Cheers, Montana Soldiers Cross-Train with Brits South of Helena

Over a dozen British soldiers trained alongside soldiers with the Montana Army National Guard near Townsend, Montana.

Check out the video below of the tanks in action at the Limestone Hills Training Facility.

Sgt. 1st Class Christopher Hoffert filed the report as Montana’s 1-163rd Combined Arms Battalion hosted over a dozen British Army Soldiers of the Royal Wessex Yeomanry (RWxY) for a joint training event. Sgt. 1st Class Hoffert reports that the training is designed to help their armored crewmembers transition to the Challenger 3 tank, which is currently in production.

Sgt 1st Class Travis Kent (US): "We make sure that everything is in tolerance, we start checking the mechanical ends of the vehicles. Start to make sure they can do everything they can. When we come up here, we start training our crews on things like berm drills, bore sighting procedures, sighting in the gun. So that way, when they come up here, they learn what all the systems are that they're using, and they learn how to use them properly so that they can be a more lethal team, crew, and they can be safe while they're out here doing things like that."

Lance Cpl. Megan Fuller (UK): So we have mostly split the crews as three Brits to one American. So, for example, my crew is a British commander, gunner, driver, and then our loader is American. I think that's really good to have that change of the junior members with senior Americans, or vice versa, but also for the relationships between the two armies.

Training involved British armored crewmembers serving in their assigned roles on the M1A2 Abrams alongside Montana National Guard Soldiers. According to the Montana National Guard, "This kind of joint training serves to enhance British Army readiness, build stronger allied partnerships, and project lethality on the battlefield." Video and information above is courtesy of the 103rd Public Affairs Detachment.

Here's the video via DVIDS: