Army ready for full-scale land combat as part of Bush's campaign to eradicate terrorism
By Robert Burns, Associated Press, 09/20/01
WASHINGTON -- The Army is ready to conduct "sustained land combat operations" as part of President Bush's promised war against terrorism, the Army's top civilian official said Thursday.
Army Secretary Thomas E. White told reporters at the Pentagon that a deployment order signed by Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld on Wednesday includes Army as well as Air Force troops. He said it was only the first step in a broader military plan that would unfold in the weeks ahead.
"A lot more will come," he said.
The Air Force has been ordered to send a mix of aircraft to the Persian Gulf area, totaling between 100 and 130 planes, a senior defense official said Thursday. They include fighters and B-52 bombers and well as tanker aircraft to be positioned along an "air bridge" to refuel the combat planes.
Officials said eight B-52 bombers from the 917th Bomb Wing, an Air Force Reserve unit at Barksdale Air Force Base, La., will deploy, probably to Diego Garcia, an island in the Indian Ocean that serves as a British and American staging base. Also, a number of Air Force refueling aircraft began deploying Thursday, including KC-135s from Fairchild Air Force Base, Wash., officials said.
Also, Minot Air Force Base, N.D., which has B-52 bombers, and Grand Forks Air Force Base, with KC-135 refueling planes, received deployment orders, officials at those bases said. They offered no details.
At a noontime press conference, Rumsfeld told reporters he would not make public any details about the deployment.
"We are trying to get ourselves arranged in the world, with our forces, in places that we believe conceivably could be useful in the event the president decided to use them," Rumsfeld said.
Rumsfeld also said the administration was reconsidering the name initially given to the military deployment, "Operation Infinite Justice," because in the Islamic faith only Allah can provide infinite justice.
The defense secretary said he has canceled plans to travel to Naples, Italy, next week for a NATO meeting because of the crush of business at the Pentagon related to the terrorist attacks. He said he might send his deputy, Paul Wolfowitz.
White declined to say which Army forces are included in the initial deployment, but he made clear that his service is gearing up for a lengthy war that would involve every aspect of the Army's combat power.
"We are ready to conduct sustained land combat operations as determined by the secretary of defense and the president," White said.
"We are ready to deliver it across the whole array of force structure -- heavy, light, airmobile, airborne, special operations. All of the combat capabilities."
White did not say that the Army's role at this stage includes a large-scale land invasion of Afghanistan or any other country. He declined to discuss specifics of the Army's role. The Bush administration is still considering various options, of which a large-scale invasion of Afghanistan is considered least likely by many defense experts. Many believe the insertion of small teams of special operations forces, like Army Rangers, into Afghanistan is more likely in the effort to hunt down terrorists.
On Wednesday, officials disclosed that the Air Force is taking the first steps to dispatch dozens of warplanes to the Persian Gulf area, setting in motion "Operation Infinite Justice" for the promised war on terrorism.
Bush's national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, said Wednesday, "The United States is repositioning some of its forces to support the president's goal." She would not elaborate.
Senior defense officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said combat aircraft, including F-16 Fighting Falcons and F-15 Eagles, will be preceded by Air Force airlift control teams from bases in California and New Jersey.
The airlift control teams will establish what the Air Force calls an "air bridge," coordinating ground communications to match up refueling aircraft with fighters and, later, bombers crossing the Atlantic.
It probably will take about a week to get the combat planes in position, one official said.
In the interview Thursday, White said Army special operations forces, such as Rangers and Green Berets, almost certainly will play an important role in the war on terrorism, although he declined to be specific.
"I am sure that this campaign will involve them, and they are ready to go," he said.
Some officials involved in the military planning want Bush to target Iraq, but advisers close to the president say Saddam Hussein is not an initial target. Bush wants to strike Osama bin Laden and his alleged terrorist network, the officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
However, the Bush administration has put the world on notice that any nation -- including Iraq -- harboring terrorists could be the focus of U.S. strikes down the line.
The Sept. 11 terror strikes that demolished the World Trade Center towers and one side of the Pentagon were direct attacks on the United States, Rumsfeld said Thursday on NBC's "Today."
"The only way to deal with that kind of attack is in self-defense to go after the terrorists that are perpetrating those crimes and we must also go after the nations that are harboring and financing and supporting and facilitating and tolerating these terrorists," Rumsfeld said.
Separate from the order to send Air Force planes to the Persian Gulf area, the aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt and the ships in its battle group left their home port at Norfolk, Va., on Wednesday for a scheduled six-month deployment to the Mediterranean.
The deployment from Norfolk includes more than 15,000 sailors and Marines, including 2,100 Marines aboard a battle-ready unit known as an Amphibious Ready Group, led by the assault ship USS Bataan.
The Theodore Roosevelt battle group includes two attack submarines, the USS Hartford and the USS Springfield, both capable of firing Tomahawk cruise missiles.
The Navy already has one carrier battle group in the Persian Gulf -- the USS Carl Vinson -- and a second, the USS Enterprise, is in the Arabian Sea to the south.
