THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, March 29, 1996 TAG: 9603290531
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A14 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: NEWPORT NEWS DAILY PRESS
DATELINE: HAMPTON LENGTH: Short : 35 lines
The first 50 members of a special 1,000-member Air Force unit are leaving Langley Air Force Base today for Jordan to help patrol the ``no-fly'' zone over southern Iraq and conduct training with allied air forces.
The two-month deployment offers Jordanians an opportunity for an up-close look at the F-16 fighter - 16 of which the Pentagon wants to sell the Middle Eastern kingdom.
The 34-jet Airpower Expeditionary Force, or AEF - flying F-15Cs from Langley's 1st Fighter Wing, F-16s from Georgia and Idaho, and KC-135 refueling tankers from Washington - was originally slated to fill a ``gap'' in Navy carrier-based jet presence in the Middle East.
The gap, however, is gone.
The gap was created when the Nimitz, a Pacific Fleet carrier on a six-month cruise, left its Middle East station in early March to help another carrier provide a U.S. presence in the Strait of Taiwan during heightened China-Taiwan tensions.
With tensions minimal in the Mediterranean, officials decided to send the Norfolk-based carrier George Washington, in the midst of a six-month cruise to the Med, to the Middle East to take the place of the Nimitz. The Washington sailed into the Persian Gulf last week.
KEYWORDS: IRAQ U.S. AIR FORCE by CNB