U.S. and Philippine service members participate in an amphibious capabilities demonstration during Balikatan 2016. Photo: U.S. Marine Corps.

[Via Satellite 05-20-2016] Comsat and Inmarsat announced that the companies supported U.S. and Republic of the Philippines forces in the Balikatan 2016 (BK 16) exercise, which took place in the Philippines from April 4 to 16. Comsat, a Value-Added Reseller (VAR) of Inmarsat’s Global Xpress services, worked with U.S. Marine Corps Forces Pacific, which organized and managed the exercise, to integrate Global Xpress into the scenarios for BK16.

Balikatan is an annual military exercise between U.S. joint forces and the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) with multinational participants such as Australia. The BK16 exercise focused on a variety of missions including humanitarian assistance, maritime law enforcement, and environmental protection.

During this exercise, U.S. forces conducted humanitarian civil assistance projects with the AFP throughout the Philippine archipelago. There were also combined operational events between U.S. forces, the three main branches of the AFP, and other major Philippine military camps to improve collaboration, increase partnership capabilities, and plan for follow-on operations.

The Global Xpress satcom as a service end-to-end managed service capability used a Cobham 5075 terminal, which completed testing at Comsat’s offices in Herndon, Va., shipped to the Philippines, and came online within minutes. Users were able to quickly set up the Global Xpress terminal and acquire service for their Web browsing and email applications at Basa Air Base, the designated headquarters for all U.S. Marine Corps Forces involved in the exercise.