“… Turmoil in China… combined with speculation about U.S. forces departures from the Philippines, have merged to Cause a new appreciation for U.S. regional security presence….. I believe there is a growing realization in the Pacific that U.S. presence cannot be taken for granted. If the U.S. presence is substantially reduced, many Pacific nations perceive the danger of other nations moving into the vacuum created by our departure, with a potential result of conflict and instability.”

Admiral Huntington Hardisty, U.S. Navy, Commander in Chief, U.S. Pacific Command, from Asia-Pacific Defense. Forum, U.S. Pacific Command, winter 1989-1990

MELEE MARS INAUGURATION OF AUTONOMY IN SOUTHERN PHILIPPINES

COTABATO (NOV 6) REUTER — Police punched and clubbed 17 Moslem students before dragging them off by their hair on Tuesday after they disrupted President Corazon Aquino’s inauguration of an autonomous government in the southern Philippines, witnesses said.

The students, members of an organization supporting Moslem rebels demanding a separate state on Mindanao island, chanted slogans against the autonomous government about 20 meters from where Aquino was speaking.

Manila has set up the autonomous government, dominated by Moslems, as a way to end separatist violence on Mindanao, the second-largest island in the Philippines.

The government, headed by former Moslem rebel commander Zacaria Candao, can pass its own laws, collect taxes and license fees, and set up a regional police force in the four predominantly Moslem provinces on Mindanao island it controls.

Manila would retain control of defense and foreign policy. — from U.S. Naval Institute Military Database Defense News.

AIR FORCE TO CREATE TWO NEW COMPOSITE AIR WINGS BY 1993

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Air Force will develop by 1993 two composite tactical air wings that combine different types of aircraft in the same unit. The new wings will serve as prototypes for the possible reorganization of the service’s tactical force structure along more mission-oriented lines… [The composite air wings] would include aircraft that could perform attack, defensive, standoff jamming, and precision- strike missions. — from Aviation Week and Space

Technology magazine, p.26

Author Note

Although the B-1B bomber is now officially called “Lancer,” the author will still use “Excalibur.”