Reserve soldiers hone warfighting skills and tactics at US base

March 15, 2024 - Defence Stories

Author: Captain Lance Wade, 36 Canadian Brigade Group Public Affairs

Caption

Troopers from The Prince Edward Island Regiment and The Halifax Rifles conduct night live-fire training at Fort Barfoot, Virginia, during Exercise MAROON RAIDER 24 on February 19, 2024. This kind of training enhances tactics, drills, and leadership skills, a valuable skill in supporting international operations.

Photo by: Corporal Sam Martell, 5th Canadian Division Public Affairs

Planning and preparing for exercises can often consume a great deal of time. However, for soldiers from the 5th Canadian Division, having the opportunity to fly to Virginia and conduct realistic warfighting training, in a new environment, and on complex ranges provided a significant time-saving value.

Over 415 soldiers participated in an annual training exercise called Exercise MAROON RAIDER 24 (MarR24). Exercise MarR24 is a Field Training Exercise centred on individual and collective Battle Task Standards, and this year took place at Fort Barfoot, Virginia, USA from February 16 to March 10. Spread over a period of three weeks, the exercise was broken into two serials between 36 and 37 Canadian Brigade Groups.

The tactics and techniques being implemented in this year’s training are adaptive dispersed operations, in conjunction with tank hunting skills, mutual support from engineers for obstacle breaching, forward observers for indirect artillery fire, and support from armoured reconnaissance vehicles.

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A gunner from the 1st Field Artillery Regiment, RCA conducts live-fire convoy lane training at Fort Barfoot, Virginia, during Exercise MAROON RAIDER 24 on February 21, 2024.

Photo by: Corporal Brad Upshall, 5th Canadian Division Public Affairs

“The focus of the training here is really to try and integrate some learning from what’s going on in Eastern Europe. There’s a lot of good lessons-learned that are coming out of there,” said Lieutenant-Colonel Michael Bobbitt, the exercise serial one lead. “So, this is our opportunity to take our existing tactics and techniques and integrate those new learnings in trying new things.”

Previous iterations of the exercise have been conducted at 5th Canadian Division Support Base, Gagetown. While proven beneficial, there’s a significant amount of preparation involved in setting up the ranges. Major Liam Taylor, the Officer Commanding training support staff, who oversaw the conduct of live fire ranges, explains, it would take us an additional five to six weeks to prepare the ranges in Gagetown, versus, four weeks here with the US. The National Guard “turn key” ranges saves us time and offer ideal training conditions for our soldiers, especially in spring-like weather conditions.

“Overall, morale is extremely high, and the intent is to come back next year,” said LCol Michael Bobbit. “We currently have infantry, armoured reconnaissance, engineers, combat service support, artillery, signalers, and medics. We're just really excited to have all these soldiers, not just here together, but interoperating together as well.”