At sunrise, an armoured vehicle with a powerful cannon rolls off a landing barge, followed by soldiers in camouflage: on the coast of Sète in southern France, a French army exercise offers an unusual spectacle to onlookers. "We have our own carnival in Nice and today it's a bit of a carnival in Frontignan, it's great," says Christine Ciais, a retiree who has recently moved to the Sète region, while filming the scene. A total of 700 soldiers and nearly 150 vehicles landed on the coast of Herault on Sunday, as part of an unprecedented exercise called Orion 2023. The drill, which mobilises 7,000 soldiers until March 11, simulates an intervention in a country ("Arnland") destabilised by well-equipped militias, and bordering a powerful state orchestrating these troubles ("Mercury"). IMAGES AND SOUNDBITES