C-130 Aircraft to Transport Tons of Presents

The holiday season is here. In Guam, volunteers from Andersen Air Force base and the local community have been busy preparing for the Operation Christmas Drop ceremony on December 15, 2009. They will be loading more than 50 boxes onto a C-130 aircraft, to send to more than 30,000 islanders residing on the smaller islands of Chuuk, Palau, Yap, Marshall Islands, and Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands.

Partnership is very important: through military and local community support, the OCD organization was able to collect tens of thousands of donated items and raise over $10,000 through donations and fundraising efforts. It's always amazing to see the big impact that people can make especially when they all work together towards a common goal--even the smallest efforts can go a long, long way!

According to Capt. Charles Schulz, 734th Air Mobility Command maintenance officer, "Each individual should take pride in knowing they helped as many people as they did."

This season, stop and take a look at what's been keeping you busy. How do you plan to help your local community to spread the holiday cheer? We'd love to hear your thoughts!

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APCSS Builds Regional Partnerships, Networks through Alumni

An outreach team from the Hawaii-based Asia-Pacific Center for Security Studies (APCSS) is in the midst of a regional trip, taking them to Japan, Brunei, and Malaysia to discuss issues of mutual concern, such as disaster management, and to strengthen ties with alumni.

The APCSS alumni, with chapters in various nations throughout the Asia-Pacific region, serve as the hub of a network of military and civilian professionals within various sectors associated with security.

These informal groups of alumni often provide a venue for professional development, as was the case, for instance, in Brunei during this current trip. There, Professor Herman “Butch” Finley, in collaboration with Brunei’s National Disaster Management Centre, had an opportunity to share his perspective on disaster management with local leaders, highlighting issues such as the importance of local communities’ involvement in disaster management.

As explained in a Brunei Times article, the event was also intended to strengthen ties between APCSS alumni by providing a venue to discuss their work professionally, as well as generate new partnerships and discussions in the area of humanitarian assistance and disaster relief – an APCSS objective for the trip.

While in Japan the team, made up of one professor and two alumni division representatives, met with alumni and also visited the Ministry of Defense to help promote participation in APCSS programs. Additonally, Professor Finley had an opportunity to discuss disaster management issues with Japan Self-Defence Forces officers.

The three-person APCSS team is currently wrapping up its outreach in Malaysia.

APCSS is a U.S. Department of Defense academic institute that addresses regional and global security issues, inviting military and civilian representatives of the U.S. and Asia-Pacific nations to its comprehensive program of executive education and conferences, both in Hawaii and throughout the Asia-Pacific region.

The Center supports PACOM's objective of developing professional and personal ties among national security establishments throughout the region.

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PACOM Commander: Strengthening U.S.-Japan Alliance is a Focus

The following was written by Capt. Lydia Robertson, PACOM’s chief of public affairs, who is travelling with Adm. Willard as he meets with senior military officials to discuss views on regional security and ways to further cooperation and partnership.

The Japan and United States alliance is a cornerstone to security in East Asia, and strengthening relationships in support of that alliance is a focus of Adm. Robert Willard, PACOM’s commander.

Earlier this week, on the first stop of one of his first regional trips as PACOM commander, Adm. Willard met with several counterparts in the Japan Self Defense Forces as well as government officials, reinforcing the commitment of the United States – and Pacific Command – to a continuing U.S. presence in the region.

“We consider ourselves to be an Asian nation in our own right with vast interests here and some very close alliances and strategic partnerships out here, and we look forward to strengthening those relationships over time,” Willard said, emphasizing he would seize opportunities to strengthen the alliance.

As the 50th anniversary of the alliance nears, Willard noted the importance of understanding how far the relationship has developed but also his role in strengthening the alliance.

“There are many ways to think about that when you consider this region of the world and the trends that are ongoing in the Asia-Pacific region: more multilateral engagement among countries and among militaries than bilateral, the teaming associated with areas of common interest, such as proliferation, terrorism, piracy, other illicit areas like counter-narcotics and so forth, search and rescue, disaster relief, humanitarian assistance on the other side,” Willard said. “These are things that can be done in partnership with other nations, not necessarily alone or just in bilateral arrangements.”

The capabilities of the Japanese and U.S. militaries are significant and overall coordination between the two continues to evolve through continued exercises together.

“Every exercise is intended to be more joint. Every exercise that we conduct in coordination with one another is intended to test interoperability and overall coordination,” Willard said. “We have to constantly practice, constantly review concepts of operations, constantly exercise to get better in order to advance those capabilities. So I think that the synergy that can be gained through joint operations, the operations between Japan’s Self Defense Forces and United States forces, will only improve over time.”

In response to questions about the U.S. relationship with China, the admiral said managing the relationship will include enhanced military to military dialogue and other engagements. “We bear a responsibility to effectively engage with the Chinese and to understand one another better,” Willard said.

In a media roundtable with Japanese reporters at the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo, Adm. Willard discussed many issues, including working group efforts to advance the realignment initiative, the importance of the deterrent role of forward-deployed U.S. forces, and other topics.

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