1st Battalion the Royal Anglian Snipers and Anti-Tank platoon recently deployed on Exercise DESERT WARRIOR 7 attached to B squadron The Queens Dragoon Guards (QDG). The month of combined training culminated with a joint demonstration of their mounted and dismounted close-combat skills prior to Kuwait’s Liberation Day.
The bilateral exercise involved the development of the Kuwaiti Land Forces (KLF) Reconnaissance Battalions by integrating troops from the QDG’s B Squadron and elements from D Company, 1 Royal Anglian.
Sniper Platoon spent the first part of the Exercise cross training with the KLF snipers working on ranges, showing each other how they operate. The last three weeks 1 Royal Anglian Sniper Platoon ran a training package for 10 potential snipers, from QDG, getting them ready for the sniper operators’ course later in the year. This involved camouflage and concealment, observation, judging distance, sniper knowledge, an introduction to stalking, navigation and of course marksmanship.
1 Royal Anglian Sniper Platoon also conducted their own marksmanship training, starting off with grouping and zeroing progressing to the sniper ACMT, qualifying in their annual tests ready to deploy on operations around the world. Sniper Pl also trained with snipers from the US army acting as a pair with the objective of getting first round hits on man-sized targets over a mile away in the Kuwaiti desert.
Anti-tank Platoon made a visit to their Kuwaiti counterparts demonstrating each other’s kit learning one another’s capabilities. Anti-tank Pl also honed their instructional skills running an anti-tank gunner’s cadre. Ten students from the QDG attended the cadre. This was over the four-week period starting off with NLAW and Javelin weapon handling, including characteristics, introduction to observation posts, identifying armoured fighting vehicles from all around the world, javelin military knowledge anti-armour ambushes and culminating in a 48-hour confirmatory exercise in the harsh Kuwaiti desert testing the students on all they had been taught. Once the QDG soldiers get back to their unit and pass the in-door trainer test (IDT) they will be badged javelin gunners able to deploy on operations with the weapon system.
Exercise DESERT WARRIOR 7 was successful for all involved, for most soldiers it was their first time in Kuwait getting to experience another culture. There was some exceptional training conducted, whether it was for the QDG operating with their Kuwaiti counterparts, Anti-tank Pl sharpening their instructional skills and qualifying ten new Anti-tank gunners or for Sniper Pl always developing their marksmanship being ready for whatever task is in front of them.