Over the past years, the Navy has grasped and seriously implemented the Resolution 765-NQ/QUTW by the Central Military Commission (CMC) via synchronous, effective measures. Consequently, it has made comprehensive progress in the training work and improved its synergy and combat strength, meeting the requirements for safeguarding seas and islands in the new situation.

Being invested to move forward to modernity, in recent years, the Navy has made remarkable progress in its structure and materiel. This has enabled the Navy to successfully fulfil the assigned task and deserve to be the core force in defending the national sovereignty over seas and islands. However, the complex, unpredictable developments in the East Sea have been imposing very high requirements on the Navy in all its operations. Fully aware of the weighty responsibility assigned by the Party, State and people, the Navy’s Party Committee and Command have grasped and seriously implemented the CMC’s Resolution 765-NQ/QUTW, dated December 20^th 2012, on enhancing the training quality in the 2013-2020 period and beyond, while further renewing and improving its training quality, combat readiness capacity and combat strength.

Vice Admiral Pham Hoai Nam inspecting weapons and equipment of the Naval Commando Brigade 126

Grounded on the CMC’s viewpoints, goals, and directions for the training work, the Navy’s Party Committee issued the Resolution 1050-NQ/ĐUQC, dated July 9^th 2013 on “enhancing the training quality in the 2013-2020 period and beyond within the Navy” and directed units’ party committees and commands to introduce this Resolution to all troops under the regulations and formulate their special resolution and action plan/program in accordance with their particularities, structure, materiel and assigned task. In the process, the Navy has asked all-level party committees and commands to renew and raise the effectiveness and efficiency of their leadership over the task of combat training, ensuring that this task would always be placed under the direct, close, comprehensive, uniformed leadership and direction of units’ party committees and commands. Moreover, the Navy has demanded units to step up the work of political and ideological education to render cadres and troops fully aware of the importance of the training work, achieve a positive change in their awareness and action, and make them politically strong and strongly determined to fulfil the training task.

The Navy has many components, forces, and weapons and technical equipment of various types as well as a large range of activity; some of its units are tasked with both training and combat readiness and operate in the harsh environment at sea and on islands. Therefore, in order to enhance the quality of combat training and the leadership and direction of all-level party committees and commands, the Navy has placed emphasis on renewing the mechanism for the training management and operation on a focalized, uniformed, synchronous, effective basis in accordance with the task requirements of each force and group of units. It has closely managed the plan, further decentralized the training work, and clearly assigned responsibility for training to offices and commands at all levels. At the same time, it has raised the effectiveness of coordination between offices and units in counselling, directing and organizing the training task, while stepping up the work of inspecting, investigating and re-examining the training results. To make the training work effective, the Navy has paid special attention to consolidating and making the offices in charge of military training and the commanders of brigades and flotillas capable of giving advice to party committees and commands on managing, operating and organizing the training task. In order to train its cadres, the Navy has effectively applied many methods, i.e. training them with simulators, organizing trips for them to visit modern materiel of its units and other countries’ navies in line with its diplomatic missions. Between 2013 and 2018, the Navy held hundreds of training courses and competitions to raise its cadres’ capability in counselling, managing, operating and organizing the training task. As a result, 100% of its cadres are capable of taking charge of training at their levels while 70% of its cadres are recognized as good training cadres.

Following higher echelons’ directions, the Navy has renewed the training content, program and method and considered this as a breakthrough measure. Based on the training program set by the Ministry of National Defence, the Navy has actively adjusted and supplemented the basic training program for each group of troops and actively renewed the method for organizing the training task in accordance with each level and speciality practically and effectively. In the process, it has taken tactical training as the centre, specialized training as the basis, and cadre training as the key; set store by practical training under the combat projects in hi-tech warfare; increased manoeuvrability training, joint exercises, physical training, and training during the process of performing the task and defence diplomacy mission. For the education-training work, the Navy has renewed training content and programs, reduced theory duration, increased practice and specialized knowledge, updated troops on the knowledge of new materiel and development of military art; associated schools with units and education-training with combat training.

