 |
| US Marines storm ashore during a Military Exercise |
By PAUL McLEARY
WASHINGTON — At some point between June 11 and June 28, a US Marine Corps MV-22 Osprey will, for the first time, land on the deck of a Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force ship as part of a major amphibious exercise between the US, Japan and regional allies.
Known as Dawn Blitz 2013, the amphibious assault war game off the southern California coast involves about 1,000 Japanese soldiers, three Japanese warships and assorted attack and cargo helicopters, which will team with the 1st Marine Expeditionary Brigade (MEB) and the US Navy’s Expeditionary Strike Group 3. The Marines also are bringing three squadrons of Osprey tilt-rotor aircraft and a handful of F/A-18 fighter jets to the scrum.
Canada and New Zealand each sent company-size elements to take part in the exercise, with observers from Australia, Mexico, Chile, Colombia and Peru in attendance as well.
So much representation from Canada and Latin American partners might seem out of synch with a Pacific-based amphibious scenario. But Brig. Gen. John Broadmeadow, commander of the 1st MEB, told reporters June 13 that partnerships like this are likely to become the norm.
“We are hitting a lot of [US Southern Command’s] objectives” in the exercise, he said. “This isn’t a one-way partnership between us and the Japanese; this is a broad coalition that looks at our pivot to the Pacific from a more global perspective, and that our South American partners are as important in that coalition as our traditional Pacific partners.”
US forces assigned to Southern Command, or SOUTHCOM, cover the Caribbean Sea and Latin America south of Mexico.
Read the full story at DefenseNews