NATIONAL TRAINING CENTER FORT IRWIN, Calif. -- Marines and Sailors with U.S. Marine Corps Forces, Special Operations Command coordinated with other U.S. Special Operations Command components and several other agencies to conduct one of MARSOC’s largest and most comprehensive deployment certification exercises.
According to Maj. Brian Fuller, operations officer, 1st Special Missions Training Branch, Marine Special Operations School, MARSOC, the DCE was sponsored by MSOS with the purpose of certifying a Marine Special Operations Company from 1st Marine Special Operations Battalion in their core and supporting tasks prior to deployment. A team from the Marine Special Operations Advisor Group, MARSOC, also participated in the exercise. The MSOAG team trained the partner nation force, allowing the MSOC to conduct operations in a coalition environment.
In keeping with the SOF tradition, the DCE was designed so the Marines and Sailors would shoulder a lot of responsibility during the exercise.
“We’re continuing to refine our bottom-up driven exercises,” said Fuller. “We want our companies and teams to drive the missions, not a higher headquarters directing them to conduct missions.”
According to Fuller, MSOS and other subject matter experts collaborated on a script for the DCE that allowed elements from the MSOC to gather intelligence from many sources that would lead them to their next target. Intelligence from one operation linked the MSOC directly to their next operation. Instructors from the MSOS and various SME’s within MARSOC acted as observers/controllers during each of the operations. The MSOAG team and the MSOC were carefully evaluated, ensuring they met or surpassed SOF training standards set by U.S. Special Operations Command.
A training priority of this DCE that was more prevalent than past DCEs was the involvement of outside forces and agencies. Outside agencies that participated in the DCE included U.S. Army Special Operations Command, U.S. Air Force Special Operations Command, 15th Marine Expeditionary Unit, Nevada Air National Guard and the Drug Enforcement Administration.
“We tried to up the ante this time because if you’re not moving forward, you are moving backward,” said Fuller. “The big shift we made this time was the interoperability with interagency, as well as joint SOF and conventional forces.”
According to Maj. Andrew Christian, branch head, 1st SMTB, familiarization with different agencies is an important tool that will help increase efficiency when they get to the fight.
“This exercise reaps benefits for both MARSOC and those agencies that want to come out here and do some joint training,” said Christian.
According to Fuller, the MSOS wanted to make sure the MSOC’s first exposure to these agencies wasn’t when they were in country.
“When you deploy overseas, you are immersed in that interagency and interoperability environment and there are barriers to working with all those forces,” said Fuller. “What we want to do with this exercise is expose our Marines and Sailors to those barriers and really allow them to find the capabilities and limitations of the forces they will work with in theater.”
This was the DEA’s first exercise with MARSOC. One of the DEA’s operational elements is the foreign-deployed advisory support teams, also known as DEA FAST, which conducts counter-narcotics investigations in areas like Iraq and Afghanistan. When MSOC and DEA missions overlap, they can combine their resources to make an arrest or seizure. In the case of this exercise, they conducted a mission on a time-sensitive target where DEA FAST provided information to the MSOC through the Joint Special Operations Task Force on a mutual target, a high value individual who the DEA believed was involved in drug trafficking, and who the Combined Joint Special Operations Task Force believed was aiding enemy forces.
“Now you hit the terrorists on multiple levels,” said Thomas F. Marble, DEA FAST agent, training liaison and reserve Marine lieutenant colonel. “You go after the shooters and the bombers, and you go after the source of money.”
Marble said it is important for the MSOC to be aware of the special skills and equipment the DEA brings to the table and vice versa. SOF warriors are trained to use every asset in theater to maximize their capabilities.
“From the individual level to the collective level, the Marines and Sailors are extremely professional, disciplined, open to new ideas and eager to learn,” said Marble.
The many agencies, operations, training objectives and the comprehensive exercise script required an expansive and robust training environment.
“The National Training Center at Ft. Irwin [Calif.] has a dynamic environment for us to conduct our exercise,” said Fuller. “The terrain looks like Iraq and Afghanistan, so it’s a good environment for our operators and they have unique live-fire venues that we can take advantage of.”
The two-week exercise ended March 26. As a result of the DCE, the Marines and Sailors from the MSOAG team and the MSOC are more prepared for direct action, special reconnaissance, foreign internal defense and unconventional warfare missions, the SOF skill sets that give MARSOC operators the ability to effectively take the fight to the enemy.
“We have hard-working Marines and Sailors, and they are really adaptive, so we have created a lot of new situations,” said Fuller. “The training staff and the Marines and Sailors being certified have really stepped up to the plate, so we couldn’t be more pleased.”