Military forces on America’s westernmost territory are preparing to defend against a possible ballistic missile assault from regional rival China.
The Vertical Launch System is a launching system for the Standard Missile, defensive interceptor missiles capable of destroying threat missiles or warheads in flight. They are also part of the proposed Enhanced Integrated Air and Missile Defense (EIAMD) System on Guam.
“A visit [by Navy Undersecretary Tom Mancinelli] provided insights into the site’s role in protecting Guam and the Indo-Pacific region from ballistic missile threats, underscoring the importance of the MK-41 system in regional defense operations,” the Navy said in a news release.
Recently, Chinese President Xi Jinping inspected a Dongfeng-26 (DF-26) missile brigade under the nuclear-armed Rocket Force of the Chinese military. The Rocket Force manages the country’s land-based nuclear and conventional missile units.
The Chinese Defense Ministry said in 2018 that the DF-26 was capable of conducting rapid nuclear counterstrikes and conventional precision strikes from medium and long ranges. It can also attack land-based targets and medium- and large-size ships at sea.
The U.S. military considered the DF-26 an intermediate-range ballistic missile, which puts Guam, home to American Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps bases, within its range. The straight-line distance between the island and the Chinese coast is a little more than 1,800 miles.
Guam’s Strategic Importance
America took control of this island after the brief and one-sided Spanish-American War of 1899 when the United States grabbed most of what was left of the decaying Spanish empire. The Americans quickly recognized the island’s strategic importance.
Several decades later, in the late 1930s, American planners envisioned Guam and its harbor facilities as an important World War II staging area. Those plans were dashed when the Japanese invaded in December 1941. After two days of aerial bombardment, the American governor quickly surrendered.
Two years later, when the tide of battle had turned in the Pacific, the Americans made plans to reoccupy the island and use it as a long-range bomber base. In the ensuing battle, the Japanese sustained some 20,000 casualties, mostly KIAs. Historians believe that some Japanese soldiers got drunk on sake and charged fortified Marine positions armed only with Samurai swords.
About 25 years thereafter, Guam played a significant role in the Vietnam War, serving as a refugee processing point and a location for military operations.
As the fighting raged in Southeast Asia, Guam was home to a large U.S. military presence, including Andersen Air Force Base and Naval Base Guam.
Andersen Air Force Base launched 27 B-52 bombers on June 18, 1965, marking the beginning of Operation Arc Light, which bombed VietCong bases, supply lines, and troop concentrations. The naval base was an important safe harbor for U.S. ships in need of repair and for U.S. sailors who needed a few days off in a quiet place.
Moreover, the poisonous herbicide Agent Orange, which was widely used in Vietnam, was also used and stored in Guam and American Samoa.
Later, during Operation New Life, Guam temporarily housed over 110,000 Vietnamese refugees who were evacuated from Saigon in the final days of the war. The U.S. government transported the refugees to Guam by ship and aircraft and then moved them to the United States for permanent resettlement. Guam is known as the “Ellis Island of the Pacific” because of this operation.
The third chapter in this saga has yet to be written. Many observers believe that a U.S. war with China is inevitable, as the neighborhood bully threatens close allies South Korea and Japan. 380
Contractor Duties on Guam
In support of these strategic efforts, private military contractors on this Pacific island serve in three primary capacities.
B-52s need runways and hangars, refugees need housing, ships need harbor facilities, and the list goes on. Private military contractors usually address these needs, mostly because of financial flexibility. Private contractors are like office temps. Contractors move in, complete a project, and move on.
Sometimes, the contractor’s commitment is longer-term. These facilities need constant maintenance, as do advanced weapons systems, like ballistic missile defense arrays. The Marines could assign regular servicemembers to these tasks, but that assignment drains precious staffing away from other efforts.
Private military contractors are an excellent alternative, not only because of the aforementioned financial flexibility but also because contractors often blend in better than regular servicemembers. More on that below.
People need maintenance, too. This maintenance includes guarding sensitive facilities, keeping troop morale high, and bridging the distance between military and civilians.
In terms of security, Guam is pretty quiet. But one person with a roadside bomb or a laptop computer can do lots of damage. Contactors guard physical facilities and virtual infrastructure. The mere presence of a guard is often enough to deter wrongdoers.
Guam is almost literally a thousand miles from nowhere. Loneliness and isolation were a big problem among the first private contractors who worked on this island in the 1930s, building facilities for Pan Am Airlines and laying underwater communication cables. Highly-trained contractors know how to use corny events, like theme days and movie nights, to keep morale high among regular servicemembers and fellow contractors.
Contractors are a cultural bridge as well. Many of the indigenous people of Guam have never been too happy about the American occupation. These disgruntled people do not see contractors as part of an invading army. Instead, they usually view contractors as people who are there for employment purposes.
Injury Compensation Available
Continuing a familiar theme, the injury compensation process is usually a three-step process for a Defense Base Act lawyer.
The DBA is a 1941 law that pays benefits, mostly lost wage replacement and medical bill payment, to injured overseas contractors. That injury could be a trauma injury, like a fall, or an occupational disease, like Agent Orange exposure illness.
Step one is filing the claim. Most DBA insurance companies have very specific rules. A violation usually means a Claims Examiner denies the claim at the next stage. Furthermore, the deadlines for trauma injury and occupational disease claims are different. Only an experienced DBA lawyer is familiar with these different timetables.
Step two is a settlement conference. A mediator meets with both sides and, based on the evidence available at the time, tries to engineer a settlement. This attempt usually fails, mostly because such limited evidence is available at this time. This proof is usually limited to medical bills, and it is very difficult to determine the reasonableness of these expenses, as well as a reasonable amount of lost wage replacement.
An Administrative Law Judge typically resolves these issues during step three. During a full hearing, a lawyer makes legal arguments, introduces new evidence, and challenges existing evidence. As more evidence becomes available, and the possibility of a defeat looms for the insurance company, most claims settle out of court between step two and step three.
For more information about DBA benefits, contact Barnett, Lerner, Karsen, Frankel & Castro, P.A.