Military Contingencies and Humanitarian Assistance


As the Cold War waned, the Corps became involved in a number of military contingencies and humanitarian assistance operations. The Corps' Mobile District supported efforts to restore democracy to Panama in Operation Just Cause. In 1990 and 1991, the Corps' Middle East/Africa Projects Office (later called the Transatlantic Programs Center) executed design, contracting, construction, and real estate services for U.S. forces during the Persian Gulf War. The Corps also played a key role in reconstructing Kuwait after the war ended.

Army engineers developed and managed the Army's Logistical Civil Augmentation Program (LOGCAP), to provide support to U.S. forces during contingencies. Under LOGCAP the Corps awarded a cost-plus-award-fee contract to Brown and Root Services Corporation of Houston, Texas, in August 1992. The contract provided for a broad range of support supply, service, transportation, maintenance, and facilities to U.S. forces. The value of this use of private contractors was evident during Operation Restore Hope, a 1992 United Nations peace keeping operation in Somalia, and in Operation Support Hope, a 1994 U.S. effort to provide humanitarian relief to displaced Rwandans. In the latter effort, Brown and Root constructed much of the water distribution facilities for the U.S. military.

In late 1994 and early 1995, the Corps supported U.S. forces involved in peacekeeping operations in Haiti (Operation Uphold Democracy). Through the LOGCAP contract, the Corps established base camps and provided a full range of logistics and engineering services for U.S. and multinational forces in Haiti. Towards the end of 1995, the Corps used the LOGCAP contract to support U.S. troops in Operation Joint Endeavor, an international peacekeeping mission in Bosnia.

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