Within Army Corps 4’s formation, Engineering Brigade 550 is tasked with organising training courses, ensuring combat readiness, constructing and maintaining defence works, clearing unexploded ordnance, preventing and combating natural disasters, conducting search and rescue operations, serving exercises held by the Corps and the Ministry of National Defence, and performing several other missions. Dangerous, complex tasks performed far from the leadership of all-level party committees and commands have posed a lot of challenges to the Brigade. Meanwhile, the Brigade’s stationed area has witnessed rather serious threats to political security and social order and safety due to high population density and a lot of industrial zones, which has directly impacted on the unit’s discipline management. Against such a backdrop, the Brigade’s Party Committee and Command have designed many measures to raise the synergy and combat power and build an “exemplarily, typically” comprehensively strong Brigade. In this regard, maintaining the position as a “top training unit” has been seen as a breakthrough and an important prerequisite for the Brigade’s good task performance.

To that end, first of all, the Brigade has focused on improving all-level party committees and commands’ capability in leading, directing, and running  training courses, while stepping up political and ideological education and raising the effectiveness of party and political work in the training process. Offices and units have grasped their higher echelons’ resolutions and directives on training, particularly Conclusion 60/QUTW, dated January 18th, 2019 by the Central Military Commission (CMC) on continuing to implement the CMC’s Resolution 765-NQ/QUTW on “raising the quality of training in the period of 2013-2020 and beyond,” the Corps Party Committee’s Resolution 278-NQ/ĐUQĐ on “raising the quality of training,” and the Corps Commander’s Combat Training Command. The Brigade’s Party Committee has issued a specialised resolution on training task and directed affiliates to develop their own resolutions and commanders’ action plans with the goal of building good training units. At the same time, due attention has been paid to promoting the roles of commanders and offices in managing and running training courses, enhancing inspection work, and organising meetings to draw lessons and overcome weaknesses in training. Moreover, the Brigade has actively improved the effectiveness of the party and political work and rendered cadres and soldiers fully aware of the importance and difficulties of the training task. It has launched emulation movements and combined the target of building good training units with the Determination to Win Emulation Movement and the Campaign titled “promoting tradition, devoting talent, deserving to be Uncle Ho’s soldiers” in the new period so as to heighten a sense of responsibility amongst cadres and soldiers and build up their determination to overcome difficulties and successfully fulfil the task of training and combat readiness.

A combat training course for new soldiers in 2021

As a specialised unit, the Brigade has to mobilise many sections and forces and use a great deal of weapons, military hardware, equipment, vehicles, machinery, ferries, ammunition, and explosives during training and exercises on diverse, complex terrains and in harsh weather conditions. Hence, the Brigade has attached special importance to making preparations for training. Prior to each training season, the Brigade has reviewed and adjusted the organisational structure and equipment of its units, with priority given to affiliates tasked with training new soldiers, performing A2 mission, preventing and mitigating natural disasters, and conducting search and rescue operations. It has proactively well prepared training facilities, grounds, equipment, and documents both qualitatively and quantitatively. In recent years, in addition to funding allocated by its higher echelons, the Brigade has invested billions of VND and thousands of working days in upgrading and constructing the system of training grounds. As a result, up to now, it has possessed sufficient grounds for physical, technical, and tactical training to meet the increasingly demanding requirements set by the training task. In the training of cadres, the Brigade has concentrated on new, difficult contents and weaknesses to ensure that its staff members would be able to well perform their assigned training task. Training courses have been organised in a comprehensive but focalised manner. Significance has been attached to holding specialised training courses for commands, offices, and cadres and considering the training of cadres, particularly at grass-roots level as the key step. Focuses of training courses have been placed on shortcomings pointed out from previous years, new and adjusted contents, maps-based and tactical exercises, and methods of designing, rehearsing, and approving lesson plans. Due attention has been paid to training cadres at company and platoon levels and new graduates. Grounded on its long-standing relations with Engineer Officer College, the Brigade has been inviting experienced instructors from the College to improve its staff members’ pedagogy and method of designing electronic lesson plans. Moreover, it has actively taken part in and organised excellent training cadre contests at all levels in order to correctly assess competence of individuals and collectives. Up to now, all cadres of the Brigade have acquired good political, military, logistics, and technical knowledge, they have been capable of taking charge of the training work at their level, and more than 80% of them have achieved merit or distinction in the training process.

Furthermore, the Brigade has always followed the training motto of “practicality and effectiveness” designed for the engineering force at campaign level, with importance attached to organising comprehensive, intensive, focalised training courses in accordance with its particularities and task. It has also adhered to criteria for specialised technical training and a “good training” engineering unit, combined basic training with intensive training, aligned technical training with tactical training, intensified night-time training and practice, and improved its troops’ engineering support capacity in enemies’ hi-tech warfare. Emphasis has been placed on training troops to master the existing weapons and military engineering equipment. Notably, the Brigade has directed its units to include specialised training in the performance of the tasks, namely natural disaster prevention and control, search and rescue, construction of defensive works, and bomb and mine clearance, with construction sites used as training grounds. Specialised training has been combined with training troops to ensure safety regulations in using weapons, equipment, and vehicles. Great value has been attached to improving staff members’ command capacity, professional competence, skills, and hands-on experience. At the same time, the Brigade has focused on training its troops’ patience, meticulousness, courage, and observance of discipline and safety regulations. It has directed its units to give instructions to troops’ practice process to avoid carelessness and truncation. As for forces in charge of construction and unexploded ordnance clearance, the Brigade has directed its units to organise on-the-spot training courses in turns and shifts properly and use “construction sites as training grounds.” As for its river-crossing mission, the Brigade has required its units to combine river-crossing training with natural disaster prevention and control and search and rescue. At the same time, units have been asked to enhance coordination between teams in assembling houses, improving manoeuvrability, and crossing rivers in all types of warfare, on all terrains, and under all complex weather conditions. Up to now, cadres and soldiers of the Brigade have effectively exploited the existing equipment, grasped theoretical knowledge, and mastered skills in building pontoon bridges and clearing bombs and mines. Over the past years, the Brigade has always successfully fulfilled the task of engineering support for the Corps’ live-fire exercises.

Additionally, the Brigade has concentrated its resources on training and other tasks. Bringing into play their internal strength, units of the Brigade have mobilised troops’ labour and creativity to consolidate and make thousands of training and working equipment, while spending thousands of working days on upgrading the system of training grounds. At the same time, affiliates of the Brigade have stepped up the Campaign entitled “managing and exploiting weapons and technical equipment effectively, sustainably, safely, economically and ensuring traffic safety,” and encouraged cadres and soldiers to apply technical initiatives and innovations to training and construction. With reference to logistics work, the Brigade has directed its offices to cooperate with its units in closely managing logistics material reserves for training, combat readiness, and both regular and irregular missions. Great value has been attached to enhancing crop/animal husbandry and constructing large-scale agricultural production zones to provide food for units. Due regard has been paid to preventing epidemics and taking care of troops’ health. As a result, the rate of healthy troops within the Brigade has always been above 98% and troops’ material and mental life has considerably improved, thereby contributing to raising the quality of training and combat readiness. In the period of 2015-2021, the Brigade has been recognised as a “good training unit” by the Corps and the Ministry of National Defence. It won third prize in the Army-wide Engineering Contest of 2021. In 2020, it was presented with Emulation Flag by the Government. Those achievements will provide an important prerequisite for Engineering Brigade 550 to maintain its position as a “top training unit” and successfully fulfil all assigned missions in the upcoming time.

Sr. Col. VU HOANG ANH, Commander of the Brigade