KAISERSLAUTERN, Germany — In Exercise Desert Spear, almost all the “what if” scenarios were replaced by “when this happens” situations by employing actual data collected from the battlefield this February.

Save for the sand and sizzling temperatures, the 37th Transportation Command could have thought it was in Kuwait last week, directing and monitoring supply convoys throughout Iraq.

Instead, roughly 100 troops from the command’s headquarters element were holed up in buildings on Panzer Casern conducting the around-the-clock training exercise in preparation for a late-summer deployment to Kuwait.

The weeklong, mid-May exercise stood out from typical training in that Desert Spear used data collected from convoys motoring across Kuwait and Iraq in February. Participants were not reacting to hypothetical scenarios of roadside bombs or lost convoys. They were responding to events that had occurred and will likely recur during their deployment.

“This is the best you are going to get without being over there and experiencing it,” said Capt. Charlie Ward of the 143rd Transportation Command, a reserve unit based in Orlando, Fla.

Ward, who has spent 16 months total in Kuwait during several rotations, and Lt. Col. Mike Cashner, also with the 143rd Transportation Command, assisted with the exercise in Kaiserslautern by coordinating the use of the real-world data compiled from their experience.

“What we’re watching here is exactly what went on at the peak of operations,” Cashner said while motioning to a wall of projection screens displaying tracking maps and computer-animated convoys rumbling through the desert.

The ability to use actual data in training is a benefit that units deploying earlier in Operation Iraqi Freedom did not enjoy.

“This exercise has been built to replicate exactly what we’re going to be doing down there,” said Lt. Col. Tim Fucik, deputy commanding officer of the 37th Transportation Command. “The more we train the more capable we are of supporting troops in the fight.”

While in Kuwait, the command, based at Kleber Casern, will orchestrate the movement of about 5,000 troops and 1,500 vehicles as part of supply convoys traveling from Kuwait to as far north as Mosul, Iraq.

The 100 soldiers who will be deploying to Kuwait are geared up and ready to go, Fucik said.

“These soldiers will be technically and tactically proficient so we can take the fight to the enemy,” he said.

And as the command’s soldiers redeploy from Kuwait, Fucik said, they would likely assist their replacements with training similar to Exercise Desert Spear.

“Maybe next year, we’ll be the ones helping out other units and soldiers,” he said.