US Soldiers Train For Large-Scale Battlefield Burials Amid Looming War Threat

The US Army is training to dig mass battlefield graves amid a looming threat of war.

Soldiers are undergoing training to prepare for the mass burial of fellow service members in temporary graves, marking the first time in decades that such exercises have taken place.

The training is designed to prepare the military for the possibility of suffering significant casualties during an ongoing large-scale conflict.

The exercises involved soldiers from the 3rd Corps Sustainment Command and the 20th Engineer Brigade, both based at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, alongside military chaplains and other religious support personnel. Using heavy machinery, including diggers and excavators, participants practiced how to carry out temporary burials while ensuring that fallen soldiers’ remains could be preserved for identification and eventual repatriation to the United States.

According to the Army, the exercises at Fort Bragg were the first in more than 20 years to provide Army chaplains and other religious affairs personnel with specific training in supporting temporary battlefield burial operations.

The U.S. Army stated that large-scale operations of this kind have not been necessary since the Korean War.

According to a report published by Newsweek last week: The Korean peninsula is still divided today after the 1950-1953 war, during which nearly 37,000 U.S. personnel were killed.

In the past quarter-century, U.S. forces, rather than excavating large temporary graves, have instead quickly evacuated deceased soldiers back to the U.S. during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

When lots of casualties are being sustained in a conflict, military teams specializing in looking after soldiers’ remains cannot individually bury or observe specific religious rituals for each person, the military says. On top of this, operations to attack or defend against an enemy force will likely still be continuing.

U.S. military rules state commanders at all levels are responsible for caring for the remains of deceased soldiers and military personnel and making sure they can be identified further down the line.

As standard, a temporary internment plot has five trenches, able to hold 100 casualties in total. During the North Carolina drills, U.S. Army soldiers used bulldozers and other vehicles to fill the space of each plot in an average of one hour and 15 minutes, the military said.

The remains of up to 2,400 soldiers could be temporarily buried in 24 hours, using eight bulldozers and four military excavators, the Army said.

“This exercise allowed us to take a critical look at how we respect, honor, and systematically manage our fallen in a high-intensity conflict,” Sergeant 1st Class Delbert Ruede, from the 3rd Corps Sustainment Command, said in a statement.

“If we went to war tomorrow, we would be making this up as we went along. What we are doing here is taking a scientific, field-tested approach so that we can maintain positive control and respectfully care for our fallen.”

The training comes as the country’s top Middle East commander, Admiral Brad Cooper, has reportedly briefed President Donald Trump on attack options to resume the war in Iran.

The US president is weighing up options to resume attacks on Iran. The meeting reportedly included cabinet members and covered considerations on continuing the US blockade in the region.