1PWRR on Exercise OLIVE GROVE in Jordan

The 1st Battalion The Princess of Wales’s Royal Regiment (1PWRR) is taking part in Exercise OLIVE GROVE in Jordan.

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Press Release, Whitehall, 30 January 2025 [circulated 06 February]: The 1st Battalion The Princess of Wales’s Royal Regiment (1PWRR) is taking part in Ex OLIVE GROVE, a bilateral exercise with the Jordanian Armed Forces.

Exercise OLIVE GROVE is a bilateral training exercise which takes place in the demanding desert environment in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. It involves up to 140 SP from A Company Group, 1PWRR who are partnered throughout the exercise with a comparable number of SP from the Jordanian Armed Forces, specifically the King Hussein Brigade (KHB). Ex OG is running from 14 Jan to 16 Feb 25.

Once deployed to Al Quwayrah Training Area, located in the southern part of Jordan approximately 45 minutes north of Aqaba and 3 hours 15 minutes south of Amman, the training initially focused on live fire tactical training. This saw an advancement from individual, through section to platoon live fire training – enhancing the warfighting competence of the 1PWRR soldiers.

The initial live fire training phase culminated in an imaginative and innovative company 36-hour live fire exercise bringing all the skills trained into a realistic and demanding scenario built on the lessons of contemporary global conflicts. This included casualty evacuations, attacks at night and patrolling along undulating desert scrub containing wadis and rocky outcrops, with peaks of over 1100m. This training ensured the validation to high-end warfighting capability was achieved before the bilateral training between the PWRR and their persistent partner, the KHB.

Major Smith, OC A Company 1PWRR was enthusiastic in praising the quality of the training area and the opportunities it offered. He said, “exercising in Jordan offers a unique opportunity. The training area is vast and the environment is demanding. This enables a complex and demanding live fire package to be constructed which has challenged and tested our soldiers and commanders and enhanced the warfighting competency of 1PWRR. We have got a lot out of it and learned a lot from it. It has been the highlight of the exercise so far for me and been the best live fire package I have ever been a part of.”

Following this phase both the PWRR and KHB conducted joint integration training. This involved a small arms weapons exchange and competition shoots, a tactical exchange of urban clearance and occupation skills – learning from each other in the process. This phase then culminated in a joint patrols competition where sections of KHB soldiers were integrated with sections of 1PWRR soldiers, moving from checkpoint to checkpoint and completing a series of tasks and challenges. This tested team cohesion, the ability to think under pressure, and most critically, improving the interoperability of both forces, building the UK-Jordanian relationship.

LCpl Vanstone, one of the section 2ICs in A Company 1PWRR was hugely positive about this phase of the exercise. He said, “working with the KHB has been brilliant. It’s the first time I’ve worked closely with a partner on exercise and they have been excellent. They turn up every morning with so much energy and enthusiasm and being integrated at the section level has meant we’ve got to know them really well. I’ve enjoyed it a lot and learnt probably more from them, then they have from me.”

1PWRR, as part of British Forces Cyprus, hold capabilities at Very High Readiness supporting regional crises response. Additionally, by, with and through key regional partners such as the KHB they build capacity and networks regionally, supporting UK interests in the Middle East. While there will be a number of other engagements and events between 1PWRR and the KHB over the next 12 months, 1PWRR are looking forward to returning to Jordan to take part in Ex OG in 2026.

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