Kofi Ampeah Woode
The weeklong 13th African Land Forces Summit (ALFS 25), on the third day delved into demonstration mode, when a Ghana Armed Forces (GAF) Joint Task Force (JTF) of some Land, Maritime, and Air Special Forces, under a fictitious scenario in a controlled exercise, displayed skills and capabilities, to free hostages, capture a leader of a terrorist group, and destroy a violent extremist sleeper cell.
The controlled military exercise codenamed OPERATION STEEL WAVE took place at the LABOMA BEACH RESORT, Accra, on Wednesday 10 April 2025, under the watchful view of over 200 Officers from 47 militaries around the world, with the Chief of the Army Staff (COAS), Ghana Army – Major General (Maj Gen) Lawrence Kweku Gbetanu as the Guest of Honour.
The fictitious scenario for the controlled exercise was in this wise: ‘Recent threats of violent extremism (VE) and terrorist activities have taken a great toll on countries in the Sahel region and other parts of Africa, destroying lives and properties and hampering international trade and direct foreign investments.
The southwest thrust of these threats is believed to be a strategy of the VE groups to take control of some littoral states along the Gulf of Guinea (GoG), with the intention of gaining access to sea ports, to influence their trade activities and enhance their financial base, and an ultimate aspiration to establish.
SONS OF MUZAN – a rising terrorist faction gaining momentum in some West African states – intends to conduct terrorist activities along the littoral states in West Africa, first focusing on Ghana’s coast, to allow for an easy southward thrust of the extremist groups’ movement into Ghana.’
Adopting multiple maneuvers to demonstrate prowess in a Direct-Action operation, the JTF operated with a mission to FIND the leader and his associates, ISOLATE the objective, FIX the terrorist elements, BREACH obstacles, NEUTRALISE improvised explosive devices (IEDs), CAPTURE the leader and associates, SECURE hostages, SEIZE suspected explosives, and EXPLOIT arrested terrorists and objective.
The JTF’s operation utilized Special Operation Units from Ghana’s Army, Navy and Air Force, supported by drones, snipers, air assets, and armoured Units, with the assault phase including a high-sea chase, land combat and air insertion.
The operation underscored the importance of swift, coordinated action to ensure national and global security, by a team trained to handle a wide range of high-stakes missions from counter-terrorism, direct action reconnaissance, hostage rescue, intelligence gathering, psychological operations, and unconventional warfare.
The actions of the controlled exercise were deliberately slowed slightly to bring out the lessons, while the helicopter operations were at a distance to avoid any destruction to civil properties around the beach resort.
By Kofi Ampeah-Woode
