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JORDAN – U.S. Marine Reservists with the Chemical, Biological, Radiological, and Nuclear Platoon, Combat Logistics Regiment 4 out of Kansas City, KS, completed a week of joint-force training with Jordanian CBRN soldiers, May 10, at the Joint Training Center.
Ten CLR 4 Marines and five Marine Reserve augmentees from around the corps joined around 7,200 military personnel from more than 20 nations in Exercise Eager Lion, one of U.S. Central Command’s premiere exercises.
The Marines spent the second week in May training with their Jordanian counterparts in preparation for a field training exercise scheduled for May 15 and 16.
Lance Cpl. Adrianna Rosello-Williams, CBRN Platoon, said she had never been out of the U.S. with the Marines and was glad for the chance to train in an environment like Jordan, even with an English/Arabic language difference.
“We’re pretty much on the same level, education-wise, with our jobs,” said Rosello-Williams. “Even though we don’t understand each other with the language barrier, we still have a good understanding of what … we’re doing because we all do the same thing.”
“Jordanians are extremely good at what they do,” said Sgt. Carlos Moreno 4th Marine Aircraft Wing, Marine Aircraft Group 41, Detachment B, at the Marine Corps Air Station Miramar, Cali. “They have really good processes (and) their team is extremely knowledgeable.”
Moreno, an active reservist who has participated in several large-scale exercises, said this type of partner country training is key to Marines because often it requires them to adapt to a complexly new scenario.
“Tactics, techniques - typically those things are similar,” said Moreno. “But they have to adapt to the language barrier, they have to adapt to the training scenario, and they have to adapt to different equipment, which is good for CBRN Marines because never will we ever enter a scenario where we’re by ourselves.”
Moreno added that when you have an active duty unit, you have an active duty mission, but the Marine Reserves will augment another unit.
“They might be an augment to another country, they might be an augment to an active duty force,” Moreno said.
Exercise Eager Lion 17 is the second time this year Marines with the CBRN platoon have traveled to an exercise overseas, according to Chief Warrant Officer 3 Clint Brown, commander, CBRN platoon. Fifteen of his Marines participated in Exercise Eagle Resolve in Kuwait, from March 19 - April 19.
“What’s interesting about this situation is that we are working directly with the Jordanian Armed Forces and combining our CBRN capabilities,” said Brown.
What he hopes his Marines take away from the exercise is the knowledge that other services and other countries bring capabilities to the table. He added it’s important that they understand how to build working relationships with partner country military members and communities.
“We have a lot of trained Marines, yet what I want them to take away is that we don’t know everything,” said Brown. “I want them to see and understand other capabilities, to make us reflect back to what we can do better.”
Marines with Brown’s CBRN platoon are all trained to conduct operations above and beyond the standards of the CBRN basic job training, he said. They are all Hazardous Materials Technicians and Assessment and Consequence Management certified. CBRN ACM is equipment that provides the ability to identify and quantify different types of chemical agents and toxic industrial materials.
Sharing experiences and training has become easier for Capt. Mohammed Alnuiamat, company commander for the Jordanian Armed Forces’ Chemical Support Unit, 3rd Company. He added that he and his soldiers have participated in four Eager Lion exercises and have built very good relationships with their allies.
“Especially nowadays we have very close relations with the personnel who are dealing with the teams, like my level - company commanders,” Alnuiamat said. “I know a lot of my friends back in the U.S. and we have also very good coordination and familiar faces with our partners. (My Soldiers) know their partners, everyone in the team know exactly who and what and when (about their counterpart).”
Alnuiamat said being in an area where chemical weapons attacks are a possible threat ensures that his soldiers take training seriously and work hard to build their technology and information.
“We get a lot of knowledge, and we continue to build our knowledge to be strong in the future by dealing with partners and this kind of training,” he said. “The knowledge we got from this exercise is very huge. I’m now confident with my soldiers, my company, we can defeat any threat.”
Eager Lion 2017 is U.S. Central Command’s largest and most complex iteration to date and consists of a week-long series of simulated scenarios to facilitate a coordinated partnered military response to conventional and unconventional threats. The scenarios developed include border security, command and control, cyber defense and battlespace management.
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| Date Taken: | 05.13.2017 |
| Date Posted: | 05.15.2017 04:24 |
| Story ID: | 233827 |
| Location: | JO |
| Web Views: | 114 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
This work, Kansas City Marines partner with Jordanian Soldiers, by SGT Zoe Morris, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
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