Fighting A Hidden Enemy: Soldiers Take To Forest
2 RIFLES and 1 SCOTS soldiers, from 38 (Irish) Brigade, have been sharpening their skills in tackling both insurgencies and conventional enemies.
It's been taking place in Galloway Forest in southern Scotland, which is the UK's largest forest park and a crucial British Army training area, spanning 300 square miles.
The exercise, Shamrock Strike, pits the two battalions against both the difficult cold, boggy, challenging terrain, and an enemy with a bomb factory concealed in the forest.
It's a mixture of a conventional enemy, and one that mirrors a counter-insurgency.
The troops have to confront them, surround the factory, seize what's inside, take prisoners and treat casualties.
The latter are made more lifelike by actors with limb amputations and graphic makeup.
But it wasn't over at that point.
The 138 soldiers on exercise also had to avoid ambush and IEDs as they made their escape.
The exercise was a great opportunity for the two battalions to work more closely together, and now they're looking ahead to overseas exercises in 2017.
(For security reasons some of the troops in this report have not been named).
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