The Philippine Navy (PN) put to test its ability to conduct amphibious operations as it made capability demonstration featuring troops from the Naval Forces West (NFW) in Brooke's Point, Palawan on Friday, Sept. 30.
An amphibious operation refers to an offensive military operation that uses naval vessels to project ground and air power onto a hostile shore at a designated landing beach.
"This demonstration is an opportunity for NFW to showcase to the local populace of Palawan the PN's capability of projecting naval forces from the sea. At the same time, the activity ushered the NFW operating units to be more familiar with their area of operations," the PN NFW said.
The amphibious operations capability demonstration was held on the shorelines of Brgy. Samariñana in Brooke’s Point which, according to NFW, was "an ideal location" for the exercise scenario.
It was the highlight of this year's iteration of Exercise "Pagsisikap" 2022, which is a unilateral naval drill.
Exercise Pagsisikap focuses on the PN’s thrust to sustain the Fleet-Marine units in the planning and execution of surface and amphibious operations and assault in the littoral battle space.
A total of 705 sailors, marines, and reservists coming from the different operational control units of NFW participated in Exercise Pagsisikap.
Further, five capital ships and two support ships from the Navy, several aircraft, amphibious forces, and special operations units also joined the exercise.