fantassin
01-23-2006, 06:25 PM
According to the official French armed forces magazine "Armées d'Aujourd'hui" dated January 2006, a team of nine members of the HALO/HAHO specialists (called GCP) of the 11°BP (French airborne brigade) did an operational jump in Kosovo on December the 25th, 2004.
They jumped at 3,000 meters from a French army Puma helicopter and flew 11 km to their objective, a group of houses believed to be hiding illegal weaponry.
They kept it under watch for 48 hours; during that period, they send datas and digital pictures of the target areas to their HQ.
Then, a conventional search operation was launched by other French troops that came by road.
The GCP then caught a number of civilians shifting weapons from one location to another to avoid seizure by what they thought were still far-away troops.
The whole operation was a success but it was only revealed this month, more than a year after it took place.
The exact unit which carried out this Op was not mentionned (just 11°BP GCP); it all looks like the airborne brigade wanted to show that even though they took a second seat in special ops since the COS (French SOCOM) was created in 1992, they still can plan and carry out special missions effectively.
They jumped at 3,000 meters from a French army Puma helicopter and flew 11 km to their objective, a group of houses believed to be hiding illegal weaponry.
They kept it under watch for 48 hours; during that period, they send datas and digital pictures of the target areas to their HQ.
Then, a conventional search operation was launched by other French troops that came by road.
The GCP then caught a number of civilians shifting weapons from one location to another to avoid seizure by what they thought were still far-away troops.
The whole operation was a success but it was only revealed this month, more than a year after it took place.
The exact unit which carried out this Op was not mentionned (just 11°BP GCP); it all looks like the airborne brigade wanted to show that even though they took a second seat in special ops since the COS (French SOCOM) was created in 1992, they still can plan and carry out special missions effectively.