Navy News
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The amphibious support vessel – on a three-year mission to reassure inhabitants of British territories in the Caribbean, tackle drug trafficking and provide assistance in the wake of a devastating tropical storm or volcanic eruption – linked up with forces from across the Americas for Tradewinds.
The exercise has been running since the 1980s and is aimed at getting all those nations with an interest in the security of the Caribbean/Gulf of Mexico/North, Central and South America to work together.
The 2019 version of the exercise is split into two stages; the first around the Dominican Republic, the second, just begun, around the small Commonwealth island chain of St Vincent and the Grenadines, all under the direction of the US military’s Southern Command (SOUTHCOM) in Florida.
It is really an enduring promise between the Caribbean and the Americas, where we come together once a year to execute training that is very critical.
Edward Rogers,
Exercise Tradewinds (TW19) is the annual Caribbean, multi-national, exercise which includes elements of ground security and interagency focused tasking, supporting the US SOUTHCOM Theatre campaign plan.
For her part in Tradewinds, Mounts Bay worked with nine nations from the Americas and Caribbean – Dominican Republic, Haiti, Canada, USA, Guyana, Jamaica, and Mexico, Bermuda, Barbados – for the annual test of international navies to deal with a myriad of potential problems in the Central America/Caribbean region, everything from disaster relief (highly likely) to countering drug runners and smugglers (a constant threat) and terrorist attacks (always possible).
The highlight was a gunnery exercise laid on by the Canadians who launched a Hammerhead remote-controlled boat from their patrol ship HMCS Goose Bay.
It zipped around the column of ships mustered for the exercise towing a target, testing each gunnery team in turn. Mounts Bay was the last ship in the line – and hence the last to fire. The hail of bullets spewed out by her Mk44 miniguns promptly obliterated the target.
Also getting the chance to lay down some lead were the troops from the ship’s specialist Humanitarian Aid and Disaster Relief detachment, aboard to provide brains, brawn and expertise in the aftermath of a hurricane – such as restoring power and water supplies.
In some circumstances they are also expected to provide security and, if necessary, help local authorities restore order (as occurred in the British Virgin Islands after the severe storms of 2017).
So 24 Commando Royal Engineers went ashore to practise ground security exercises with Dominican Republic army and navy personnel.
“Tradewinds was a well-resourced and smoothly-executed exercise,” said Capt Thomas Booth 24 Cdo RE and in charge of the disaster relief troops on Mounts Bay.
“It presented an exciting and unique training environment for members of the unit and allowed them to develop skills that they may not otherwise use in the UK.”
Edward Rogers, deputy head of training at US Southern Command, said many of the lessons learned during Tradewinds were valid far beyond the Caribbean – chiefly the ability for military of different nationalities with different equipment, often speaking different languages to work together to a common goal.
“Whether this is your first Tradewinds or you’ve been in multiple ones, it’s an important exercise. It is really an enduring promise between the Caribbean and the Americas, where we come together once a year to execute training that is very critical. It builds friendships, trust, and partnerships and solidarity with all the participants.
“By us coming together it allows us to be ready and to rapidly respond to whatever we face, whether they’re man-made or natural security threats.”
Direct from the front-line, the official newspaper of the Royal Navy, Navy News, brings you the latest news, features and award winning photos every month.