Posted on 01/22/2004 6:21:41 PM PST by Ragtime Cowgirl
| Japan Air Self-Defense Force team leaves for Iraq |
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KOMAKI, Aichi -- The Air Self-Defense Force (ASDF) main troops to be dispatched to Kuwait to support Iraqi reconstruction left its base here Thursday afternoon. A government-owned Boeing 747-400 jumbo jet took off from ASDF Komaki base carrying 110 members of the unit. The troops will join the ASDF advance team that was dispatched to a U.S. base in Kuwait late last year, and begin supply transportation missions in early February. Prior to the departure, the ASDF held a send-off ceremony attended by Defense Agency deputy chief Yasukazu Hamada. "I imagine you will face problems there that would never occur at home, but I would like you to fulfill your responsibility," Lieutenant General Seiji Kagawa told the ASDF unit during the ceremony. The 110 troops boarded the government aircraft as their family members and colleagues sent them off. The unit will transport humanitarian supplies as well as supplies for Ground Self-Defense Force, U.S. and British troops on three C-130 transport aircraft between Kuwait and Iraqi airports in Basra, Baghdad and Mosul. The C-130s are scheduled to take off from Komaki base Monday for Kuwait. (Mainichi and wire reports, Japan, Jan. 22, 2004) |
The unit will transport humanitarian supplies as well as supplies for Ground Self-Defense Force, U.S. and British troops on three C-130 transport aircraft between Kuwait and Iraqi airports in Basra, Baghdad and Mosul.
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NON-UN-ilateral, ping!
During the first days of the war (o.k., I still do it), I was getting the ranks of officers wrong all over the OIF war threads, reducing Generals to Lts, ETC.
Was told I could do so to most any branch of the service...but that Marines were sensitive. (^:
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