In 2008, under the government of Manuel Zelaya Rosales, Honduras asked the United States for military aid to include 4 Maule MXT-7-180 aircraft with Lycoming O-360-C1F engines. They also asked for replacements for the current AT-27 flight training aircraft.
Somewhere along the line, that request, which was granted, got delayed, and the aircraft were never received.....until now.
The US Southern command has now delivered two batches of two Maule aircraft, painted a fetching yellow, to the Honduran Air Force.
These are relatively slow aircraft (top speed 164 MPH or 256 KMH) that can carry up to six passengers, or equivalent weight in cargo, for up to 1000 miles (1600 km.).
La Tribuna said the Maule Air 7-180s will be used in pilot training, search and rescue, and aerial spying, as well as disaster relief.
This echoes a story from June of 2008, in the Moultrie, Georgia, Observer that quoted Honduran Air Force Colonel Jorge Cabrera saying that while the primary use would be for air force pilot training, they could also serve in search and rescue, surveillance, and reconnaissance. (Moultrie is the location of the Maule Air, Inc., manufacturer of these planes.)
Some Honduran press reports suggest that these small planes will now be used as part of the drug interdiction program in Honduras, though how has not been made clear.
The US Embassy in Honduras made note of the delivery of the Maule aircraft in a press release marking the visit of SOUTHCOM Commander Douglas Fraser.
So what's the explanation for the long delay in turning over the last of the Maule aircraft first requested in 2008?
Some Honduran media mentioned the suspension of military aid that followed the coup of June 2009 as contributing to the delay. Announced September 3, 2009, the suspension of aid came so late that it had no real effect on the political emergency. But that doesn't mean it didn't have substantial effects on specific programs. So we decided to try to follow the money here.
International media attributed the financing for the Maule aircraft just delivered to the Foreign Military Financing Program of the Department of Defense.
According to an October 2011 GAO review, over $6.5 million in Foreign Military Financing Program funds (administered by the Department of State) were suspended in September 2009. Suspended categories of aid were restored after the inauguration of Porfirio Lobo Sosa. A Congressional Budget justification of the USAID budget for Honduras, undated but after the inauguration of Lobo Sosa, projected $1.075 million in 2010 and $1.3 million in 2011 for the Foreign Military Financing Program. (The funding from this program for Honduras is not singled out in the "highlights" sections of the full budget reports, that give the only specificity to the proposed and completed uses of the funds in this program.)
This level of funding is a sharp increase from the total recorded for 2008 under the same program, when $496,000 was expended.
The sometimes unreliable Honduran media, however, gave the source of the funds for the Maule aircraft as a different program, Foreign Military Sales. Honduras received rather less from that program over the period of interest: $292,000 in 2008; $845,000 in 2009; and $117,000 in 2010, the last year for which we found data.
For those of you curious about how many Maule MXT-7-180 planes Honduras could have purchased with funds from either of those programs, we found 2007 models going for just under $160,000. A bargain.
Showing posts with label SouthCom. Show all posts
Showing posts with label SouthCom. Show all posts
Tuesday, December 13, 2011
Monday, November 28, 2011
New US Bases in Honduras
The United States military continues to build bases in Honduras, with the public mission of supporting US drug interdiction missions and oversight of the Caribbean, especially the area from Honduras to the Dominican Republic.
The first of these bases, at Catarasca, in the Mosquitia, opened in April 2010. The US built this base from scratch, providing all the materials, logistics, and construction forces through DOD contracts. One of the DOD contracts that only partially built the base was for $1.9 million:
Now comes word that the visit of the HSV 2 Swift earlier this year brought the materials to build a base on Guanaja, an international tourist destination previously known as a diving mecca for its pristine waters, and a celebrity vacation spot.
Honduras has never had a navy base in the Bay Islands. The Guanaja base, at a cost of $2 million, again built from scratch, contains buildings and a pier built by US Navy personnel, and technology supplied by and installed by the US forces. It will eventually house a Honduran patrol boat, the L. P. Honduras, that was recently retrofitted by the Honduran Navy at a cost of $790,000 after being abandoned for the last 22 years!
The base will also reportedly house both US and Honduran aircraft used for drug interdiction missions. Quotha listed part of the public contract for the base on Guanaja as follows:
So the running total for these two bases is upwards of $3.1 million.
But wait, there's still more.
