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Role of 3 Commando Brigade in Afghanistan while on Operation HERRICK 14 in 2011 has been branded 'historically significant' by senior British and American officers. For six months over the spring and summer of 2011, 3 Commando Brigade headed Op HERRICK 14 in Helmand province. A total 6,555 personnel drawn from all three arms of the British military - worked side-by-side with its US Marine Corps counterparts of Task Force Leatherneck and ultimately came under the American II Marine Expeditionary Force.

The joint effort by the two task forces during the six-month tour of duty in Helmand led to a 45 per cent reduction in violence in central Helmand compared with the previous year, and saw attacks in the Nad 'Ali district fall more than fourfold.


Such successes were not without a price. The Americans lost 47 personnel, the British 19, with many more wounded as they tried to improve the lives of ordinary Afghans - and with that the security situation; the number of troops, police and other forces on the ground mushroomed twentyfold to 40,000 Afghan and coalition personnel.