ROSTOV-ON-DON. March 27 (Interfax-AVN) - Troops from the Southern Military District motor rifle brigade based in Chechnya performed a cross-country march arriving at the Sernovodskoye training ground in Stavropol Territory for a bilateral battalion-wide tactical live-fire exercise, the District said on Tuesday.
"The exercise involved over 1,500 troops and around 300 units of equipment, including the T-72B3 battle tank, the infantry fighting vehicle BMP-3, the army aviation Mil helicopter Mi-8 AMTSh, the Sukhoi attack aircraft Su-25SM, self-propelled artillery systems, armored personnel carriers and combined surface-to-air missile and anti-aircraft artillery systems," the district's spokesman Col. Vadim Astafyev told Interfax.
The troops were put on mock alert and marched to the assembly area where they are to neutralize militant groups, he said.
The troops will practice offensive combat at nighttime, landings from the combat aircraft, organizing concentrated fire against enemy firing positions, and cohesion with drone systems, Astafyev said.
The drills involve reconnaissance and electronic warfare units. The concluding stage of the exercise will involve live-fire drills with T-72B3 tank, BTR-82A and BMP-3 weapons and small arms, the spokesman said.