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| Wednesday, 30 April 2003 |
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US pulls air force out of main base in Saudi Arabia Prince sultan air base, Saudia (AFP) The United States has moved its combined air command centre from Saudi Arabia to Gulf neighbour Qatar and will close all air operations there soon, senior US officers said Tuesday. Rear admiral David Nichols, deputy commander of the air operation centre, told reporters US air operations would be shut down totally at Prince Sultan air base at Kharj, south of the capital Riyadh, by the end of the summer. "The move was by mutual agreement with the Saudis," he said, ending months of speculation as relations cooled post-September 11 and Riyadh baulked at the war on Iraq. "We already have switched," the air operations centre from Prince Sultan to Al-Udeid in Qatar, Nichols said. "As of yesterday (Monday) the ATO (Air Tasking Order) is being planned and executed out of Al-Udeid." The US Air Force has been using the giant Al-Udeid facility south of Doha to run air operations in Afghanistan and the Horn of Africa. "It will be towards the end of the summer before the 363rd and pretty much all we've got here will be repositioned elsewhere," Nichols said. The 363rd is a USAF air expeditionary wing. "We are getting out a lot of stuff sooner than that but we can't get the bulk of it out of here by the end of the summer." Asked how many aircraft would remain at the base by the end of the summer, Air Force spokesman Major General Ronald Rand replied: "US airplanes zero." At the peak of operations during the Iraq war as many as 2,700 missions a day where handled by the headquarters in Saudi Arabia. About 100 coalition aircraft were still at Prince Sultan base, 80 kilometers (50 miles) south of the capital, on Tuesday, compared to a peak of 200. "Our future relationship is in very robust exercise, training and engagement," said Rand. Prince Sultan base would still be wired but computers and other equipment would largely be taken out, Nichols said, adding that it could easily be reinstalled. "There will still be a capability if we and the Saudis decide we need to come back in." A need remained for AWACs and joint surveillance operations "for a while", but the air force wanted to move it elsewhere. The revelation of the long-awaited move in the aftermath of the September 11, 2001 suicide hijacking in the United States, in which 15 Saudis led by Osama bin Laden, played a leading role, came during a visit by Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. He flew into what had served as coalition air force headquarters during the Iraq war to meet troops at the base and Saudi leaders in the nearby capital. The visit to a long-standing key Gulf ally, the world biggest oil exporter, came after Rumsfeld announced in Qatar on Monday that the United States would reduce its military forces in the Gulf now that Iraq no longer posed a threat to the region. Rumsfeld was set to have talks with Crown Prince Abdullah and Defence Minister Prince Sultan, officials said. For the Iraq war, the United States had more than doubled its troops in the kingdom to 10,000, a majority of them stationed at Prince Sultan. Some 5,000 US troops, mostly airmen, and around 40 US, British and French aircraft had been stationed at the air base since the end of the 1991 Gulf war mainly to enforce a no-fly zone over southern Iraq. Saudi served as the launchpad for coalition forces to push Iraq out of Kuwait in 1991, but the kingdom refused to take part in the 2003 war to oust the regime of Saddam Hussein without full UN backing. |
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