By Hajaratu Kalokoh
The Fleet Anti-Terrorism Security Team Europe (FASTEUR) has trained members of the Republic of Sierra Leone Armed Forces on medical and humanitarian aid procedures.
The training is meant for non-medical personnel to become familiar with trauma care in combat situations, with the goal of reducing causalities.
Some 45 RSLAF officers took part in the training conducted at the Peace Mission Training Center in Hastings, outside Waterloo.
United States Senior Defense Official to Sierra Leone, Lt Col. Braden Coleman, told Politico that the training is to capacitate RSLAF to enable its personnel to participate in peace keeping operations and to be able to act in case of emergencies before the arrival of medical personnel.
According to Coleman, the idea is part of the continued engagement with Sierra Leone in building a strategic partnership.
“After the training, we expect to see improvement. We will continue to see RSLAF build up their capacity and ability. Hopefully, for the next couple of years, they can potentially go on peace keeping operation deployment. So, there will be many of these types of training,’’ he said.
The team also trained members of the Sierra Leone Police (SLP) on the same trauma protocols.
The training is made up of Tactical Combat Casualty Care (TCCC) procedures. It provides important knowledge to the crucial interval between trauma and arrival of medical personnel.
Deputy Minister of Defense, Simeon Nasiru Sherriff, noted during the training that he was happy to see US Marines training the RSLAF. Sherriff later told Politico that they have gone ahead to compartmentalize the training as this is an antecedent before the proper training starts.
"This is not the only training we are going to have. We are going to have a collective training. This training is like individual level training. After the collective training, then we will go on for an assessment by the UN before we go for deployment," he said
The Marine Corps Fleet Anti-Terrorism Security Team are deployed around the globe with the task of providing limited duration expeditionary anti-terrorism and security forces training in support of selected component and geographic combatant commanders in order to protect vital naval and national assets.
The primary mission of the FAST Company is the reinforcement or recapture of critical US infrastructure in their specified area of operations. FAST companies conduct specialized training to include non-combatant evacuation operations, close quarter battle, military operations in urban terrain, convoy operations, specialized operations and specialized security operations.
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