FROM EASTERN BORDER: The country’s largest and most comprehensive military exercises, the Azm-e-Nau-3, started here on Saturday on the eastern borders with the demonstration of ‘Dispersal Techniques’ by the troops in the ‘battle-like’ situation.
The exercises, to continue till May 15, will be participated by soldiers, numbering more than 20,000 and belonging to all arms and services.
The ongoing exercises are the culmination of the year-long training process in light of the directives of Chief of the Army Staff General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, who had declared 2009-10 as the ‘Year of Training’.
To provide the troops the real feel of battleground, the troops have been divided into two groups, namely the Blue Land and the Fox Land, with the former as the defendant and the latter as the adversary.
A heavy anti-tank battalion of the Blue Land demonstrated the dispersal techniques in the Cholistan desert sector and demonstrated the capabilities of armoured personnel carriers (APC).
Other supporting units, including tanks, infantry, artillery guns, anti-aircraft, Engineers, Electrical and Mechanical Engineering and Signals, are also actively taking part in the exercises.
The teams, being commanded by a battalion commander, rolled out the camouflaged APC within minutes and moved to the ‘battlefield.’
The exercises are the culmination of a long and deliberate process of war games, discussions and logistic evolution of “Concept of Warfare” that is fully responsive to a wide menu of emerging threats.
This is a concept validation stage of the operational thought, to be manifested in the form of tactical, operational and organisational aspects, which would be validated and refined through the lessons learnt.
The process commenced with the Army war games, named the Exercise Azm-e-Nau-2, conducted in February 2010.
The PAF’s ongoing exercises, namely “High Mark 2010”, would be fully integrated with the Army field exercises.
In connection with the Pakistan Army exercises Azm-e-Nau-3, the Pakistan Air Force fighting aircraft, depicting the Fox Land and Blue Land Air Force, will carry out mock air strikes in the wee hours today (Sunday).
