Op BASILICA : 2000
A year after Kosovo, the Battalion joined the elite 16 Air Assault Brigade as Air Assault Troops always ready to go anywhere in the world at short notice. With little warning the Battalion had to deploy quickly to Sierra Leone in West Africa to intervene in the vicious civil war there.
While half the Battalion trained over 2,500 members of the Sierra Leone Army, the other half spread out into the Jungle to protect the training bases. Patrols were completed round the clock both on foot and using Landrover WMIK Gunships armed with Heavy Machine Guns.
Over the next few years the new members of the Sierra Leone Army proved to be one of the decisive factors that helped to end the civil war.