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    173rd Airborne, Italian Folgore conduct combined Tuscan exercise

    173rd Airborne, Italian Folgore conduct combined Tuscan exercise

    Photo By Sgt. A.M. LaVey | Paratroopers from the 173rd Airborne Brigade march towards a helicopter extraction...... read more read more

    LIVORNO, ITALY

    12.05.2014

    Story by Sgt. A.M. LaVey 

    173rd Airborne Brigade

    LIVORNO, Italy — American paratroopers from the 173rd Airborne Brigade and Italian army paratroopers from the Folgore Parachute Brigade completed the two-week Exercise Mangusta here Dec. 5.

    While hiking in the mountains of Tuscany might be a vacation for some people, for the paratroopers of Company A, 1st Battalion, 503rd Infantry Regiment it was anything but.

    “It was hard and I was tired most of the time,” said Pfc. Edwin Jackson, an infantryman from Company A. “The terrain was way challenging – it was beautiful, but difficult.”

    After a weeklong train-up with the Italian 186th Folgore Parachute Regiment, the Americans began the practical portion of Exercise Mangusta, Italian for mongoose, training at the Italian parachute training center in Pisa.

    “Training at the Italian airborne school was quite an experience,” said Pfc. Wyatt Davis, a healthcare specialist with Company A. “Even though they use similar systems to us, it’s still not the same – as we have different commands, hand signals, so it’s very good to get that training.”

    The following morning the American paratroopers parachuted into Drop Zone Tosca, near Massa Marittima, and a set of Italian army scouts embedded with each of the three platoons and made their way on foot towards Siena, about 60 km away.

    The terrain of Tuscany is mountainous and densely forested, terrain very different from the areas around Vicenza and Aviano, Italy, where the troops usually train.

    “We don’t get to train like this very often,” said Davis. “It’s been a great opportunity to move long distances and to train with night vision in austere terrain – it’s a good way to check where we are training-wise and what we need to work on.”

    Each day the Soldiers moved an average of 25 km, up and down mountains, through rivers and deep mud, facing different missions against Italian oppositional forces each night.

    Every trooper carried a rucksack weighing approximately 100 pounds, his assigned weapon and its ammunition, as well as enough for and water for the week. They slept in mountain clearings, getting only a few hours of sleep a day and marched through freezing rain.

    The first day’s mission was to try to elude capture as long as they could, with the second and third night’s missions to conduct a raid and assault an objective, but the underlying mission was to build upon existing relationships with the Folgore Parachute Brigade, the 173rd’s Italian sister unit.

    “Combined training is extremely important,” said 1st Lt. Christopher Bolin, a platoon leader with Company A. “By working often with the Italians, we can see some of the areas that we need to work on in order to find the friction points in our interoperability – because we are going to be working with each other for years to come – and we need to cultivate these relationships.”

    Mangusta is just one of many combined training that American and Italian forces have conducted this year. Most recently, 1st Battalion parachuted in a new drop zone with Italian army engineers from Verona, and also hosted a combined ranger assessment course for both the U.S. and Italian ranger courses.

    Mangusta, part the larger Exercise Green Market, was designed to verify Italian parachute operation abilities, while endorsing and fostering intra-brigade and American integration.

    The other half of Green Market, Exercise Smart Spider, included other paratroopers from Company A and Italian marine infantry troops from the Serenissima Amphibious Assault Regiment conducing combined air assaults, riverine raids and a river crossing operation.

    “This is one of the key exercises for the Italian army this year,” said 1st Lt. Sean McIlroy. “At the invitation of the Italian government, we’ve been working with and building relationships with Italian paratroopers, forming these relationships, while getting great, expanded combined training opportunities as well.”

    The importance of training with their Italians hosts was felt at each level within the company.

    “This training with the Italian army is very important as they’re around us constantly,” said Pfc. Brendan S. Spangler, an infantryman with Company A. “We live here and we do a lot to mutually support each other. If we were to go to war with the Italians by our side again, I would feel very comfortable because they understand how we work and we understand how they work. We share a common foundation together.”

    The 173rd Airborne Brigade is the Army contingency response force in Europe, capable of projecting forces to conduct the full range of military operation across the U.S. European, Central and Africa command areas of responsibility.

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    NEWS INFO

    Date Taken: 12.05.2014
    Date Posted: 12.17.2014 05:43
    Story ID: 150511
    Location: LIVORNO, IT

    Web Views: 992
    Downloads: 4

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