RAPID CITY, S.D. - 'TRAINED and READY.' After two long weeks of tough military training, the 4,300 service members who trained in the 2007 Joint Thunder Exercise, packed their duffle bags and equipment and headed home ready to respond to state emergencies and support the Global War on Terror.
This was the 23rd year that South Dakota's Army National Guard has hosted the training exercise in the Black Hills, attracting 81 units from 34 states along with personnel from five countries.
"The most successful part is when you can take active, guard, and reserve components from different branches and combine them to work as a joint operation like we do in the theater," said Brig. Gen. Keith W. Corbett, assistant adjutant general of the South Dakota Army National Guard. "We all wear the U.S. initials on our first line, so it's important we are able to come together to work as one."
South Dakota has conducted this exercise for the past 23 years and has developed into one of the Army National Guard's most prominent training exercises offered in the nation - utilizing forces from the U.S. Army, Army Reserve, National Guard, Air National Guard, Air Force and, Navy Reserve. The training event has become international over the past two years, with foreign military support from Singapore, Canada, Germany, United Kingdom and Suriname.
"The importance of combining all entities of the armed forces is that in times of conflict, especially the war we are fighting today, we do just that," said Command Sgt. Maj. Larry Zimmerman, Joint Thunder task force command sergeant major. "We bring together all these different units of the armed forces along with those of other countries and work together as one organization. That is how we must train."
Spanning a broad spectrum of warrior skills, Joint Thunder gives service members the opportunity to train on land navigation, leadership reaction courses, urban combat lanes, convoy missions, firefighting events and a combat life saver course.
Highlights included a simulated mass-casualty exercise at Black Hills State University in Spearfish, river crossing operations near Chamberlain and Mobridge, and a timber haul mission to the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation.
"Great, successful missions were completed daily," said Col. Michael Lewis, Joint Thunder task force commander. "The timber haul mission conducted by the 615th Transportation Company out of New Mexico definitely sticks out as being an exceptional success story."
The lessons learned over the course of the exercise are meant to better prepare those service members who are closer to deployment.
"These Soldiers received exceptional training that far exceeded their expectations," said Lewis. "This real-world training is some of the best they've ever received."
The 2007 Joint Thunder Exercise ended June 23 with a joint-nation, sling-load operation to build a floating bridge on the Missouri River.
"Every year we continue to perfect the exercise and add to it," said Corbett. "We conduct after action reviews and pay particular attention to those comments in order to improve and learn from the exercise - or to eliminate what didn't work. That's how the 23 years of Joint Thunder has grown to be so successful."