Vietnamese warship hailed at AUMX

PANO – Ship 18 of Brigade 171 of the Naval Region 2 Command of the Vietnam People’s Navy has successfully implemented required contents in the first ASEAN-U.S. Maritime Exercise (AUMX), which took place from September 2 to 6 in the Gulf of Thailand and off Vietnam’s Southern Ca Mau province.

Vietnam’s naval ship to join AUMX

An exercise to share awareness and interoperability in the maritime domain

The Vietnamese crew-members’ performance at the drill was highly appreciated by other participating countries.

In the first AUMX, Vietnam’s Ship 18 was in the third tactical group with Brunei’s Ship 08 and the Philippines’s Ship 16. Under the command of Ship 16, the Vietnamese ship participated in PUBEX (decoding and encoding telegram), FLASHEX (signaling by flashlight), the moving at night combat formation and PHOTOEX (moving in formation for aerial photography).

Naval Lieutenant Huynh Chi Cuong, Ship 18’s Political Commissar, said that he couldn’t forget the happiness and excitement when crew-members successfully completed the PUBEX content. In spite of conducting the content for the first time, the participating Vietnamese officers decoded all the diagrams and signals and answered all questions from fellow ships.

In the PHOTOEX content, the Vietnamese ship joined other ships from the first and second groups and moved in line formation before changing into a diamond one. The ship kept the alignment while also maintaining distance and speed. The movement of the participating ships was captured by an U.S. helicopter, marking a milestone in the ASEAN-U.S. strategic partnership.

The first AUMX was conducted under the theme, “Enhancing Shared Awareness and Interoperability in the Maritime Domain,” with the participation of seven ships, four aircraft and seven patrol ships from navies of the U.S. and ASEAN member nations. Contents in the exercise aim to promote information sharing among navies and to strengthen the security and freedom of navigation and aviation in line with the basic principles of international law.

Highlighting the Vietnamese crew-members’ good performance at the event, naval Captain Pham Quang Hieu, Deputy Chief of Staff of Naval Region 2 and head of the delegation, said that the outcomes came from the proper preparations of personnel, weapons, equipment and logistics, close coordination among units as well as careful training of the participants.

He affirmed that the exercise will be valuable experiences for Vietnamese naval troops and an encouragement for them to join other multilateral naval events in the coming time, especially in 2020 when Vietnam takes ASEAN Chair.

Below are several photos of the exercise.