The USS Oak Hill (LSD-51) is currently docked at Puerto Castillo, nominally so its Marines can hold joint exercises with the Honduran forces. Among the exercises: refurbishing the existing facilities here.
La Tribuna quotes a US Embassy release as saying:
This military aid, the Embassy explains, is coordinated by the US Southern Command. This project is partially built on the following contract:
This contract allows a US presence at the only deep water port in Central America, one the Seabees improved in the 1980s to support the US bases in the Trujillo area (CREM, for example).
La Prensa said that the US Navy had not yet identified a place along the Pacific coast to build a base to support US anti-drug efforts, but this La Tribuna story says that the Swift carried out a similar "training" mission in the Honduran part of the gulf of Fonseca last March. As it happens, there is an abandoned base in the southern Honduran department of Choluteca, the only department in Honduras with coastline on the Pacific, previously upgraded by the US in the 1980s. But it is not clear whether La Tribuna is talking about this former base, or something else.
The 2010-2011 contracts include pier and barrack upgrades at Corinto, Nicaragua, along the Pacific coast, which may be better equipped to support the US Navy.
Add to the bases listed above a multi-million dollar contract to build permanent base housing at Soto Cano airfield in Comayagua, and you have an increasingly permanent US military presence in Honduras, now extending across all of the territory.
The first of these bases, at Catarasca, in the Mosquitia, opened in April 2010. The US built this base from scratch, providing all the materials, logistics, and construction forces through DOD contracts. One of the DOD contracts that only partially built the base was for $1.9 million:
"Caratasca FOL [Forward Operating Location] Facilities", $1.9 million contract W91278-07-D0098 0001, with Eterna S.A., initially to be completed in May 2009, extended to August 2009.
Now comes word that the visit of the HSV 2 Swift earlier this year brought the materials to build a base on Guanaja, an international tourist destination previously known as a diving mecca for its pristine waters, and a celebrity vacation spot.
Honduras has never had a navy base in the Bay Islands. The Guanaja base, at a cost of $2 million, again built from scratch, contains buildings and a pier built by US Navy personnel, and technology supplied by and installed by the US forces. It will eventually house a Honduran patrol boat, the L. P. Honduras, that was recently retrofitted by the Honduran Navy at a cost of $790,000 after being abandoned for the last 22 years!
The base will also reportedly house both US and Honduran aircraft used for drug interdiction missions. Quotha listed part of the public contract for the base on Guanaja as follows:
"Design Build CN [Counternarcotics] Facility", contract signed June 2010 for $1.2 million, funded by SouthCom, for completion by Empresa de Construcción y Transporte Eterna, by September 2011.
So the running total for these two bases is upwards of $3.1 million.
But wait, there's still more.
The USS Oak Hill (LSD-51) is currently docked at Puerto Castillo, nominally so its Marines can hold joint exercises with the Honduran forces. Among the exercises: refurbishing the existing facilities here.
La Tribuna quotes a US Embassy release as saying:
The marines will disembark to work jointly with the Navy of Honduras in infrastructure projects to improve their living quarters, training, and security on the base.They will also share information on maintaining weapons and military procedures, according to news reports.
This military aid, the Embassy explains, is coordinated by the US Southern Command. This project is partially built on the following contract:
Listed as "Puerto Castillas", "Team Room and Range," $350,000 funded by Special Operations Command South, scheduled for July-September 2011.
This contract allows a US presence at the only deep water port in Central America, one the Seabees improved in the 1980s to support the US bases in the Trujillo area (CREM, for example).
La Prensa said that the US Navy had not yet identified a place along the Pacific coast to build a base to support US anti-drug efforts, but this La Tribuna story says that the Swift carried out a similar "training" mission in the Honduran part of the gulf of Fonseca last March. As it happens, there is an abandoned base in the southern Honduran department of Choluteca, the only department in Honduras with coastline on the Pacific, previously upgraded by the US in the 1980s. But it is not clear whether La Tribuna is talking about this former base, or something else.
The 2010-2011 contracts include pier and barrack upgrades at Corinto, Nicaragua, along the Pacific coast, which may be better equipped to support the US Navy.
Add to the bases listed above a multi-million dollar contract to build permanent base housing at Soto Cano airfield in Comayagua, and you have an increasingly permanent US military presence in Honduras, now extending across all of the territory.
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