented it, and this cover names no supplier, manufacturer or contractor at all.

What the agreement commits nations to

The interoperability requirement STANAG 2630 responds to is "to standardize for use within NATO the layout of military correspondence and the rules for the use of abbreviations and acronyms." The STANAG states it "is effective upon receipt and ready to be used by the implementing Nations and NATO bodies," and it "is implemented when the necessary orders/instructions putting the procedures detailed in the covered standard into effect have been issued to the forces concerned." That is national and administrative machinery: a nation's forces put AAP-56's correspondence rules into effect once the relevant orders are issued, not a design or delivery obligation on a contractor. Nations report their effective implementation using the form in Annex H to AAP-03(J); partner nations report adoption using the form in Annex G to AAP-03(J).

A cover agreement, not the correspondence rules themselves

A reader who only has STANAG 2630 in hand does not yet have the correspondence layout or abbreviation rules it points to. Those sit in AAP-56, Edition A. STANAG 2630 also names two other related documents: STANAG 2199, covering command and control of Allied land forces, and AAP-15, the NATO glossary of abbreviations used in NATO documents and publications. Edition 1, dated 29 March 2018, supersedes no prior document: the STANAG states plainly that it "does not supersede any document."

Reporting and review

National decisions on ratification and implementation are recorded in the NATO Standardization Document Database. The STANAG itself "is to be reviewed at least once every three years," with the result "recorded within the NSDD" - a check on whether the agreement is still current, not an audit of any nation's correspondence practices. Nations and NATO bodies may propose changes at any time, processed during that review. The agreement is supervised under the authority of NATO's Military Committee Land structure (MC, MCLSB, LO, SLIERP), and its custodian nation is named as the United States.

What it does not cover

STANAG 2630 names no correspondence layout, abbreviation list or acronym of its own - that detail sits entirely in AAP-56. It also names no assessment or certification scheme: the only stated check is that the STANAG itself is reviewed periodically, not that a nation, an organisation or an individual is certified.

Standards it references

• STANAG 2199Background
• ATP-3.2.2Background