War games enter second day

LAHORE: The Pakistan Army's war games Azm-e- Nau 3 have entered their second day today. The six-week war games will be the largest manoeuvres conducted by the Pakistan Army since the Zarb-e-Momin exercise in 1989.

The field exercise involves troops belonging to all arms and services, besides engagement of various aircraft and equipment of the Pakistan Air Force, military sources said.

The ongoing PAF’s exercise High Mark 2010 will be fully integrated with the army field exercise which will continue till May 13.

The exercise is being organized in areas of Southern Punjab, Sialkot and Sindh and involves more than 20,000 officers and Jawans belonging to all armed services.

Director General of Military Training Maj-Gen Muzammil Hussain said India had been informed about the exercise.

He said the field exercise involving troops belonging to all arms and services would be a culmination of a long and deliberate process of war games, discussions and the logistic evolution of the Concept of Warfare, fully responsive to a wide menu of emerging threats.

He said the exercise was a concept validation stage of the operational thought process manifested in the form of tactical, operational and organisational aspects which would be validated and refined through the lessons learnt.

The process commenced with the army war-games named Exercise Azm-i-Nau-2, conducted in February this year.

He pointed out that the army followed a biennial training system wherein training objectives set forth were to be achieved over a span of two years.

The training remains mission oriented based on the obtaining security environment.

The training is methodical and progressive, culminating into Map Exercises, war-games and field exercises at various levels of command.

Military sources went on to say that Chief of Army Staff Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kiyani is supervising “Azm-i-Nau 3” besides visiting different fields. All corps commanders would be responsible for their respective command and formation.