More than a dozen US M1A2 Abram tanks have arrived in Georgia to participate in the Noble Partner 2016 military exercises, Radio Svoboda reported.

The exercises involving American, Georgian, and British soldiers will begin on May 11th.

The Abrams tanks and Bradley M2 infantry fighting vehicles arrived in Vaziani, a suburb of Tbilisi, on Thursday, at a former Russian army base.

"Exercise Noble Partner is a bilateral effort focused on enhancing U.S. and Georgian NATO Response Force interoperability in the context of military-to-military relationships. The exercise focuses on Unified Land Operations and is based on NATO standard operating procedures," the US Army in Europe's website stated.

Earlier, the commander of US ground forces in Europe, General Ben Hodges, said that the main purpose of Noble Partner 2016 is to "see how quickly the US military can come to Georgia's aid if needed."