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Military's Global Expansion Greatest in U.S. History
Wednesday, January 16, 2002
By Sally Buzbee
Associated Press Writer

Uzbekistan, for example, is skittish that its role could anger Islamic hard-liners and thus has pressed U.S. officials to restrict news coverage. Rumsfeld and his spokeswoman, Victoria Clarke, have said that is a fair deal, in return for base access.

WASHINGTON -- AP
The United States is rapidly increasing its military ties with nations large and small, thanks to the war on terrorism.

That means more U.S. soldiers will be spread around the globe in coming years, despite President Bush's warning during his election campaign that the military was stretched thin, with too many overseas deployments.

Already, American special forces train armies across Africa. The Pentagon fights war games in the Middle East. U.S. soldiers engage in scores of joint training exercises from South America to Southeast Asia.

Even before Sept. 11, the military had a presence in 140 countries worldwide.

Now it is busy expanding -- or considering expansion -- not just in Afghanistan, where the war against accused terror mastermind Osama bin Laden is taking place, and neighboring Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan, but in a slew of countries beyond: Armenia and Azerbaijan in Central Asia to Somalia in East Africa to the Philippines and Indonesia in Southwest Asia.
(More: The Worldlink News Source)
2002 © The Associated Press.

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