US army trains soldiers in Djibouti

Flintlock, U.S. Africa Command’s premier special operations exercise, will kick off with an opening ceremony scheduled for February 16 in N’Djamena, Chad.

Conducted by Special Operations Command Forward – West Africa and hosted by Chad, Flintlock is a joint, combined multinational exercise to improve information sharing at the operational and tactical levels across the Saharan region while fostering increased collaboration and coordination.

Its focus is military interoperability and capacity-building among African, Western and U.S. counterterrorism forces. The exercise is scheduled to run through March 16.

Over 1,200 personnel will be involved in Chad-hosted Flintlock ’15, with outstations in Niger, Nigeria, Cameroon and Tunisia. Participants are from Burkina Faso, Denmark, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Mauritania, the Netherlands, Belgium, Sweden, Norway, Senegal, Spain, the U.K., Mali, Czech Republic, Estonia, Lithuania and the U.S.

Flintlock ‘15 builds upon the successes and lessons learned during previous exercises which were conducted annually since 2005 and were designed to foster regional cooperation among North and West Africa militaries, while reducing sanctuary and support for violent extremist organizations.

The exercise strengthens security institutions, promotes multilateral sharing of information, and develops interoperability among the partner nations of the Trans-Sahara Counter-Terrorism Partnership (TSCTP). Exercise Flintlock also helps USAFRICOM to achieve objectives for military capacity development training and multinational regional cooperation.

*Press Statement