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                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SATURDAY, February 8, 1992                   TAG: 9202080042
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-7   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: BERLIN                                LENGTH: Short

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U.S. AIRLIFT `HUMANITARIAN'

In a final symbolic turnabout after more than 40 years of enmity, the U.S. military is getting ready to fly tons of food and medical supplies to cold, hungry people caught in the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Organizers acknowledge that the 54 flights of Operation Provide Hope will make only a small dent in the needs of the new Commonwealth of Independent States and its 280 million people. But they say the gesture is an important one.

"It's a humanitarian airlift. We're doing what we can do," U.S. Air Force spokesman Capt. Mike Caldwell said on Friday. "It's better than doing nothing at all."

Caldwell said the U.S. cargo planes flying from Germany and Turkey will carry 4.5 million pounds of military rations and medical supplies over two weeks, beginning on Monday.

In a historical twist, many of the planes will take off from the Rhein-Main air base just outside Frankfurt. That also was the starting point for thousands of U.S. flights that broke the Soviets' blockade of Berlin in the late 1940s, one of the opening battles of the Cold War.

Secretary of State James Baker announced the airlift last month after officials from 47 countries agreed to help the former Soviet Union.

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