Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, December 12, 1993 TAG: 9312120011
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: B-8 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Medium
About 1,000 soldiers from the Fort Drum, N.Y., base - which was among the first to send troops into the starving nation last year - are expected to be among the first flying home at the end of the week, said military officials who spoke on condition of anonymity.
Last week, Defense Secretary Les Aspin pledged that a "fairly significant" number of the approximately 8,000 troops in Somalia should begin leaving before Christmas, but he did not give an exact figure.
"Some of these soldiers have been away from home for Christmases ad nauseam. It's wonderful that they're going to be able to get back for this one," one senior officer said.
President Clinton decided to bolster the U.S. forces after an Oct. 3 battle in which 18 American soldiers died and 75 were wounded in a raid against Gen. Mohammed Farah Aidid. But he also set March 31 as the deadline for pulling out all the American troops.
"All he had to do was say the date, and the logisticians started figuring it out all backwards to find the point when they'd have to start" removing the forces, their weaponry and support structure, said a second military officer.
Somalia's lack of an infrastructure hasn't changed much since the military's initial humanitarian mission began last year. Thus, the withdrawal operation could stretch more than three months, the officer said.
"There's still only one airport in Mogadishu, and only one port," he said, noting that the pipeline through which troops and their equipment may move is extremely tight.
"There's only so much you can move in or out on any given day," he said.
Dozens of flights by chartered or military aircraft and more than a half-dozen cargo transport ships will be needed to accomplish the transfer of the U.S. forces, officials said.
And complicating the exit is Somalia's status as one of the most unhealthy nations on earth.
The Pentagon is sending in several hundred packing specialists and "de-buggers" who will clean up the force's equipment and ready it for transport home.
"The Department of Agriculture has nightmares about what kind of things could crawl home on our tanks," one officer laughed. "They hose that stuff down and go over it with a fine-toothed comb."
by CNB