Philippines and Australian forces staged a simulated beach assault at Long Beach in Barangay New Agutaya on Sunday as part of the ongoing Exercise ALON, a joint military training meant to strengthen interoperability between the two nations.
The Combined and Joint Forcible Entry Operation (CJFEO) featured navy troops aboard rubber boats storming the shore to retake an enemy-controlled area.
It was the first time the activity was held in San Vicente, following the inaugural ALON in Zambales in 2023.
“Coordination between both the Australian and Philippines forces were smooth,” Department of National Defense (DND) Secretary Gilberto Teodoro Jr. described.
He stressed that the exercise was the product of months of planning and preparation, noting that the cooperation went beyond the drills themselves, covering logistics.
Such undertakings, he explained, are never arranged overnight but are carefully designed in advance, with the flexibility to adjust quickly to unexpected events like typhoons.
“The cooperation does not merely extend here but also to hosting the forces, making sure that all the things you don’t see – fuel and other necessities are prepositioned months before,” he said.
“So these things are not just planned overnight. Things like these are done with advance planning however, with the realization that, in a moment’s notice, let’s say a typhoon or what not, we may have to operate well,” he added.
Australian Ambassador to the Philippines Marc Innes-Brown likewise said that up to the last moment of preparations, cooperation and harmony could be felt during the exercise.
“I think it has been a very impressive and successful exercise. Even in the last hour, what you’ve seen is air, sea, land, all combined together which is really complex and impressive engagement between the two countries and speaking to our personnel, there is a real a sense of cooperation that exists between our forces which was very much on display now,” Innes-Brown said.
The two also shrugged off criticisms from China, with Teodoro noting that the criticisms are nothing but “propaganda which unfortunately for them is not working for us.”
Innes-Brown also said the activity is “about building interoperability between two countries with shared values and one intent – and that is to uphold rules-based order in this region.”
