Indonesia and U.S. Militaries Cooperate on TNI
Deployment to Lebanon

November 3, 2006

  bahasa Indonesia

Indonesia is sending peacekeeping troops to Lebanon, and the U.S. is assisting with the transportation. This cooperation represents another example of renewed military-to-military cooperation between the two countries.

About 200 pieces of TNI equipment, painted bright white with U.N. markings, are being loaded aboard SS Wilson, a U.S.-flagged ship hired for the mission by the U.S. Navy's Military Sealift Command (MSC). Later this month, 850 of Indonesia's Garuda XXIIIA Troop unit will fly to Lebanon to meet up with their equipment and join the United Nation's Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL). Indonesia will join 20 other nations comprising UNIFIL.

Armored personnel carriers, as well as five-ton trucks, trailers, patrol vehicles, ambulances, construction equipment, water tanks, and shipping containers containing various supplies are being loaded aboard Wilson in around-the-clock cargo operations.

Personnel from the U.S. Army's Surface Deployment and Distribution Command (SDDC) performed the advance planning with the Indonesian Military. SDDC Commander Lt. Col. Colice Powell said: "We've been working with the Indonesian military for several weeks to coordinate the arrival of equipment at the port as well as to develop a plan to load it aboard the vessel."

The ship arrived in the early hours of Nov. 2, and shipboard cranes began hoisting equipment aboard the same day. Wilson is a break-bulk vessel belonging to Sealift, Inc. of Long Island, New York. The ship is solely for U.S. Government use, and most recently delivered grain to Mombasa, Kenya for the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID).

The 185 meter, 32,000-ton Wilson will make the 5,690 mile journey to Beirut. The Army, Navy, and Air Force team all come from elements of the U.S. Transportation Command (USTRANSCOM).

For more information, refer to the Command's website at www.transcom.mil

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