US, Philippines stage war games amid rising South China Sea tensions
As the Philippines disputes China's claim to parts of the South China Sea, US and Filipino marines carried out a mock amphibious assault on a beach there as part of their annual joint military drills
Scores of US and Filipino marines launched mock assaults on a South China Sea beach in the Philippines on Friday in war games aimed at honing the allies’ combat skills.
The exercise came as tensions simmer between the Philippines and China over rival claims to the strategic waters.
Three US rubber raiding craft and two small-unit Filipino river-going boats made repeated sallies at a desolate beach at a northern Philippines navy base in a practise stealth landing of squads of armed marines.
Shouting “volume fire” and “bounce up”, the teams scrambled up the sloping shore with assault rifles to surround a mocked-up enemy tent before running back to their boats in rapid manoeuvres.
“We’re here for the sake of training, to build up and develop our capabilities,” US Marines spokesman Captain Jeremy Scheier said, when asked if they had a specific enemy target in mind.
“There was no specific scenario,” he said, adding that Friday’s exercises began well before dawn and involved about 40 US and 80 Filipino marines.