Emerging waterways and lush terrain all make it more difficult for Soldiers to track, find and destroy hidden enemies in the jungle – a major training emphasis for the Army as it seeks to prepare for the widest possible range of combat contingencies in the future.
Staging ambushes, raiding enemy safe houses and seeking out enemy fighters woven into trees, bushes, marshes, small rivers and thick underbrush – are all activities performed in an Army “jungle warfare” school.
US Army paratroopers with the 82nd Airborne Division and Soldiers with the 3rd Infantry Division were attacking enemies, conducting ambushes and “moving to contact” in the thick jungles of Africa as a way to better prepare for potential future combat scenarios, service officials said.
The combat exercises took place at the French Jungle Warfare School in Libreville, Gabon, a country in central Africa.
After more than a decade and a half of fighting in the Iraqi desert and mountains of Afghanistan, the Army is stepping up its training in “jungle warfare” conditions as part of a broader effort to anticipate emerging terrorist and state threats against whom the Army could be called to operate.
The training included “mock-combat” circumstances wherein troops had to repel ambushes, attack enemy locations and conduct surveillance and reconnaissance missions in circumstances with reduced visibility.
“In the jungle everything is in confined quarters. You do not have freedom of maneuver because of the vegetation,” 1st Lt. Blake Moore, Assistant Operations officer, 2nd brigade, 82nd Airborne, told Scout Warrior in an interview.
