US troops due here tomorrow

The first big batch of American soldiers who will participate in a joint Phi-lippine-American military exercise this month is expected to arrive tomorrow through the Villamor Air Base in Pasay City.

US Army Maj. Ann Freed, spokesman for the exercise called "Balikatan 2000," said the contingent of 50 troopers from the Alaska Command will plane in at around noon.

Freed said the unit will include engineers who will erect two school buildings and build artesian wells under the civic action aspect of the exercise.

"This is the first biggest batch, but they are coming in several increments," Freed said, adding that some troops came in earlier aboard commercial flights in groups of five to 20.

Balikatan 2000, the first large-scale joint military exercise since 1995, will be held at the former American military bases in Clark Field in Pampanga and Subic Bay in Zambales, the Manila Bay, Fort Magsaysay in Nueva Ecija and in Cavite, Pampanga and Palawan.

A total of 2,500 American soldiers will take part in the war games. They were chosen from various American military installations in Alaska, Guam, Hawaii, Japan and the US mainland.

Capt. Erwin Rommel Lamzon of the Armed Forces of the Philippines' Public Information Office said some 85 US military officers who participated in the joint pre-exercises and planning seminars in Manila and Clark Field in Pampanga left last Feb. 7 aboard commercial flights.

Freed also disclosed that the US ship Ft. McHenry will arrive on Feb. 21 with some1,000 Marines from Japan.

"There will be no more than 1,000 (American) troops on Philippine soil at any one time," Freed clarified.

The exercise, made possible with the Senate approval of the controversial Visiting Forces Agreement between the Philippines and the US in May last year, officially opened last Jan. 28 and will end on March 3. It covers live-fire exercises and amphibious landings.