Long BUT Worth Reading........
Guest Column: No Relief in Sight for the Lincoln
By Ed Stanton


It has been three weeks since my ship, the USS Abraham Lincoln,
arrived off the Sumatran coast to aid the hundreds of thousands of victims
of the Dec. 26 tsunami that ravaged their coastline. I'd like to say that
this has been a rewarding experience for us, but it has not: Instead, it has
been a frustrating and needlessly dangerous exercise made even more
difficult by the Indonesian government and a traveling circus of so-called
aid workers who have invaded our spaces.


What really irritated me was a scene I witnessed in the Lincoln's
wardroom a few days a go. I went in for breakfast as I usually do, expecting
to see the usual crowd of ship's company officers in khakis and air wing
aviators in flight suits, drinking coffee and exchanging rumors about when
our ongoing humanitarian mission in Sumatra is going to end.


What I saw instead was a mob of civilians sitting around like they
owned the place. They wore various colored vests with logos on the back
including Save The Children, World Health Organization and the dreaded baby
blue vest of the United Nations. Mixed in with this crowd were a bunch of
reporters, cameramen and Indonesian military officers in uniform. They all
carried cameras, sunglasses and fanny packs like tourists on their way to
Disneyland.


My warship had been transformed into a floating hotel for a bunch of
trifling do-gooders overnight.


As I went through the breakfast line, I overheard one of the U.N.
strap-hangers, a longhaired guy with a beard, make a sarcastic comment to
one of our food servers. He said something along the lines of "Nice china,
really makes me feel special," in reference to the fact that we were eating
off of paper plates that day. It was all I could do to keep from jerking him
off his feet and choking him, because I knew that the reason we were eating
off paper plates was to save dishwashing water so that we would have more
water to send ashore and save lives. That plus the fact that he had no
business being there in the first place.


My attitude towards these unwanted no-loads grew steadily worse that
day as I learned more from one of our junior officers who was assigned to
escort a group of them. It turns out that they had come to Indonesia to "ass
ess the damage" from the Dec. 26 tsunami.


Well, they could have turned on any TV in the world and seen that the
damage was total devastation. When they got to Sumatra with no plan, no
logistics support and no five-star hotels to stay in, they threw themselves
on the mercy of the U.S. Navy, which, unfortunately, took them in. I guess
our senior brass w as hoping for some good PR since this was about the time
that the U.N. was calling the United States "stingy" with our relief
donations.


As a result of having to host these people, our severely over-tasked
SH-60 Seahawk helos, which were carrying tons of food and water every day to
the most inaccessible places in and around Banda Aceh, are now used in great
part to ferry these "relief workers" from place to place every day and bring
them back to their guest bedrooms on the Lincoln at night. Despite their
avowed dedication to helping the victims, these relief workers will not
spend the night in-country, and have made us their guardians by default.


When our wardroom treasurer approached the leader of the relief group
and asked him who was paying the mess bill for all the meals they ate, the
fellow replied, "We aren't paying, you can try to bill the U.N. if you want
to."


In addition to the relief workers, we routinely get tasked with
hauling around reporters and various low-level "VIPs," which further wastes
valuable helo lift that could be used to carry supplies. We had to dedicate
two helos and a C-2 cargo plane for America-hater Dan Rather and his
entourage of door holders and briefcase carriers from CBS News. Another
camera crew was from MTV. I doubt if we'll get any good PR from them, since
the cable channel is banned in Muslim countries. We also had to dedicate a
helo and crew to fly around the vice mayor of Phoenix, Ariz., one day.
Everyone wants in on the action.


As for the Indonesian officers, while their job is apparently to
encourage our leaving as soon as possible, all they seem to do in the
meantime is smoke cigarettes. They want our money and our help but they
don't want their population to see that Americans are doing far more for
them in two weeks than their own government has ever done or will ever do
for them.


To add a kick in the face to the USA and the Lincoln, the Indonesian
government announced it would not allow us to use their airspace for routine
training and flight proficiency operations while we are saving the lives of
their people, some of whom are wearing Osama bin Ladin T-shirts as they grab
at our food and water. The ship has to steam out into international waters
to launch and recover jets, which makes our helos have to fly longer
distances and burn more fuel.


What is even worse than trying to help people who totally reject
everything we stand for is that our combat readiness has suffered for it.


An aircraft carrier is an instrument of national policy and the big
stick she carries is her air wing. An air wing has a set of very demanding
skills and they are highly perishable. We train hard every day at sea to
conduct actual air strikes, air defense, maritime surveillance, close air
support and many other missions - not to mention taking off and landing on a
ship at sea.


Our safety regulations state that if a pilot does not get a night
carrier landing every seven days, he has to be re-qualified to land on the
ship. Today we have pilots who have now been over 25 days without a trap due
to being unable to use Indonesian airspace to train. Normally it is when we
are at sea that our readiness is at its very peak. Thanks to the Indonesian
government, we have to waive our own safety rules just to get our pilots off
the deck.


In other words, the longer we stay here helping these people, the more
dangerous it gets for us to operate. We have already lost one helicopter,
which crashed in Banda Aceh while taking sailors ashore to unload supplies
from the C-130s. There were no relief workers on that one.


I'm all for helping the less fortunate, but it is time to give this
mission to somebody other than the U.S. Navy. Our ship was supposed to be
home on Feb. 3 and now we have no idea how long we will be here. American
taxpayers are spending millions per day to keep this ship at sea and getting
no training value out of it. As a result, we will come home in a lower state
of readiness than when we left due to the lack of flying while supporting
the tsunami relief effort.


I hope we get some good PR in the Muslim world out of it. After all,
this is Americans saving the lives of Muslims. I have my doubts.


Ed Stanton is the pen name of a career U.S. Navy officer currently
serving with the USS Abraham Lincoln carrier strike group.