Spain’s participation in the ‘Estrella Austral 2023’ exercise

• Chile, U.S. and Spain bring together land, air and amphibious assets and troops in this combined and joint exercise

Military personnel from Chile and the U.S., as well as Spain’s Special Operations, have deployed air, land and sea assets and troops in Chile to complete the integration phase in the combined and joint exercise ‘Estrella Austral 2023’.

This exercise will be conducted until next August 11, bringing together more than 1,500 military personnel from the Armed Forces of the three countries, which belong to Chile’s Special Operations, Joint Special Operations Combined Command of the U.S., and the Special Operations Joint Command. In addition, troops from the Special Operations Command, the Parachute Sapper Squadron and Special Naval Warfare Forces take part in it.

Exercises of mobility, amphibians, procedures of area beaconing and aircraft control are found among the activities that have already been conducted in the integration phase.

Interoperability work

The main objective of the ‘Estrella Austral 2023’ exercise is the development of joint work between the different units from the Special Operations of Chilean’s Armed Forces, and combined with the collaboration of countries such as the United States and Spain, and the increase in interoperability between the host Special Forces and the other two participating countries.

Apart from the biggest challenge that the Chilean Joint Special Operations Command will face, which were created ad hoc for the aforementioned exercise, will be the interconnection of the four marked areas throughout the country, whose distance exceeds 4,000 km from the north to the south of the country.