BUH-BYE

From Air Force News:

8/27/2003 - PRINCE SULTAN AIR BASE, Saudi Arabia (AFPN) -- U.S. officials transferred control of portions of Prince Sultan Air Base to Saudi officials at a ceremony Aug. 26. The ceremony also marked the inactivation of the 363rd Air Expeditionary Wing.

"We came here under difficult circumstances following the Khobar Towers bombing (at Dhahran Air Base),? said Col. James Moschgat, the wing?s commander. ?The mission thrived and prospered here, and I believe our legacy will live on. We are leaving after seven years of friendship and cooperation. It's bittersweet, but it's time to go."

Saudi government officials asked U.S. servicemembers to deploy to Saudi Arabia during the 1991 Gulf War. The troops remained to enforce U.N. Security Council Resolution 688 -- the no-fly zone south of the 33rd parallel over Iraq -- until Operation Iraqi Freedom started March 19. The base here became the center of the U.S. presence in the country in 1997 after the Khobar Towers bombing that killed 19 airmen and injured 400 others.

Aircraft here monitored the southern no-fly zone in Iraq. During Operation Iraqi Freedom, the Combined Air Operations Center and a limited air-refueling mission operated here.

The base was home to about 60,000 coalition forces during the past seven years. At the height of OIF, there were more than 5,000 troops and about 200 coalition aircraft based here.

The decision to withdraw the troops was made by U.S. and Saudi officials during a meeting between Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and the Saudi defense minister in Riyadh on April 29.

"Today ends more than a decade of military operations in this strategic Middle East nation," said Maj. Gen. Robert J. Elder Jr., the 9th Aerospace Expeditionary Task Force vice commander. ?The end of (major combat operation in Iraq) and Saddam Hussein's government means the American military mission here is over.?

This ceremony signals a change to the U.S. and Saudi military operational relationship as the countries? militaries continue tactical training and conduct exercises together, he said.

"Closing U.S.-controlled areas of Prince Sultan Air Base ... is a time for reflection,? Elder said. ?But, this won't be the end of coming to Saudi Arabia. We've been working with our friends from Prince Sultan for seven years; we're beginning a new relationship with the royal Saudi air force."

In July, Moschgat returned Coalition Complex, the housing center for coalition forces since 1999, to Saudi officials.

The last Americans will complete the U.S. pullout in early September.

Kind words. Diplomatic, to say the least.

One of the unheralded results of the recent Iraq war has been the end of Operation Northern Watch and Operation Southern Watch, the USAF missions to patrol and enforce the no-fly zones established in the aftermath of the first Gulf War to protect the Iraqi Shia and Kurd populations.

Since 1991 the Air Force has kept a continuous rotation of troops and equipment into locations like Prince Sultan Air Base in Saudi Arabia and Incirlik Air Base in Turkey. Air Force men and women have withstood the family separation, heat, and general discomfort of living in modern-day 14th century nations.

An example of the type of things put up with: just last year and only after a legal battle and congressional intervention, the Air Force stopped forcing its female members to wear Burkhas when off base in Saudi. Initially they downgraded "mandatory wear " to "highly encouraged wear", but in this instance no one was fooled as everyone knows the military frowns on those who won't do something they're "highly encouraged" to do. (It's simply a semantic dodge when one doesn't want to issue unpopular orders.) The Air Force was scolded into removing all strictures on female garb off base.

To what end? As of last December, according to CNN's Wolf Blitzer:

Dr. Abdullah al-Lheedan, an associate professor at King Saud University, explains, "If the women go without a veil at all, people will notice and feel offended, and that's why the government here insists that the non-Muslim wears the minimum requirement of hijab to cover the whole body except the face and the hands."

Back at the Prince Sultan Air Base in Saudi Arabia, the war against Iraq has already begun. U.S. pilots based here are dodging Iraqi fire on an almost daily basis.

Those F-15 and F-16 pilots often wouldn't be in the air over southern Iraq if it weren't for U.S. Air Force Capt. Laura Lenderman. A graduate of Duke University and a 9-year Air Force pilot, she flies KC-135 tankers which refuel warplanes in midair -- a most delicate and dangerous mission.

It's a mission for which she and her fellow service members are prepared. "We are ready," she told me. "This is what we train to do. And we are ready to do it."

Here's the irony: Capt. Lenderman can fly these sophisticated aircraft over Saudi Arabia but off-base, she's not allowed to drive or even sit in the front seat of a car.

That's why the American women serving at Prince Sultan for all practical purposes, hardly ever leave the base.

They don't have to stay on base but they do. We heard that repeatedly. The few who leave the base adhere to local restrictions. One service woman told me, "If we have people that go downtown, they wear burkas or the abeyahs and try to respect the traditions."

A lawsuit filed by U.S. Air Force Lt. Col. Martha McSally earlier this year forced the Pentagon to drop the requirement that women in the military serving in Saudi Arabia wear those traditional Muslim garments when they're off base.

Trivial perhaps, in light of the fact that American aircraft were being shot or at least radar-pinged almost daily for over 10 years by Iraqi SAM sites. Or the aforementioned bombing at Khobar Towers. Still, this issue is a good example of the challenges faced daily by troops that perhaps would have preferred to be elsewhere.

Is it ironic then, that the mere presence of these infidels protecting the holy Saudi soil would help inflame the passions of terrorists to the point of murder on an unprecedented scale?

It's over now. As it may well be for our long held bases in Turkey. I've spoken with folks "in the know", and have reliable reports from those who've been there recently. The Turks have a strange relationship with the US; as members of the Muslim world many Turks hate us for reasons all too well known. As a small nation behind the power curve on standard of living many harbor jealous rage at our phenomenal national success. As NATO allies they have benefited greatly from us over the years. They have their own national concerns with the Kurds along the Iraqi border. Still, all in all, they'd like us to leave, but please to not take our money with us.

And they miscalculated tremendously when figuring how much we needed them in the current gulf war. Content with the protective umbrella provided by the American Air Force enforcing Operation Northern Watch, the government, in a misguided attempt to show strength, appease the masses, and pocket a few quick bucks, made ridiculous monetary demands for their services as an ally against Saddam. In thinking we had no other options they were wrong. The Bush administration spurned their offer, and a massive airdrop and airlift replaced the Turkish land route for opening a northern front.

So now ends ONW and OSW. And forgive me for noting that those who would complain of lengthy deployments and demand the return of the troops are about 10 years behind the times. We leave the Saudis with a state-of-the-art command and control center. We leave the Turks too. Using the end of those seemingly eternal operations, those endless deployments, those months in the sand, as official justification. The cessation of the seemingly magic American cash flow through the gates of Incirlik will make a not too minor blip on the local economy. But then again the Turks will no longer need to smile and feign friendship when the infidel enters their shop.

And now stay tuned, as the drawdown in Germany, promised from the day the wall fell, inevitable and perhaps overdue since the break up of the evil empire, at last begins...