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GALLERY: PEC military exercise Pte. Steven Galabay of the Governor General's Horse Guards in Ottawa emerges from a damaged building at Loch-Sloy Business Park outside Picton, Ont. Saturday, Dec. 1, 2018. He was part of an army training exercise unfolding across Prince Edward County during the last two weekends. The exercise trained troops in how to build relationships and help civilians during a crisis, in this case, the aftermath of a fictional battle between warring states. Luke Hendry/Belleville Intelligencer/Postmedia Network Luke Hendry /Luke Hendry/The Intelligencer

Trooper Rabindra Lalldatt of the Governor General's Horse Guards tries to comfort a distraught civilian, played by Pte. Jennie Vallangca, at Loch-Sloy Business Park outside Picton, Ont. Saturday, December 1, 2018. Luke Hendry/Belleville Intelligencer/Postmedia Network Luke Hendry /Luke Hendry/The Intelligencer

Sgt. Jordache Young surveys the interior of a building while training at Loch-Sloy Business Park outside Picton, Ont. Saturday, December 1, 2018. Luke Hendry/Belleville Intelligencer/Postmedia Network Luke Hendry /Luke Hendry/The Intelligencer

Elgin County council accepted Heather Derks’ proposal to investigate the possibility of creating a county school board. Derks is the former chair of the pupil accommodation review committee for Sparta elementary school, which was closed last year as an English-track school along with four other schools in the Thames Valley board. (Laura Broadley/Times-Journal)

Playing a relief worker, Humber College student Kristen Pelletier meets with and Cpl. Tom Schiratti, portraying a civilian, and Sgt. Peter Cuciurean of the Ontario Regiment at Loch-Sloy Business Park outside Picton, Ont. Saturday, December 1, 2018. Luke Hendry/Belleville Intelligencer/Postmedia Network Luke Hendry /Luke Hendry/The Intelligencer

Sgt. Jordache Young of The Royal Canadian Regiment removes a mock propaganda poster during an exercise at Loch-Sloy Business Park outside Picton, Ont. Saturday, December 1, 2018. "Can you trust Canadian spies and invaders?" it read. Luke Hendry/Belleville Intelligencer/Postmedia Network Luke Hendry /Luke Hendry/The Intelligencer

Humber College international development students Julia Beljo and Tenzing Dorji chat with Sgts. Jordache Young, second from left, and Peter Cuciurean tour in the Prince Edward Community Centre in Picton, Ont. Saturday, December 1, 2018. Beljo played a governor and business leader during the exercise; Dorji served as manager of the community centre. Luke Hendry/Belleville Intelligencer/Postmedia Network Luke Hendry /Luke Hendry/The Intelligencer

PICTON — The crisis has been averted.

The invading troops are gone, the humanitarian aid is coming, and life is returning to normal.

None of it, however, is real. It was the storyline of a military exercise staged here during the last two weekends.

Soldiers of the army’s 4th Canadian Division trained across much of Prince Edward County. The division is the army’s Ontario branch.

Their mock humanitarian-aid mission also involved students of Humber College’s international development post-graduate certificate program.

Maj. Tim Lourie, an organizer of the exercise, said the goal was to school soldiers in psychological operations and in working with the public and other organizations.

The mission: arrive in the area, assess the situation visually and through meeting locals and relief workers, and begin to plan ways to help.

In creating the scenario’s backstory, planners created an invasion by two fictional countries on the Caspian Sea. The nation of Ariana invaded its northern neighbour, Atropia. Locales including Picton, Bloomfield and Wellington served as towns in Atropia’s Lower Janga region.

An American-led coalition, including Canada, then pushed the invaders out of Atropia and began trying to help the latter to rebuild.

“We’re starting to go and help rebuild the country and get things back to normal in the Lower Janga region,” Lourie said. “It’s a looming crisis.”

During the exercise, troops were ordered to assess the situation: the needs of the residents, the state of infrastructure, security and more.

Humber students played the roles of workers with non-governmental organizations and of local officials.

“It proved to be highly successful,” said Lourie.

While soldiers in civilian dress also portrayed Atropian citizens, he said, compared to actual civilians, “They just don’t speak the same language.”

Twenty-seven students participated during the last weekend in November; 30 were involved last weekend.

“Having them do it brought a whole bunch of new dynamics – realism – that the soldiers had to deal with,” Lourie said.

Troops who arrive in an area to work with locals must start by building trust and relationships, he explained.

“Military can be intimidating sometimes,” said student Kristen Pelletier, explaining her mock organization was to be involved in setting up a camp for displaced people in cooperation with the army.

“Establishing those relationships is really important for things to run smoothly,” she said.

That means a lot of listening, asking the right questions, and presenting the right image, whether through words, actions or body language. They were coached to avoid anything that could seem intimidating.

As the students met with – and sometimes challenged – the soldiers “they were able to bring that out perfectly.”

Many of the students were female, Lourie said, and interactions with larger, male soldiers led to discussions about gender dynamics.

“I definitely learned a lot about how the military responds to crisis and the military in general,” said Pelletier.

“It was really cool.

“My perception of the military definitely changed.

“I always thought they were more authoritative in these types of situations,” she said. Pelletier said she instead found the troops to be more collaborative and intent on ensuring co-operation and the success of each group’s goals.

There were no weapons or armoured vehicles involved.

Part of the training dealt with psychological operations. Lourie said soldiers had to interact with others “to identify what makes these towns tick.”

The troops, who boarded at CFB Trenton’s barracks, assembled Saturday morning for a briefing at the Belleville Armouries.

From there, they headed to Loch-Sloy Business Park outside Picton. Built as a Second World War airfield, its fictional role was that of a private airport once held by Arianan forces and dealing with the arrival of people displaced by the fighting.

Sgts. Jordache Young and Peter Cuciurean toured the buildings, chatted with people affected by the “war,” and tried to determine the source of anti-Canadian propaganda littering the area.

Other stops were the Prince Edward Community Centre’s arena, the Bloomfield fire hall and a former school there, and the Wellington and District Community Centre.

There was limited contact with the public, but Lourie said past exercises have been interesting.

“You’re asking real people about real issues,” he said.

While training last year in Picton, he continued, seniors told soldiers they were concerned about gentrification of homes being turned into rental properties for tourists, “which in turn is increasing the property values and the rental market costs are going up.”

“Some of the senior citizens can’t afford their rents anymore and are selling their medication in order to make their rents,” Lourie said. “They were quite open about that.”

Lourie said establishing communications – both personally and through media – is an important first step of operations. The army can, for example, set up mobile radio stations to broadcast across a 30-km radius to relay messages to a population.

This time, however, they stopped by County FM for a chat with Saturday-afternoon host Pat Larkin.

“From the second we stepped out of our truck, people were so friendly to us,” one army reservist, who gave his name only as Adam, told Larkin.

“We had a woman that came and shook our hands and thanked us for our service,” he said.

“We’re really grateful for that.”

lhendry@postmedia.com