The U.S. Army on Sept. 12 sent 130 paratroopers and portions of three Army units, along with a M142 mobile artillery rocket system to Shemya Island, a small island in the western Aleutians, as a show of force after several Russian and Chinese military jets patrolled the area.
Shemya is about 1,200 miles southwest of Anchorage and is one of the farthest west islands in the Aleutian chain; it is on HDT — Hawaii-Aleutian Daylight Time. The windswept tundra island is 2.73 miles long and 4.32 miles wide. A U.S. Air force radar, surveillant, weather station, and 10,000-foot runway opened on Shemya during World War II and is still in operation as Eareckson Air Station, mostly as a refueling stopover for the military. In 2018 a Delta Airlines flight made an emergency landing there en route from Beijing to Seattle after encountering mechanical troubles.
Troops with the 11th Airborne Division and the 1st and 3rd Multi Domain Task Forces, were deployed to Shemya Island during this September military activity after increased presence of Chinese and Russian war ships over the summer.
“As the number of adversarial exercises increases around Alaska and throughout the region, including June’s joint Russian-Chinese bomber patrol, the operation to Shemya Island demonstrates the division’s ability to respond to events in the Indo-Pacific or across the globe, with a ready, lethal force within hours,” said Maj. Gen. Joseph Hilbert, commanding general of the 11th Airborne Division.
The division, stationed at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson and Fort Wainwright, defends the northern- and western-most reaches of the U.S., as well as the Arctic.
In addition, the 11th Airborne Division is also assigned to U.S. INDOPACIFIC Command, the Department of Defense’s priority theater and an area representing more than 50% of the world’s population.
“Testing ourselves with this operation and others like it is critical to our nation’s defense and the preservation of a free and open Indo-Pacific,” said Hilbert. “Our ability to deploy combat-credible forces quickly and effectively to any location, no matter how remote, is critical to supporting the nation and our strong relationships with allies and partner nations.”
I spent a month on Shemya one weekend in 1996. The wind never stops. The place defines the word desolate. On the other hand critically important to our defense. Just would not want a station assignment there.
It is not for everybody, that’s for sure. – sd