JEDDAH: The joint maritime exercise “Red Wave-8” has started at Saudi Arabia’s King Faisal Naval Base, with the Western Fleet hosting naval, land, and air forces, as well as Ministry of Interior units, including Border Guard contingents.
Naval forces from Red Sea littoral states—Jordan, Egypt, Djibouti, Sudan, and Yemen—also took part, joined by observers from Pakistan and Mauritania, the Saudi Press Agency (SPA) reported on Monday.
The exercise aims to strengthen defence cooperation and security coordination among participating nations, unify efforts to safeguard the Red Sea, protect strategic maritime routes, ensure freedom of navigation, and support the security of energy and international trade.
This edition continues the Red Wave series, first launched in 2019, and demonstrates significant progress in operational planning and execution.
It also showcases the use of modern combat systems and platforms while improving the readiness and interoperability of participating forces.
The exercise includes a range of maritime operations covering surface and subsurface warfare, air operations, electronic warfare, countermeasures against fast attack craft, protection of shipping lanes, and measures to combat smuggling, terrorism, piracy, and illegal immigration, as well as live-fire drills for the participating units.
The scenarios and field drills also feature operations in built-up areas, patrols, raids and ambushes, counterterrorism tasks, and a simulated hostage-and-crew-recovery scenario.
