Post by dberube on Jan 7, 2005 23:42:04 GMT -5
I received this in an email from a guy a year ahead of me who is a Marine on the Bonhomme Richard. It doesn't look like his words, and he didn't send an original link or source, but he forwarded the article.
-Berube
________________
Tuesday January 4, 21:01 PM
In politically sensitive south Asia, U.S. Marines find it hard to get boots on the ground
Down in the hull, everything is ready to go. There are tractors and trucks and three huge landing craft. There's water purifying equipment, plastic tarps and wood beams for building temporary shelters.
And there are more than 1,300 Marines ready to take it all ashore and get to work.
But _ even for a strictly humanitarian mission _ in the political minefield of southern Asia, getting American boots on the ground is a delicate concept.
While U.S. military helicopters have been flying aid into stricken villages on the Indonesian island of Sumatra for the past few days, plans to put a Marine expeditionary unit ashore on Sri Lanka have been put on hold after Colombo scaled down its request for help.
The change of plans comes as Sri Lanka's Tamil Tiger rebels voiced opposition to troops from the United States or neighboring India coming ashore. A pro-rebel politician on Tuesday said such troops could be used as spies to help put down their insurgency.
"The attempt by the American and Indian troops to land in Sri Lanka ... is totally based on their political and military interests," Nallathamby Srikantha, a rebel leader, said on Voice of Tigers radio, the official rebel mouthpiece.
"They may try to collect details to help the government crush the Tamil national struggle in a future conflict," Srikantha said.
The United States and India both officially consider the Tamil Tigers, which control a large portion of northern and eastern Sri Lanka, to be a terrorist group.
This ship and the USS Duluth canceled plans to spearhead relief efforts off Sri Lanka's coast and have instead joined the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln and its battle group off Sumatra.
The USS Mount Rushmore, carrying a smaller contingent of Marines, will travel on to Sri Lanka alone. It was expected to cross the Indian Ocean by the weekend. An advance party of seven Marines arrived in the southern town of Galle Tuesday.
The first helicopter flights off the Bonhomme Richard began relief operations on Tuesday, flying to the city of Medan on Sumatra, where more than 100,000 people are feared dead and a million or more are homeless after the catastrophic Dec. 26 earthquake and tsunami. About a dozen countries were hit by the waves, and the death toll is expected to top 150,000.
In Galle, the Marine survey team arrived in civilian vehicles from the capital, Colombo.
Capt. Peter Wilson said he expected at least several hundred Marines to deploy in Galle to provide "limited engineering capability" by repairing roads and other damaged infrastructure, as well as help in the distribution of food.
"This is what Marines do. We like to help people," he said, citing assistance that U.S. forces gave during natural disasters in Bangladesh in 1991.
The Bonhomme Richard, carrying more than 1,300 Marines, has three landing craft aboard that float on air cushions and are capable of putting the troops ashore by the hundred on almost any kind of beach.
All are fully loaded and ready to go.
But for the time being, that capability will not be used. Instead, the ship's helicopters will continue ferrying supplies to and from the regional airports where they have been piling up, and taking them out to the more remote places where they are needed.
Part of the reason is clearly political.
Sumatra's Aceh province is also a highly sensitive area for Indonesia. Due to a long-standing insurgency, Aceh had been restricted to foreigners.
Jakarta was quick to open Aceh because it needed the help, but the image of large numbers of Marines pouring ashore would be politically sensitive to the predominantly Muslim nation.
All told, about 20 U.S. military ships and more than 10,000 Marines and sailors have been mobilized for the relief operation, which is the largest the U.S. military has conducted in Asia since the Vietnam War ended in 1975.
With Sri Lanka no longer on its itinerary, the Bonhomme Richard was expected to take its position off southern Sumatra, while the Lincoln battle group would remain in the more heavily populated north.
