Photo By Maj. Bryant Wine | U.S. Army Soldiers with the Georgia Army National Guard’s Fort Benning-based 648th...... read more read more
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U.S. Army Soldiers from the Georgia Army National Guard’s Fort Benning-based 648th Maneuver Enhancement Brigade and Macon-based 48th Infantry Brigade Combat Team arrived to Morocco June 7-9, 2021, for participation in African Lion 21.
African Lion 21 is U.S. Africa Command’s largest, premier, joint, annual exercise hosted by Morocco, Tunisia and Senegal, 7-18 June. More than 7,000 participants from nine nations and NATO train together with a focus on enhancing readiness for U.S. and partner nation forces. African Lion 21 is a multi-domain, multi-component, and multi-national exercise which employs a full array of mission capabilities with the goal to strengthen interoperability among participants.
“We’re here to build individual readiness, unit readiness, capability development and just partnerships,” said U.S. Army Maj. John Riddle, an officer-in-charge of a Georgia Army National Guard movement chalk. “We’re partnering with the Moroccan forces, the Senegalese forces are here, and the Tunisians are participating in the exercise.”
Georgia Army National Guard units participating in African Lion 21 include the Fort Benning-based Headquarters, 648th Maneuver Enhancement Brigade; the Cumming-based 420th Signal Company, 648th MEB; the Elberton-based 1st Battalion, 214th Field Artillery, 648th MEB; and the Forsyth-based 2nd Battalion, 121st Infantry Regiment, 48th Infantry Brigade Combat Team.
The Georgia Army National Guard has deployed more personnel and equipment to African Lion 21 than any other overseas deployment training in the organization’s history. Over 640 personnel and 200 vehicles, including nine M109A6 Paladin howitzers.
The Georgia Guardsmen began the journey to Morocco by mustering at their unit armories for transportation to Hunter Army Airfield in Savannah, Georgia. The Soldiers flew to Ireland to refuel, then to Agadir, Morocco. Finally, the Guardsmen traveled over 360 kilometers by ground from Agadir to the training area in Tan Tan, Morocco.
“It [deployment] is a good example of how we’re building our readiness as individual units and as the Georgia Guard as a whole,” said Riddle. “It’s good to get our individual unit movement officers experience and getting our units trained up to deploy outside of the United States.”
Georgia Army National Guard operations during African Lion 21 include operating a tactical command post, conducting situational training exercise lanes, conducting field training exercises and conducting indirect fire gunnery table qualification. The exercise culminates with a combined and joint live-fire exercise.
African Lion offers the opportunity to improve interoperability and cooperation while demonstrating the strong military bond that exists between the participating nations. It is designed to provide training for U.S., Moroccan, Tunisian, Senegalese, and other regionally-based African partnered forces while simultaneously reinforcing lessons learned from past African Lion exercises, and provides a foundation and structure for future military cooperation and engagements.
| Date Taken: | 06.09.2021 |
| Date Posted: | 06.10.2021 11:04 |
| Story ID: | 398483 |
| Location: | TAN TAN, MA |
| Web Views: | 539 |
| Downloads: | 1 |
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