The Unit­ed States says its mil­i­tary co­op­er­a­tion with the Trinidad and To­ba­go De­fence Force re­mains a key pil­lar of re­gion­al se­cu­ri­ty, ac­cord­ing to a re­lease is­sued to­day by the U.S. Em­bassy.

The em­bassy said U.S. Marines from the 22nd Ma­rine Ex­pe­di­tionary Unit vis­it­ed Trinidad and To­ba­go from 27 to 29 Oc­to­ber for mil­i­tary-to-mil­i­tary train­ing with the TTDF. The Ar­leigh Burke-class USS Grave­ly al­so docked in Port of Spain be­tween 26 and 30 Oc­to­ber to sup­port joint train­ing and host stu­dents and teach­ers from the Lochmaben Ro­man Catholic School in Ce­dros, who lat­er toured the ves­sel.

The re­lease out­lined re­cent sup­port to the school, in­clud­ing in­fra­struc­ture up­grades and do­na­tions made by Unit­ed States South­ern Com­mand in Au­gust and Sep­tem­ber.

Dur­ing the USNS Com­fort’s vis­it from 5 to 11 Au­gust, U.S. med­ical teams pro­vid­ed a range of free health ser­vices and per­formed more than 80 surg­eries. That vis­it al­so fea­tured ex­pert ex­changes with the TTDF on dis­as­ter re­sponse, health care col­lab­o­ra­tion, and law en­force­ment ca­pac­i­ty.

The em­bassy said the two coun­tries al­so strength­ened co­op­er­a­tion ear­li­er this year dur­ing the Tradewinds ex­er­cise, which was co-host­ed by the TTDF and U.S. Army South. More than 1,300 per­son­nel from 24 na­tions took part.

In May, a com­mem­o­ra­tive plaque was un­veiled at the U.S. Em­bassy to ho­n­our the con­tri­bu­tions of more than 130,000 U.S. ser­vice mem­bers and over 10,000 Trin­bag­o­ni­ans who served in Trinidad and To­ba­go be­tween the 1940s and 1970s.

The re­lease al­so not­ed past con­tri­bu­tions, in­clud­ing the do­na­tion of 45 Har­ris ra­dios to the TTDF in Ju­ly 2024 and joint avi­a­tion train­ing with the Delaware Na­tion­al Guard ear­li­er that year, part of the 21-year State Part­ner­ship Pro­gram be­tween Delaware and Trinidad and To­ba­go.