From the endless lines of military Humvees, wrecker trucks, all-terrain vehicles, ambulances, flat-bed cargo trucks, generator trucks, fuel trucks, communications vans, and paratroopers waiting in a cold rain, it's clear that the U.S. military mission in Haiti is going to be a long one.
For a week, cargo handlers and loaders and flight crews have been struggling to get the 3,200 paratroopers of the 2nd Brigade Combat Team of the 82nd Airborne Division into Haiti. As of midday Thursday, the job is about two-thirds complete, with 2,177 soldiers and 2,000 tons of military cargo airlifted into Haiti so far.
They are joining a fast-growing U.S. military force responding to the Haitian earthquake, a commitment that U.S. officials said Thursday will grow to roughly 20,000.
In addition to the 82nd Airborne paratroopers, 1,700 Marines of the 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit embarked aboard three warships. Now the Pentagon has ordered the 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit diverted from deployment to Afghanistan to join the forces committed to Haiti.
That order means that two of the Marine Corps' six expeditionary units, normally held for crisis response, are committed to Haiti. And the 82nd Airborne is also normally held in reserve for military crises as part of the Defense Department's Global Response Force.
But this is no simple military operation. If it were, the 82nd Airborne Division brigade would have been gone last weekend: the wartime standard is to load and fly the brigade into combat within 96 hours.
Instead, the brigade is equipped for an extended humanitarian assistance mission, taking gear like wreckers, fuel tankers, and cargo trucks.
Long lines of vehicles stretched from the parking aprons where huge C-17 cargo planes and smaller C-130s squatted with their ramps open. Paratroopers were crammed into their vehicles along with packs, cartons of Meals Ready to Eat (MRE rations), radios, sleeping bags and other gear.
"I've been out here waiting for three days, sleeping in the truck,'' said Sgt. Jason Bourque, who leapt out of his Humvee to talk to me as we stood in a an icy rain. He is a 25-year-old communications specialist from New Iberia, La. Later Thursday, he hoped to be able to drive his vehicle up the ramp into a C-17 for the ride into Haiti.
The top U.S. commander in Haiti, Lt. Gen. Ken Keen, said Thursday that the U.S. military "will stay until the needs of the Haitian people are met.'' He said the military command would "look for opportunities to transition'' responsibility to civilian U.S. and international agencies "who do a much better job and are committed to the long-term'' effort in Haiti.
Keen told reporters at the Pentagon that the airport at Port-au-Prince is now handling as many as 140 flights a day. But he said there are still 1,400 aircraft wait-listed to get into the airport, which has a single runway and limited aircraft ramp space for unloading cargo planes.
Two airports in neighboring Dominican Republic, and one at the Haitian town of Jacmel, are also being used to receive cargo flights. Repairs at the capital's port, heavily damaged by last Tuesday's earthquake, will enable the landing of 150 cargo containers Friday and soon will be able to handle 150 containers a day, Keen said.
The U.S. military and U.S. Coast Guard have 63 helicopters working in the region, he said.
But even with the massive airlift – six C-17s and six C-130s were loading Thursday afternoon, with dozens more scheduled – vehicles will be in short supply in Haiti, at least for a while. One military police unit, for instance, will go with only a third of the Humvees it normally takes on missions. Logistics planners here say that once the entire brigade is on the ground in Haiti, follow-up cargo flights will bring in supplies and equipment required by ground commanders.
Those requirements are "emerging,'' grinned Air Force Maj. Ed Hogan, an intense senior operations officer with the 43rd Airlift Wing here. Airlift operations here and other major airlift ports at Charleston, S.C., Dover, Del., and McGuire Air Force in New Jersey, will continue at a high tempo to provide supplies for the deployed troops, including food, water, fuel and other consumables, officers said.
The Air Force also has chartered commercial airliners to ferry troops to Haiti. Thursday afternoon, paratroopers were lined up to board a Continental Airlines 757 here at Pope Air Force Base.
