Joint Indo-US military exercise in Mizoram

GUWAHATI, May 2— Taking Indo-US military cooperation to a new height, special forces of the two largest democracies recently held a joint combined exercise in Mizoram. The US will host Indian Special Forces in Guam in June for the next leg of the cooperation. Balance Iroquois 03-1 (Vajra Prahar), a three-week long joint exercise involving the personnel of the US Special Forces and an assault team from the Indian Special Forces Battalion concluded at the Counter Insurgency Jungle Warfare School (CIJWS) at Vareingte in Mizoram last Saturday, a press release from the Public Affairs Office of the US Consulate General in Kolkata said today. Three complex jungle exercises, Avgat, Shagoofa and Brahmastra, marked the completion of each training phase. Brahmastra was a simulated hostage rescue operation carried out by a joint team of the two forces, the release said. The Indian and US soldiers learned a lot from each other and reached a new level of cooperation and camaraderie with respect to demonstrating the practical interoperability of the forces over an extended period. The joint exercise ended with a mass airborne drop from An-32s using Indian Army supplied parachutes. Indian Special Forces will go to Guam in June for the next Balance Iroquois, the release added.