On April 24 and 25, the analysis and closing meeting of the DESI 2023 exercise was held, as well as the establishment of goals and the start of planning for the next version that will take place in 2025.
The activity was carried out at the Naval Operations Command and was attended by a delegation of 11 members of the United States Navy, chaired by the Deputy Commander of the Submarine Force, Rear Admiral Michael Van Poots.
They were received by the Commander of Naval Operations, Vice Admiral Claudio Maldonado and by the Commander of the Submarine Force Commodore Federico Saelzer, beginning the evaluation of the exercise carried out.
The Commodore declared that “in general the evaluations are very positive and they are all in the order of having obtained valuable experiences for what the future periods of operation will be.”
He continued explaining that “being able to carry out training of these characteristics is of great relevance, because we can put into practice an interoperability that we have formed together with the United States Navy. Therefore, we have prestige as a submarine force at the regional level.”
For his part, Rear Admiral Van Poots announced part of the evaluations of the exercise, highlighting the excellent participation of the submarine “Carrera”, “it was one of the best DESIs we have carried out so far. The preparation of the Chilean Submarine Force is of an excellent level and allows us to challenge ourselves and improve both Navies.
He concluded his words by explaining that “these exercises have been carried out for 17 years and each version we strive to make them more demanding than the last so that we can learn to challenge each other and become better,” stated the Rear Admiral.
DESI EXERCISE
The international program “Diesel Electric Submarine Initiative” (DESI) is a program created by the United States Navy with the objective of providing advanced and realistic anti-submarine training to its surface, submarine and naval units, considering the participation of type submarines. electric or conventional diesel from friendly countries.
Thus, since 2006, Chile’s presence in this activity has been recurrent and the Chilean Navy plays an active role with one of its units, thus promoting trust and mutual cooperation between both Navies, which share interests and challenges in the basin of the Pacific Ocean.
In the 2023 version of this international exercise, the submarine “Carrera” was the protagonist in highly complex operations, covering simulated accident scenarios on board; multiple threats with nuclear aircraft carriers, MH-60R helicopters and P-8 aircraft; anti-submarine exercises and light load transfer capacity training between a submarine and helicopters. All actions aimed at strengthening and developing detection, classification and attack tactics.
