U.S. Marine Corps Col. Brian Mulvihill, right, meets Royal Australian Navy Capt. Mitchell Livingstone at Royal Australian Air Force Base Darwin, Australia, on March 24, 2024. (Cristian Bestul/U.S. Marine Corps)
U.S. Marines have returned to northern Australia to train as an air-ground task force for six months across the continent and in the Philippines and Indonesia, a Marine Corps spokesman said Thursday.
This year’s 2,000-strong Marine Rotational Force-Darwin is the 13th contingent to arrive in the Northern Territory since 2012, according to a Marine Corps statement that day.
“The Marines and Sailors of Marine Rotational Force-Darwin are honored and excited to continue the legacy of cooperation,” force commander Col. Brian Mulvihill said in the statement. “Our strong Alliance contributes to stability in the region and enables the readiness of our forces to respond to any crisis or contingency that arises.”
Led by an infantry regiment from Camp Pendleton, Calif., for the third year in a row, the Marines are scheduled to train until October with Australian troops and counterparts throughout the region.
The force will be supported by Combat Logistics Battalion 5, 1st Marine Logistics Group with a command element from 5th Marine Regiment, 1st Marine Division, 1st Lt. Colton Martin, a spokesman for the rotational force said by email Thursday.
The ground combat element for the force is comprised of 2nd Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment, with artillery from 1st Battalion, 11th Marine Regiment, and engineers from 1st Combat Engineer Battalion, he said.
They’ll be supported by Marine Medium Tiltrotor Squadron 268 out of Hawaii flying MV-22 B Osprey aircraft, he said.
U.S. Navy Petty Officer 1st Class Daniel Formano, a hospital corpsman with Marine Rotational Force-Darwin, prepares to disembark at Royal Australian Air Force Base in Darwin, Australia, on March 24, 2024. (Cristian Bestul/U.S. Marine Corps)
Marine Corps, Navy and Air Force Ospreys began flying again this month after being grounded following the Nov. 29 crash of an Air Force Osprey off the coast of Japan that killed eight airmen.
An Osprey crash in Australia in August killed three Marines attached to Marine Medium Tiltrotor Squadron 363 during last year’s rotation to the Northern Territory.
Marines of the Darwin rotation will participate in the annual Balikatan drills in the Philippines, Martin said.
Balikatan will include 11,000 U.S. and 5,000 Filipino troops training from April 22 to May 8, the state-run Philippine News Service reported March 20.
The Darwin Marines will join Marine Aviation Support Activity, another drill in the Philippines that will follow Balikatan, Martin said.
Later, the rotational Marines will participate in Super Garuda Shield in Indonesia, he said. The exercise in September involves 5,000 troops from seven nations.
“These rotations … serve to increase regional cooperation with partner nations in the Indo-Pacific,” Australian navy Capt. Mitchell Livingstone, who leads the Darwin-based Headquarters Northern Command, said in the Marines’ statement.
In Australia, the Marines will join numerous training events, including Southern Jackaroo, which typically involves Japanese troops; Bhakti Kanyini AUSINDO, which involved Indonesian forces last year; and the aviation-focused Pitch Black, Diamond Storm and HELICON LUK, Martin said.
The rotational force will train across a full spectrum of missions, including expeditionary operations, geographically distributed communications, non-combatant evacuation operations, embassy reinforcements, humanitarian assistance and disaster relief, and rapid projection of combat power, according to the Marines’ statement.
