Page 48 - Light Dragoons 2022 CREST

It wasn’t easy, getting on the flight to Kenya. First there were COVID restric- tions, then most of the platoon had to iso- late due to COVID, and when we finally got to the airport, Lufthansa, who’s slo- gan is ‘say yes to the world’ , very nearly said no. Finally, the 34 Light Dragoons from B and C Sqn made it to the British Army Training Unit Kenya (BATUK) in Nanyuki.
At the foothills of Mount Kenya and sit- ting just above the Equator line, BATUK is now one of the army’s three ‘Land Regional Hubs’. In addition to the 10,000 infantry personnel who pass through BATUK on Ex Askari Storm each year, the camp is now used to project British influence in the wider region through exercises, STTTs, and small operations. The rise in the threat posed by Al Shabab means that BATUK has a Force Protection Platoon to act as a guard force and to staff the Ops room which monitors and reacts to the movement of personnel throughout Kenya, and crucially coordinates the medi- cal evacuation for the variety of casualties which occur.
After a week’s isolation in which the pla- toon conducted it’s acclimatisation PT, worked on its tan (Tpr Dixon in particular showed huge dedication to this) and com- pleted Netflix for the fifth time that year, we were allowed out to complete a range package at Archers Post.
It’s fair to say that the infanteers of BATUK didn’t really know what to make of their new, cavalry colleagues. With flair, and naturally better looking, it’s reason- able to guess that they were intimidated at first, but as the Light Dragoon Platoon settled in, the junior soldiers on duty impressed everyone with their friendly, common-sense approach to matters.
A break before the summit
The Regimental Journal of The Light Dragoons
BATUK Force Protection Platoon
One of the first jobs was to help BATUK set up their new Ops Room, reflecting the upgrade to a Land Regional Hub; a task led by the JNCO’s. MERT training quickly followed, as each of the teams on duty became slick at marking HLS’s and trans- ferring casualties between the MEDEVAC helicopters that BATUK used. The value of this training became apparent when the Battlegroup arrived, and the FP Platoon had to start doing it for real (perhaps the most unfortunate casualty being a soldier who had to be HELIVACED off the area one week having been hit in the head with a shovel, only to be bitten by a snake the next).
The new camp had a range of urban train- ing areas which the platoon was able to
make use of, keeping up with some of their basic recce skills, whilst practicing their OBUA (Operating in Built Up Areas) skills. These were put to use when the pla- toon tested BATUKs new security drills. As well as this, the camp RMP taught
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