NZ in major military exercise in US

A major military exercise involving US, Australian, British, New Zealand and other allied forces is under way in an inhospitable area of Arizona to test intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance technology before it is used against al Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan.

The Empire Challenge, held at the Fort Huachuca US Army installation in south-east Arizona near the Mexican border, replicates situations and operations faced by allied forces in Afghanistan, including roadside bomb attacks and the identification and tracking of "high value individuals".

The scenarios test the flow of intelligence information between different segments of the US military, as well as from ally-to-ally to prevent hiccups in Afghanistan.

The Australian military has representatives at Fort Huachuca as well as members at installations back in Australia receiving and monitoring data and surveillance footage from the live exercises.

"The data we are collecting here is also going back to locations in Australia," US Joint Forces Command's John Kittle, the Empire Challenge's project manager, told reporters on Monday.

"By getting access to the data, the Australian defence commands back there are able to see and be able to judge or work the interoperability they are looking for."

Empire Challenge, held over 13 days, is an annual exercise and proved valuable to the British military last year when extreme hot temperatures at the US Naval Air Weapons Station, located in California's Mojave Desert, "literally melted" their equipment, while high winds also caused problems.

"So they made fixes to that system based on what they learned at Empire Challenge and then that deployed to Afghanistan," Mr Kittle said.

One topic not on the official agenda at the Empire Challenge is the massive leak of classified US military intelligence reports and files by the Wikileaks website, headed by Australian activist Julian Assange.

"They may be talking about it at the bar, but to be honest with you we haven't talked about it at all around the compound," US Air Force Colonel George "Skip" Krakie said.