Philippine-US airborne exercises held today

MANILA, Philippines — Filipino and US Army paratroopers will conduct today joint airborne operations exercises at Clark Field, Pampanga, the first since World War II.

Philippine Army spokesman Lt. Col. Ramon Zagala said 500 Filipino and US Army Scout Rangers and Special Forces elements would take part in the joint drill aimed at strengthening  the capabilities of both armies in joint  airborne operations.

“This is historic because this type of massive air operations was last launched by combined Filipino and US forces in the University of the Philippines-Los Banos and Corregidor Island in Manila Bay during World War II,” Zagala said.

Zagala said four US C-130 transport planes, flying at a very low altitude, will drop the Filipino and US paratroopers over Cesar Base Air Base in Floridablanca.

US Army soldiers and their Filipino counterparts are already in Pampanga for the joint exercises, one of the hundreds of Phl-US drills lined up for this year.

There was a notable increase in the frequency of Phl-US military exercises, carried out under the auspices of the 1959 Phl-US Mutual Defense Treaty to develop joint operations capability.

The Armed Forces of the Philippines deployed yesterday for the first time four brand new amphibious assault vehicles from South Korea during amphibious assault exercises in Subic Bay, Zambales.

The exercise, dubbed AFP Joint Exercise (AJEX-Dagit), seeks to harmonize and enhance joint sea, air and land operations of the three major serivces – the Army, the Navy and the Air Force.

“The amphibious exercise demonstrated the military’s ability to seize a littoral object in a scenario of an island retake,” Capt. Rhyan Batchar, AFP AJEX-Dagit spokesman, said.

More than 1,500 soldiers, a Navy strategic sealift vessel BRP Davao del Sur and Philippine Air Force helicopters joined yesterday’s combined Army, Navy andAir Force exercise in Subic.

Other AJEX-Dagit exercises lined up include mock maritime interdiction operations in Palawan, airfield seizure and military operations in urban terrain in Nueva Ecija and combined arms live fire exercise in Tarlac.