Grasping and implementing Decision No. 18/QĐ-BCĐPTDS, dated 16 February 2024 by the National Steering Board for Civil Defence on the working programme in 2024; Directive No. 875/CT-QK3, dated 15 May 2024 by the Commander of Military Region 3 on organising the civil defence exercise in Thai Binh province in 2024, after a long time of preparation, on 19 July 2024, Thai Binh province successfully organised the civil defence exercise, responses to storms and hurricanes, search and rescue. This was the first time the Province organised the large-scale civil defence exercise (in all 3 levels), also the first province in the entire country to organise the exercise after the Civil Defence Law having been in effect (in 01 July 2024). The exercise happened in many areas of 4 districts and cities, mobilising the participation of numerous elements, forces and means. The exercise contents covered many fields such as dealing with slides in Tra Ly right-bank dyke (Xuan Hoa commune, Vu Thu district); responding to storms and hurricanes in Nam Thinh fishing port (Tien Hai district), the collapses in the 9-storey building for students; and solving the chemical incident in Thai Binh 2 thermoelectric power plant. Owing to the careful preparation, close leadership and direction, detailed task assignment and harmonious coordination and support among localities and units, the exercise has been conducted successfully, achieving the defined targets and absolute safety.

Mechanism operating exercise

The exercise has helped improve the awareness and responsibility of cadres, party members and the people for the civil defence; the leadership and direction of the local party committees and governments, especially the Provincial Steering Board for Civil Defence; the consultation role of services, branches and unions; the operation of the mechanism in mobilising forces and means; the commanding and coordination in responding to the natural disasters. It is also the foundation for the Province and localities, offices and units to adjust and complete their plans of civil defence closely to the reality. Through the exercise, the Province has drawn some experience as follows:

Firstly, well conducting the propaganda and education for all people to understand the importance of the civil defence and the exercise task. This is a primarily important solution, creating the agreement in awareness and actions for all organisations and forces in the civil defence exercise in 2024 of the Province. Accordingly, as a permanent organ of the Provincial Steering Board for Civil Defence, the Provincial Military Command advised the Provincial Party Committee, People’s Council and People’s Committee to direct services, branches and unions and local party committees and governments to promote the propaganda and education for cadres, party members, armed forces and people on the civil defence in general, the position, meanings and necessity of the 2024 civil defence exercise in particular, in order to raise their awareness and responsibility; their activeness and proactiveness in responding to urgent cases of natural disasters, diseases, chemical incidents, building collapses, dyke breaches (if happened), etc.

The propaganda and education contents should be wide and comprehensive but concentrated, focusing on the Party’s resolutions, directives and the State’s policies and law relating to the civil defence activities, especially the Decree No. 02/2019/NĐ-CP, dated 02 January 2019 by the Government on Civil Defence, Law on Civil Defence 2023, Law on Natural disaster Prevention and Control 2013; the geographical features of the Red River Delta and Thai Binh Province; conditions of extreme weather, losses of life and property of the State and people due to natural disasters and diseases, etc. To achieve high effectiveness, the Provincial Steering Board for Civil Defence directed the Provincial Military Command to closely coordinate with the Department of Propaganda, the Police, the Border Guard, the Department of Information and Communications; the Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism; Thai Binh Newspapers, the local party committees and governments to reform the propaganda and education, at the same time, attached the responsibility of the party committees, commanders, leaders of offices, units and localities to the results of propaganda and education on the exercise. In addition to the propaganda and education on the mass media, in briefings and meetings, the Province also integrated it into the local activities of performances, traditional festivals, the propaganda panels, posters and slogans, etc. Thanks to the propaganda and education, the awareness and responsibility of all levels, branches, cadres, party members, armed forces and people have been improved, which has proved the general power of the entire political system in implementing the task of military exercise.

