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Things are going to get even more interesting in Asia...
U.S. orders 24 long-range bombers to Guam
Deployment planned to send message to North Korea
From Barbara Starr
CNN Washington Bureau
Tuesday, March 4, 2003 Posted: 5:28 PM EST (2228 GMT)
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Twenty-four bombers will begin moving from bases in the United States to Guam as part of a planned beefing up of U.S. military forces in the Pacific, the Pentagon said Tuesday. It is not clear how soon they will deploy.
The deployment order for the bombers had long been planned and is not related to the recent intercept of an Air Force reconnaissance plane over the Sea of Japan by four North Korean MiG fighters, officials said.
Twelve B-1 bombers from Ellsworth Air Force Base in South Dakota received deployment orders Saturday, as did 12 B-52 bombers. It was not immediately clear whether the B-52s would come from Minot Air Force Base in North Dakota or Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana.
The move is part of the U.S. Pacific Command's effort to maintain a robust military presence around the Korean Peninsula while forces are built up in the Persian Gulf region. Officials say they intend to send a nonthreatening message to North Korea not to take advantage of the Iraqi situation and assume the U.S. military is distracted.
The Pentagon issued this statement in connection with the deployment:
"As part of our global efforts to address worldwide requirements, we are deploying additional forces to the Western Pacific as U.S. forces are preparing for possible military action elsewhere in the world. These moves are not aggressive in nature. Deploying these additional forces is a prudent measure to bolster our defensive posture and as a deterrent. As the President has said, we are seeking a peaceful, diplomatic resolution of the international community's concerns over North Korea's nuclear weapons program."
The United States said last month that North Korea had reactivated its five-megawatt nuclear reactor, a sign that Pyongyang might be going ahead with its nuclear weapons program.
The plant had been mothballed since 1994. But two months ago, North Korea expelled the U.N. atomic inspectors at the plant and removed U.N. seals on the equipment in preparation for reactivating the reactor.
North Korea for its part has never publicly acknowledged that it has a nuclear weapons program, saying only that it needs to restart its reactors because of an acute energy shortage.
A number of additional Air Force fighters and other aircraft have also been repositioned throughout the Pacific theatre.
The deployment was ordered a month after the commander of U.S. forces in the Pacific, Adm. Tom Fargo, requested additional planes and ships be sent to the region. Pentagon sources said Fargo also proposed sending eight F-15 fighter jets to bases in Japan.
The aircraft carrier USS Kitty Hawk, based at Yokosuka, Japan, has been deployed to the Persian Gulf.
Pentagon officials have said it is "routine" to increase the number of land-based warplanes in Japan whenever the carrier based there is sent out of the region
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