Cobra Gold returns to Thailand with added bite of 6,000 US troops
Cobra Gold 2023 will be back to full strength at the end of this month when 30 nations including 6,000 US personnel will join the annual wargames, Thailand and the United States announced on Tuesday.
This year’s military exercise will be the first to include training for space disasters, according to the press conference at Royal Thai Armed Forces Headquarters in Bangkok.
The press conference, held by joint chief-of-staff Gen Thitichai Thienthong and US ambassador Robert F Godec, announced that the 30 participating nations would be divided into the following groups:
- 7 participating in main war exercises: Thailand, the US, Singapore, Japan, Indonesia, South Korea, and Malaysia.
- 3 participating in humanitarian aid exercises: China, India and Australia
- 10 nations will join as observers: Cambodia, Laos, Brazil, Pakistan, Vietnam, Germany, Sweden, Greece, Kuwait and Sri Lanka.
All in all, 7,394 military personnel will join the 42nd Cobra Gold for this “light-training year”.
Thitichai told the press conference that Cobra Gold would be restored to full operations following Covid-19 but would still observe Public Health Ministry measures during training from February 27 to March 10.
He said this year’s training includes:
- Command Post Exercise. Training on commanding large forces to deal with threats in the land, marine, aerial, cyber and space domains.
- Cyber warfare training. Participants will learn strategies to counter cyberattacks, detect cyber threats and implement standard cyber security.
Thai, Japanese and US military and civilian space agencies will provide data and methods for the training.
- Humanitarian Civic Assistance (HCA) training. HCA participants will construct multi-purpose buildings for schools in six training areas.
- Humanitarian Assistance and Disaster Response Exercise (HADR-X). The exercises incorporate the HADR Tabletop Exercise and HADR-Demo exercise.
In the tabletop exercise, the participants will be trained to deal with natural disasters by using regional and international responsive networks.
In the HADR-Demo, the participants will observe demonstrations on how to search for and rescue victims, provide urgent medical help and evacuate victims, deal with chemical leaks, and fight fires.
- Field Training Exercise (FTX). The FTX will include combined exercises of army, navy and air force troops. Joint Forcible Entry Operations will cover landfall exercises, parachuting, evacuation of civilians from war zones, and live fire training.
Brazil will join Cobra Gold as an observer for the first time this year.
“This partnership has improved the lives of both Thais and Americans and will continue to make our countries more prosperous and secure,” Godec said.
The security partnership and field training exercises would “better the lives of our farmers, students, and shop owners” in Thailand, he added.
Godec hinted at tensions in the disputed South China Sea and cybercrime/warfare in his explanation of why the war exercises were crucial.
“The Indo-Pacific region accounts for roughly 60% of the world economy and two-thirds of all economic growth over the last five years. At least a third of global maritime trade goes through the Indo-Pacific region. Our shared security partnership ensures that the goods exported by Thai and American business owners can continue flow freely, enhancing our shared prosperity. In Thailand, an estimated 35% of local financial payments are now digital. We are working together to ensure that our critical digital infrastructure is secure,” he said.
“What makes Cobra Gold special, is that it exemplifies the fabric of our friendship – a genuine friendship – that we have woven together over the last 200 years. Thousands of Thai and US military members have formed lasting friendships through Cobra Gold and other military interactions. Our 1833 Treaty of Amity and Commerce started as bilateral trade agreement and blossomed into the partnership we celebrate today. Similarly, Cobra Gold evolved from a small bilateral marine exercise into one of the world’s preeminent multinational security exercises,” the ambassador added.
Speaking at the same press conference, Colonel Kurt Leffler, US Senior Defence Official and Defence Attaché to Thailand, thanked the Thai government and Thai people for co-hosting the war exercises. Leffler is also chief of the Joint US Military Advisory Group – Thailand, also known as JUSMAGTHAI, which celebrates its 70th anniversary this September.
He said this year would mark the largest US participation in Cobra Gold in a decade.
“We’ve certainly returned to a ‘Cobra Gold of Old’ in terms of scale,” he added.
“The Cobra Gold Exercise provides participating countries the opportunity to practice, rehearse, and experiment together against a wide variety of challenges. These repetitions, year after year, build shared understanding and muscle memory needed to respond together against disasters in the real world, saving time in our collective response, and thus saving lives. Our effective response to regional disasters in recent decades – from floods and storms to earthquakes and cave rescues – is the direct result of millions of personnel hours of training in Cobra Gold.”
Leffler said that exercises will be focused not only on current concerns but also on those over the horizon.
