This is the news.
http://www.straitstimes.com/Free/Story/STIStory_238805.html
lion note:this is the first time SAF show shoot and scoot in
EX.
May 19, 2008 
Aim of exercise is to shave precious seconds off time taken to
tackle fleeting enemy targets <!-- Author --> By Teh Joo Lin
<!-- more than 7 paragraphs -->
<!-- story content : start --> NORTHERN CAPE (SOUTH
AFRICA) - FIVE hundred Singapore soldiers on Saturday successfully
demonstrated their ability to 'shoot and scoot' when confronted
with fleeting enemy targets.
This is the latest in a series of Singapore Armed Forces (SAF)
exercises that validate new war-fighting concepts.
The 'enemy' in this exercise included modern-day multiple-launch
rocket systems that can deploy, fire and flee in about 15
minutes.
'The idea is to take them out before they fire. We just have to
be faster,' said Colonel Lim Teck Yin, director of the exercise
codenamed Lightning Warrior.
Just how fast can they do it? Sorry, that is classified
information, says the military.
Speed is the key and by putting the foot down on the technology
pedal, SAF troops are looking to shave seconds and minutes in the
time it takes to detect and destroy a target.
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<!-- Audio --> <!-- Video --> <!-- PDF -->
<!-- Photo Gallery --> The strike operation in the Lohatla
Combat Training Centre is just one of several battlefield
manoeuvres, including exercises held in the United States and
Australia in the last few years, that test the new concepts and
technologies which lie at the heart of what has been coined the
third-generation or 3G SAF.
One of the new concepts tested in this exercise is a six-man
Storm or Strike Observers Mission team.
Storm teams are digitally plugged into a network of 'sensors'
like the Searcher unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), and 'shooters'
like Apache attack helicopters and self-propelled artillery
guns.
This gives the team the ability to see enemy targets from afar
and rapidly direct a combination of air and land strikes against
them.
In the past, this would be handled separately and by the time
this was completed, the mobile target might be gone, explained
Colonel Yeo Yee Peng, the exercise's air director.
'In the past, we were talking about minutes. Now, we are talking
about minutes and seconds,' he said.
With several Storm teams in the field, the division strike
centre - considered the brain or nerve centre - can direct
precision strikes against multiple pockets of enemies lurking in
the battlefield.
'We're like their arms and legs,' said Lieutenant Jerome Lim,
23, deputy commander of a Storm team.
Inside five-tonne trucks parked under camouflage nets kilometres
away from the heat of battle, commanders in the division strike
centre can view everything live on large screens as battle
unfolds.
Smarter and faster computers allow for quicker decisions, even
in an environment cluttered with many targets.
Two things that help make this possible: digital maps that give
a complete picture of what is happening on the ground and in the
air; and the streaming of live images from the UAVs, which have a
range of about 100km.
Witnessing the outcome of all this was Defence Minister Teo Chee
Hean on Saturday from a hilly observation post more than 1,400m
above sea level.
Speaking to reporters after he saw the Apaches and artillery
guns blow five armoured 'enemy' vehicles to bits, Mr Teo said the
exercise confirmed the SAF's ability to be fully aware of the
battlefield and to conduct precision strikes on multiple targets,
including those that 'appear only for a short while'.
'This means the SAF division now has the capability to see first
and to strike first, well into the division's depths.'
The Apache pilots, on their maiden trip to South Africa, were
grateful for the chance.
Lieutenant-Colonel Ng Wei- Jin, commanding officer of the 120
Squadron, said: 'We've a vast training area with little
restriction...we can do a lot over here that we can't do in
Singapore.'
[email protected]
THE army troops and airmen have been roughing it out since May
10 in a training area spanning 50km by 40km - about three times the
size of Singapore - making it an ideal spot for long-range
live-firing exercises.
Lohatla Combat Training Centre is more than a two-hour drive
along pencil-straight roads from Upington, the biggest city in
South Africa's Northern Cape province, some 9,000km from
Singapore.
The largely flat bushland terrain is marked by occasional rocky
knolls and soldiers have reported sightings of wildlife including
springboks, baboons and wild horses.
It is now autumn in South Africa and temperatures can dip to a
chilly 10 deg C at night, the troops said.
In the day, winds gust at speeds of up to 20 knots.
Apart from the cold, the soldiers also have to be mindful of
poisonous snakes like cobras and mambas, as well as spiders.
Exercise Lightning Warrior wraps up on May 27.
