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U.S. soldiers learn jungle warfare

— Photo: Ritu Raj Konwar

‘Operation Vajra prahar’: American Special Forces personnel undergoing jungle warfare training at the specialised counter-insurgency range of the Army’s Counter-Insurgency Jungle Warfare School in Vairengte in Mizoram on Monday.

Vairengte (Mizoram): Captain Greg Adams and soldiers of the U.S. Army’s Special Force Green Berets held their breadth and watched with rapt attention as soldiers of the Special Force of the Indian Army crawled on a jungle strip towards a mock insurgent hideout, with the Israeli Tavors in their hands booming with deafening sound and two others camouflaged in the jungles keeping their fingers on triggers of their snipers at the targets of the counter-terrorist range.

With live bullets from automatic weapons flying from all directions, it provided the perfect stage for the 24 personnel of the Green Berets to learn some lessons from their buddies of the Special Force as to how to fight a guerilla like a guerilla.

Capt. Adam and his team arrived at the firing range of the Counter-Insurgency Jungle Warfare School (CIJWS) here on Monday after hours of exciting joint manoeuvres such as slithering. They were flown over the Mizoram hills by an Indian Air Force chopper, the hilly terrain providing the perfect setting for learning jungle warfare and counter-insurgency skills.

The soldiers of both the Armies emplaned and deplaned in batches of 10 during the slithering exercise from the chopper at the CIJWS helipad here. During the ‘style exercise,’ they hovered over the hilly terrains of Vairengte in groups of five, each group following the other quickly.

“It is an excellent training. The Indian Army has a lot of experience in counter-insurgency and jungle warfare and it will be very useful to us. We enjoyed the training. We also shared our experiences with them,” said Capt. Adams, who has the experience of operating in Iraq for six months. Some of the personnel of the U.S. Special Force have also been to Afghanistan on assignments.

Puneet Atwal of the Special Force said “it is wonderful learning experiences for both the sides.”

The manoeuvres were part of their fifth joint exercise — Vajra Prahar-08 — that began at the CIJWS on August 4 and will continue till August 24. The first joint exercise was held in April 2003, the second in March 2004, the third in September 2005 and the fourth in August 2007. A total of 133 U.S. personnel have undergone training at the CIJWS so far.

“Faced with terror attacks in both Iraq and Afghanistan, the U.S. Army is keen to learn from Indian Army’s experience in combating insurgency for the last 50 years. One can’t think of a better staging ground for this exercise between the two forces than the CIJWS. This is the best training institute of its kind. For its special field of training to fight insurgencies, the School has been recognised as a Centre of Excellence for counter insurgency training,” said CIJWS Commandant Brigadier A.K. Ram.

“The defence cooperation joint exercise is aimed at increasing the interoperability between the two forces. Many countries have shown keen interest to conduct joint training in counter-insurgency with the Indian Army training establishment here at Vairengte and the CIJWS is set to become a global institution on sub-conventional warfare,” he added.

Over the past 38 years since its inception, a total of 1,487 personnel of 25 countries and 1,56,000 personnel of all ranks of the Indian Armed Forces, Navy, paramilitary forces and central police organisations have been trained.

The training modules include familiarisation and understanding the doctrine of each other, tips on survival in the jungle, including trapping of wild animals and familiarisation with special condition under which they might be required to eat snakes, monkey, light a fire with wood sticks, reflexive firing and awareness on Improvised Explosive devices.

“It is an intensive training and not a day is wasted, not a moment is wasted. Both the Armies are trying to make the best use of it,” said Colonel B. Mukherjee, who is in charge of the training modules.

Asked about the training programmes for foreign countries lined up for the year, Brigadier Ram said that the CIJWS would soon train a special batch of trainers of the Indian Army, who in turn would impart training in counter-insurgency and jungle warfare to the Chinese Army.

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