Secondly, making preparations for the exercise carefully, from building the leading and directing documents and plans to giving further training to forces. Right after receiving the directives and instructions from the seniors, the Military Command advised the Provincial Steering Board for Civil Defence to direct branches, departments and forces, the Police and Border Guard as the cores, together with the military to consult the Provincial Party Committee, People’s Council and People’s Committee to issue directives, instructions and decisions to establish the steering board, exercise framework, organising board and other subcommittees; made surveys and built exercise plans for the authorities to approve and assign the task of exercise to all attending units and forces. On this basis, the Provincial Military Command built guiding documents, exercise script and documents, and sent cadres to help departments, branches and unions to prepare the exercise contents, making them in good quality and close to the features, functions and tasks of each office, unit and locality; at the same time, closely coordinated with functional agencies of the Ministry of National Defence, the Ministry of Public Security, the Ministry of Industry and Trade and Military Region 3 in order to build the system of exercise documents, assuring they are synchronous, consent and proper to the strategic operations.

Incident response exercise

This was a large-scale exercise which needed to mobilise a large quantity of forces, materials and facilities of all attending localities and units; happened in a short time with high requirements, meanwhile, the Province did not have much experience in organising such an exercise. Therefore, to successfully accomplish the contents and programmes of the exercise, the Provincial Military Command invited cadres of the Department of Search and Rescue under the General Staff, the Department of Operations under Military Region 3, profession offices of the Ministry of Public Security to give lessons and further training to the exercise framework of Thai Binh Province and City, and districts of Tien Hai, Thai Thuy, Vu Thu; organise training with real troops and summaries of exercise periods in order to make agreement on awareness, contents and methods of exercise. In the training process, it was to timely correct and draw experience from mistakes in the way of “fixing where it’s wrong”, retraining when lots of mistakes are found; focus on grasping and strictly following the safety precautions in training and practising, contributing to the success of the exercise.

Thirdly, directing and managing the exercise harmoniously to the determination and suitably with the local features. Based on the exercise plans which have been ratified, the exercise framework organised conferences applying the mechanism of the party committee leading, the state managing and operating, the military, police, departments, branches and unions advising, and the Steering Boards for civil defence at all levels commanding and inspecting the responses to the natural disasters correctly to their positions and closely to the reality. These conferences focused on major contents and difficult issues; gave clear directions, conclusions, and scientific task assignments, bringing into play the democratic spirit and the collective intelligence in discussing and deciding the suitable solutions in proper time. All cadres in the exercise framework had punctual and serious behaviours, fully understood the contents and proposed solutions which were suitable and close to their offices and units. Together, the Organising Committee applied the technology to transfer the online images of the Province’s conference contents to each district and city taking part in the exercise, especially the conferences of the Provincial Steering Board for Civil Defence.

In the real-troop exercise, given the presiding role, the Provincial Military Command made a careful research of contents of the Law on Civil Defence; flexibly applied suitable methods of organising military exercise for each content; proactively anticipated and built situations and suitable methods. The exercise managers strictly followed the intention, play and plans in order to command and direct forces and vehicles to solve any situations suitably with the real conditions and geographical features of the exercise areas. All forces taking part in the exercise seriously complied with the rules, closely followed any simulated situations and flexibly applied theories into reality; made the most of the “4 on-site” motto in dealing with any situations, assuring the absolute safety in all fields. During the exercise, all forces made a close coordination and suitable force assignments for each task such as helping local people fasten and support their houses, protect the property from the hurricanes; made announcement, arranged and anchored boats and ships, organised activities of rescue at sea, dealt with any incidents related to dyke slides, building collapses and chemicals.

The results and experience from the civil defence exercise in 2024 were effectively applied and implemented by the Province in their leadership and direction on preventing and overcoming the consequences of Typhoon Yagi (Typhoon No.3 on 9/2024), stabilising the people’s life, and normalising all activities of the Province. This is a precious lesson and experience for the armed forces, the Party Committee, government and people of the Province to continuously bring into play their readiness for urgent cases of possible natural disasters, well conduct the civil defence combined with building the strong defence zones.

Senior Colonel VU VAN DINH, Commander of the Provincial Military Command