Exercise Wallaby, which was inaugurated in 1990, is the Singapore Armed Forces (SAF)’s largest overseas exercise. Conducted annually, Exercise Wallaby involves air, land and sea components. This year’s exercise features about 4,000 personnel and 400 platforms, and is conducted from 19 September to 17 November 2018. This year also marks 28 years of training in Exercise Wallaby. Over the years, the exercise has grown in scope and scale with realistic and challenging training scenarios. Exercise Wallaby showcases the capabilities of the 3rd Generation SAF through tri-service integration training, where all three services operate together to achieve mission success.

Exercise Wallaby is held at the Shoalwater Bay Training Area (SWBTA) in Queensland, Australia, an area about four times the size of Singapore. This valuable overseas training area allows the SAF to exercise its full range of capabilities and maintain the training currency for its units. Under the Singapore-Australia Comprehensive Strategic Partnership, SAF troops will also look forward to enhanced and expanded access to training areas, including SWBTA, over a period of 25 years.

This year’s Exercise Wallaby comprises three main frames:

a. 19 Sep to 22 Sep 2018 – Preparation. Given the scale of Exercise Wallaby, the Forward Support Group (FSG) arrived earlier as an advance party to prepare for the three main frames.

b. 23 Sep to 13 Oct 2018 – Frame 1. Frame 1 is a unilateral manoeuvre exercise for our Armour and air force units, involving integrated air-land live-firing by our armoured platforms and attack helicopters. The air force also conducted large scale air-land training for air-land strike, heli-borne insertion, C-130 airdrop, divisional air defence, airspace control and Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) operations.

c. 14 Oct to 30 Oct 2018 – Frame 2. Frame 2 is a unilateral training exercise to maintain the competencies of our Mechanised Combined Arms Brigade. The air-land operations conducted in this frame are similar to Frame 1 but on a larger scale. 

d. 31 Oct to 14 Nov 2018 – Frame 3. Ex Trident, Frame 3 of Ex Wallaby, comprises a bilateral ship-to-shore exercise featuring a battalion-level amphibious operation involving SAF and ADF troops with supporting air and sea platforms. This fosters close interoperability between both armed forces in the conduct of sea-air integration, through helicopter operations on the Endurance-class Landing Ship Tank RSS Resolution, as well as ship-to-shore transfer of troops and assets conducted by the Fast Craft.

e. 15 Nov to 17 Nov 2018 – End of Exercise. With the completion of all three frames, FSG conducts the necessary logistical preparation to conclude Exercise Wallaby and return to Singapore.