Britain’s supercarrier HMS Prince of Wales has become the first surface ship to be equipped with a state-of-the-art atomic clock as it departs for the Exercise Cold Response 2022 NATO joint exercises off the north coast of Norway.

With 35,000 troops from 28 countries on land, sea, or air, Exercise Cold Response 2022 is a prime example of how complex modern military missions can be. It’s not only a matter of assembling armies, air wings, and warships, but also the long, complex logistical train that supports them and their increasingly intricate and sophisticated command and control systems.

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One of the keys to keeping all of this collapsing into utter chaos is the use of precise time keeping. This doesn’t mean having synchronized watches that are accurate to the second, but intricate digital systems that can keep in sync within nanoseconds or better, for the control of cyber systems and long-range military assets that must be able to reach their targets with a precision of within much less than a meter.

Read more: New Atlas