Military Secures Fuel Tankers for Asia September 17, 2001 11:44 AM ET Email this article Printer friendly version LONDON (Reuters) - The U.S. military has secured two oil tankers it tendered for on Friday to take 235,000 barrels of marine diesel fuel from Kuwait to Diego Garcia, site of a U.S. Air Force base in the Indian Ocean, and from South Korea to Japan, shipbrokers said on Monday.

"Ten ships went in for the U.S. Military Sealift Command's tender for a tanker to take cargo from Kuwait to Diego Garcia, but the Sea Witch 1 got the deal at $620,000 lump sum," said a Norwegian tanker broker. "The Torm Anne got the deal to South Korea at $266,000."

He said that the ships were due to load between September 25 and September 27 and that he was unaware of any further tanker orders by Sealift Command.

Defense analysts said the marine diesel for Diego Garcia could be intended for "mothballed" assault ships that the U.S. keeps there.

Brokers said on Friday that the Sealift Command had also booked another oil tanker, the Cypriot-flagged tanker Presnya, to carry 28,000 tons of aviation fuel from Greece to southern Spain.

Spanish bases were used by the U.S. for air operations during the Gulf War and Balkans crisis, and Spain said last week it would make them available again for U.S. retaliatory strikes following last week's attacks on the New York World Trade Center and the Pentagon.

Shipping sources said that the aviation fuel would be discharged in Spain later this week, and the high price paid to secure the tanker at such short notice, $625,000, suggested it was not a routine cargo.

Military analyst Clifford Beal, editor of Jane's Defense Weekly, cautioned on Friday against interpreting the shipments as signs of imminent retaliation by the U.S.

"They're doing the groundwork for all possible options," he said.

http://www.reuters.com/news_article.jhtml?type=politicsnews&StoryID=225524

-- Martin Thompson (mthom1927@aol.com), September 18, 2001

Answers

I guess the US Merchant Marine is in such a sorry state, the US has to contract foreign flag ships to haul fuel. I hope these crews are sympathetic to the US objectives.

-- David Williams (DAVIDWII@prodigy.net), September 18, 2001.