In the training process, the Navy has directed units to cling to the motto of “basics, practicality, and thorough grasp”, to put store by synchronous, intensive, focalized training and make it relevant to the task, object of struggle, operating environment, organizational structure, and existing materiel, to take the battlefield as the training ground and the tasks of protecting seas and island and building a revolutionary, regular, elite, modern Navy as the training goal, to pay due regard to training troops to master new-generation materiel. To meet the high task requirements and deal with the complication of its task, the Navy has paid special attention to combining military training with political education, discipline management and combat readiness as well as building up cadres and troops’ political stuff, morality, sense of observance of superiors’ command, and absolute faith in our combat method and existing materiel. In campaign-level training, the Navy has undertaken in-depth researches on object of struggle and the enemy’s types of operations at sea and on islands as the basis for adjusting, supplementing and completing naval combat projects, method, and art, while concentrating on training all-level commanders to raise their capability in command and combat coordination. One of the Navy’s breakthroughs in its training work is that it has directed clusters of naval forces to hold the 2-side, 2-level field exercise under the projects to defend seas and islands, the anti-submarine exercise, the search and rescue drill for submarines, the amphibious exercise, the exercise on defending the bases, and the electronic warfare and artillery exercise. While actively applying information technology and simulation technology to its exercises, the Navy has ordered units to rerun the exercises on the system of operational simulation in order to assess the results of the preset projects and opportunely draw the lessons.

As for detachment-level training, the Navy has directed units to follow the “5-relevance” motto¹, focus on basically, intensively training troops to master, exploit, and use materiel, and set store by combat training and exercises, long movement and operation at sea, live firing, night firing, synchronous firing with manual materiel on surface vessels, and submarines’ torpedoing. Between 2017 and 2018, the Navy organized large-scale coastal missile and artillery firing with the participation of many forces (frigates, submarines, coastal missiles, and coastal artillery) and achieved good results, which was highly appreciated by the Ministry of National Defence. Up to now, over 48% of its cadres and troops have mastered all functions of its materiel, meeting the requirements for combat readiness.

The Navy is fully aware that a contingent of professional servicemen and technicians acts as its backbone. Thus, the Navy has concentrated on improving their professional competence and capacity to intensively, professionally exploit and use materiel via various practical, effective measures. Up to now, those who have served in the Navy for over 5 years are capable of providing training courses for troops, dealing with technical incidents, mastering the existing and modern materiel, and undertaking 1 position or 2 positions within a combat crew.

Over the past years, the Navy has considerably renewed its training support work. Units have proactively performed the work of logistics-technical support, particularly weapons, equipment, documents, textbooks, models, and training grounds relevant to the training targets and each group of troops in a synchronous, solid manner. Notably, the Navy has established the system of training documentaries and sample exercises for each type of units and increased the use of simulators, thereby making a huge change its training work.

In the upcoming years, the Navy’s task will be very onerous while its mission requirements will be increasingly higher. To successfully fulfil its task, the Navy determines to continue executing the CMC’s Resolution 765 and making a comprehensive breakthrough in its training work. Based on the attained experience and results, the Navy has directed units to keep grasping the CMC’s viewpoints, goals, and directions as well as the Navy’s contents, targets, and measures. Units have been asked to more comprehend the importance of training; to heighten the role and responsibility of party committees and commands in leading and directing the process; to enhance all-level party committees and commands’ leadership and direction over the training task; to promote resources to the utmost to realize the training goals and targets. To that end, significance should be attached to completing the mechanism for managing and operating the training work; comprehensively improving the capacity of staff offices and training cadres at all levels; adhering to the higher echelons’ directions, the road map for the Navy’s modernization, and the requirements for defending the Homeland’s sea and island sovereignty in order to renew the programs, contents, and methods of training, exercises and competitions. Emphasis should be placed on completely overcoming weaknesses and building up the determination to better fulfil the tasks of training and combat readiness, thereby contributing to building a revolutionary, regular, elite, modern Navy, firmly protecting the Homeland at sea.

Vice Admiral Pham Hoai Nam

Member of the Party Central Committee

Commander of the Navy

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1- the “5-relevance” motto: relevance to the task, relevance to the object of struggle, relevance to the battlefield, relevance to the organizational structure, and relevance to weapons and technical equipment