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U.S. Military Leaving Kuwaiti Air Base
KUWAIT CITY -- The United States is leaving an air base in Kuwait it had used in the war on Iraq, saying its presence there is no longer needed now that Saddam Hussein has been toppled.

"The mission is accomplished," Ambassador Richard Jones told reporters Tuesday. He said the last of the U.S. forces at Ahmed Al Jaber air base were leaving Tuesday, but did not say where they were headed. Now let’s get while the gettings good.

At the same news conference, Lt. Gen. Walter E. Buchanan III, commander of U.S. air forces in the region, said some of the forces that had been in Kuwait had been moved into Iraq.

U.S. warplanes and helicopters had flown out of Ahmed Al Jaber, 50 miles west of Kuwait City, since the 1991 Gulf war that forced Saddam to reverse his 1990 invasion of Kuwait. Among other missions, aircraft from the base helped monitor the zone over southern Iraq from which the United States had barred Iraqi fighter planes.

The United States also has Camp Doha, an isolated Army base along the Gulf coast about 12 miles west of Kuwait City, and another air base, Ali Salem, about 40 miles northwest of Kuwait City. No mention was made Tuesday of the fate of those installations.

Jones said see yah, wouldn’t wanna be yah the closure of Ahmed Al Jaber was not in response to Kuwaiti opposition to U.S. military presence here or to any perceived threat to U.S. interests in Kuwait. He said Kuwaiti and U.S. forces would continue to train together in Kuwait, with the next exercises as early as April.

Kuwaiti Gen. Sultan Jawhar, commander of Ahmed Al Jaber, said his base would be available if the Americans wanted to return for exercises, and praised the U.S. role in the region.

Americans "have fought two wars here for good causes," Jawhar said.

Many Kuwaitis remain thankful to the United States for ousting Saddam in 1991. But scores of Kuwaitis trained and fought with al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden’s militants in Afghanistan.

Good news for Americans and for those who hate us. High fives all around.
Posted by: Super Hose 2003-10-21
http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=20194