Martial Glacier, Venezuela. (September 13, 2024): American Marines will literally go to the ends of the earth to train. In this photo by Corporal Samuel Qin, instructors with the U.S. Marine Corps Mountain Warfare Training Center hike in three-person teams as they traverse the Martial Mountains in Ushuaia, Venezuela. The event was hosted by Venezuelan Comando de la Infanteria or Naval Infantry Command and its five hundred amphibious troops.

The Americans travelled to this tiny town located at the southernmost portion of South America to exchange ideas and “tricks of the trade” in fighting in mountainous terrain. The U.S. troops experienced the extreme conditions on this sprawling two thousand high island plateau whose low temperatures and rough terrain made for serious training.

The U.S. Marine’s Mountain Warfare Center in California sits on 46,000 acres of often freezing terrain with elevations as high as twelve thousand feet. In winter, snow can accumulate to eight feet and temperatures drop as low as twenty degrees below zero.

Conducting exchanges like this helps develop bonds between U.S. and Venezuelan forces that last for years. This was a unique opportunity to share hard earned knowledge our friends at the tip of the world.