The military's helicopter operations have been key to easing aid bottlenecks and getting supplies out to the harder-to-access areas. But the Marines had hoped to put troops on the ground to provide badly needed manpower for clearing roads and airfields and for building shelters for refugees.
-Berube
________________
Tuesday January 4, 21:01 PM
In politically sensitive south Asia, U.S. Marines find it hard to get boots on the ground
Down in the hull, everything is ready to go. There are tractors and trucks and three huge landing craft. There's water purifying equipment, plastic tarps and wood beams for building temporary shelters.
And there are more than 1,300 Marines ready to take it all ashore and get to work.
But _ even for a strictly humanitarian mission _ in the political minefield of southern Asia, getting American boots on the ground is a delicate concept.
While U.S. military helicopters have been flying aid into stricken villages on the Indonesian island of Sumatra for the past few days, plans to put a Marine expeditionary unit ashore on Sri Lanka have been put on hold after Colombo scaled down its request for help.
The change of plans comes as Sri Lanka's Tamil Tiger rebels voiced opposition to troops from the United States or neighboring India coming ashore. A pro-rebel politician on Tuesday said such troops could be used as spies to help put down their insurgency.
"The attempt by the American and Indian troops to land in Sri Lanka ... is totally based on their political and military interests," Nallathamby Srikantha, a rebel leader, said on Voice of Tigers radio, the official rebel mouthpiece.
"They may try to collect details to help the government crush the Tamil national struggle in a future conflict," Srikantha said.
The United States and India both officially consider the Tamil Tigers, which control a large portion of northern and eastern Sri Lanka, to be a terrorist group.
This ship and the USS Duluth canceled plans to spearhead relief efforts off Sri Lanka's coast and have instead joined the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln and its battle group off Sumatra.
The USS Mount Rushmore, carrying a smaller contingent of Marines, will travel on to Sri Lanka alone. It was expected to cross the Indian Ocean by the weekend. An advance party of seven Marines arrived in the southern town of Galle Tuesday.
The first helicopter flights off the Bonhomme Richard began relief operations on Tuesday, flying to the city of Medan on Sumatra, where more than 100,000 people are feared dead and a million or more are homeless after the catastrophic Dec. 26 earthquake and tsunami. About a dozen countries were hit by the waves, and the death toll is expected to top 150,000.
In Galle, the Marine survey team arrived in civilian vehicles from the capital, Colombo.
Capt. Peter Wilson said he expected at least several hundred Marines to deploy in Galle to provide "limited engineering capability" by repairing roads and other damaged infrastructure, as well as help in the distribution of food.
"This is what Marines do. We like to help people," he said, citing assistance that U.S. forces gave during natural disasters in Bangladesh in 1991.
The Bonhomme Richard, carrying more than 1,300 Marines, has three landing craft aboard that float on air cushions and are capable of putting the troops ashore by the hundred on almost any kind of beach.
All are fully loaded and ready to go.
But for the time being, that capability will not be used. Instead, the ship's helicopters will continue ferrying supplies to and from the regional airports where they have been piling up, and taking them out to the more remote places where they are needed.
Part of the reason is clearly political.
Sumatra's Aceh province is also a highly sensitive area for Indonesia. Due to a long-standing insurgency, Aceh had been restricted to foreigners.
Jakarta was quick to open Aceh because it needed the help, but the image of large numbers of Marines pouring ashore would be politically sensitive to the predominantly Muslim nation.
All told, about 20 U.S. military ships and more than 10,000 Marines and sailors have been mobilized for the relief operation, which is the largest the U.S. military has conducted in Asia since the Vietnam War ended in 1975.
With Sri Lanka no longer on its itinerary, the Bonhomme Richard was expected to take its position off southern Sumatra, while the Lincoln battle group would remain in the more heavily populated north.
The military's helicopter operations have been key to easing aid bottlenecks and getting supplies out to the harder-to-access areas. But the Marines had hoped to put troops on the ground to provide badly needed manpower for clearing roads and airfields and for building shelters for refugees.