Beale Collaborates With Coalition Partners in Support of Exercise Resolute Hunter

  • Published
  • By Senior Airman Juliana Londono
  • 9th Reconnaissance Wing
BEALE AIR FORCE BASE, Calif. --  

Exercise Resolute Hunter 24-1 culminates after 35 Airmen from the 548th Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance Group (ISRG) participated both at home station and at Naval Air Station Fallon, Nevada.

Resolute Hunter is a biannual joint, combined exercise that serves as the Department of Defense’s only dedicated Battle Management, Command-And-Control (C2), and Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance (ISR) exercise. The U.S. Army, Air Force, Navy and Marines all worked together along with partners from the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) and the Royal Air Force (RAF) totaling around 415 participating members.

Beale’s involvement included members from all four squadrons of the 548th ISRG which include the 9th Intelligence Squadron, the 553rd Intelligence Squadron, the 13th Intelligence Squadron, and the 48th Intelligence Support Squadron. Beale Airmen who continuously support the U-2 mission also played a role in contributing to the exercise.

U.S. Air Force 1st Lt. Daniel Malay, 9th IS full motion video officer in charge, was the Defense Ground Station (DGS) Mission Management Team chief during Resolute Hunter. He served as a liaison for the intelligence professionals, aircrew and mission commanders to inform them of the DGS capabilities.

“What was unique about the DGS compared to other participants is that most of our participants weren’t at Naval Air Station Fallon,” said Malay. ”DGS-2 (548th ISRG) had a team of roughly 20 analysts supporting [from Beale] while DGS-IN (Indiana) also had a team of roughly 20 analysts that supported the U-2 sorties in the exercise from their home station.”

The U-2 provided high-altitude imagery and signals intelligence capabilities in support of the ISR needs of Resolute Hunter. The exercise demonstrates and assesses the processes and intelligence capabilities leading up to engaging adversaries.

“The output we provided to the participants and exercise as a whole was maintaining the Disposition of Forces (DoF) which provides every warfighter with a common operating picture in order to plan and execute the mission to be both effective and safe,” said Malay.

Members from the 83rd Squadron RAAF and 1st ISR Wing RAF provided the DGS-2 teams, which included subject matter expertise across intelligence disciplines. Coalition partners were also exposed to challenges of resource management and mission execution.

“Resolute Hunter is an opportunity to share working practices, knowledge, and experience,” said 1st ISR Wing Warrant Officer Robert Watkinson. “The exercise offers UK intelligence participants the unique opportunity to work side by side with American and Australian counterparts in a realistic operational environment and is widely acknowledged as being at the forefront of what is currently on offer.”

Coalition participation is essential to integrate processes, sensors and personnel. This type of exercise is key to ensuring total force readiness for the near-peer fight.

“Combined exercises are extremely important as they enable us to learn from each other, whether that be passing on tips and advice from our own experiences or learning from each other's shortcomings to improve our analytics tradecraft,” said U.S. Air Force 1st Lt. Margiealice Uffre-Gomez, 9th IS analysis office in charge. “They also allow us to form a tighter bond between coalition partners and units that will be an extremely valuable relationship moving into the future; especially in our shared areas of interests countering foreign state actors that are attempting to redraw the geopolitical landscapes around the world.”

At Beale and around the globe, units like the 9th Reconnaissance Wing and 548th ISRG partner with joint forces and allies to support and defend the nation. From the Wing level to the DoD's largest ISR exercise, allies and partners make the joint force stronger.