Monday, April 3, 2000
Few but mighty: U.S. troops in East Timor doing important work
By Jan Wesner Childs
Okinawa bureauTheir numbers are small, but the Americans deployed to the peacekeeping mission in East Timor are accomplishing a lot, the top U.S. military commander there says.
"I think all of us here are proud and grateful to have the opportunity to do something like this," Col. Mike Williams, commander of U.S. Group East Timor, said Friday in a telephone interview from his headquarters. "This is a good thing that we're doing. This is a country that really needs our assistance. The rewards are fast and coming. We're making friends here and to be part of a nation-building process like this is really something.
"You can't ask for much more than that."
The United States currently has 50 servicemembers in East Timor, and another 19 supporting them from a staging base in Darwin, Australia.
It is also sending larger numbers of personnel to the region on various ship visits. The USNS Spica, a supply ship, was there last week. The USS McCain from Yokosuka Naval Base is scheduled to arrive in Dili, the East Timor capital, later this month.
The people of East Timor voted Aug. 30 to become independent from Indonesia. Pro-Indonesia militias rampaged through the territory after the vote, destroying about 90 percent of the buildings and forcing three-fourths of the population from their homes.
The first small group of 13 U.S. troops entered East Timor Sept. 18 as part of an Australian-led international peacekeeping mission to stabilize the troubled territory. The mission was called International Forces in East Timor, or INTERFET.
More than 5,000 U.S. sailors, airmen, soldiers and Marines were sent to the region over the next four months under the U.S. portion of INTERFET. Most were on ships. Others were assigned to the staging area in Darwin, or the small headquarters in Dili.
The largest number in the region at any one time was in mid-October, when the USS Belleau Wood and elements of the 31st Marine Expeditionary Unit floated just offshore from Dili with about 2,000 Marines and sailors.
The United Nations took over the mission from Australia in February. All of the original members of the U.S. contingent were home by then. Another small group of U.S. service members was sent to support the U.N. mission. They are known as U.S. Group East Timor, or USGET.
There are 7,500 United Nations-led troops and 930 civilian police officers from 43 different countries deployed to East Timor. Most are wearing the blue beret of the U.N. The U.S. contingent, however, has remained autonomous and is not under U.N. control.
Williams said that's because the United States wanted to control which troops it sends and in what numbers, and what they do in the country.
"I believe what it does is it gives us the flexibility to pace our participation based on what the need is here," Williams said.
The U.S. contingent in Dili now includes a 25-person staff and 25 Navy Seabees from Naval Mobile Construction Battalion 40. The Seabees are based in California but are currently assigned to Guam. They are on a 90-day rotation to East Timor.
Williams said the Seabees will be followed by Army engineers and then by Marine Corps engineers.
They are helping rebuild schools destroyed during the militia rampages.
"When the Indonesians left, they took basically the entire infrastructure with them," Williams said. "The schools and buildings were gutted, the roofs were ripped off."
Small U.S. military medical and dental teams are also rotating in and out of Dili. A medical team from Camp Zama recently left the country. A three-person dental team from Yokota and Misawa air bases is there now and is seeing about 40 patients a day.
Williams, who was an operations officer for the 3rd Marine Expeditionary Force on Okinawa when he was selected for the East Timor post, said the mission will continue in its current form for at least three more months.
"We expect to re-evaluate and adjust, if necessary, the scope of our participation sometime around the June-July timeframe," he said.
His staff lives and works on a barge anchored to the shoreline in Dili. The barge and its support operations - like food - are run by a civilian corporation.
Williams said the barge provides good living conditions, and helps protect against illnesses carried by mosquitoes.
The United States' most important mission in East Timor is simply waving the flag, Williams said.
He said the USS Bonhomme Richard, a huge amphibious assault ship based in San Diego, could be seen floating prominently in the background on the day the Australian commander handed over the peacekeeping mission to the United Nations.
"That really sent a very strong message, a strong message of support...and signals the U.S. commitment to peace and stability," Williams said.
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