In January of 1971 Seabees of NMCB 40’s advance party waded ashore at the remote atoll of Diego Garcia in the middle of the Indian Ocean. The Seabees were there to begin the highly-significant undertaking of building a Navy Communications Station and enough runway by July 19,1971 to land a C-130 Hercules. Up to this time, Diego Garcia had been a relatively unknown tropical atoll whose only industry was copra. Seabee Battalions including Naval Mobile Construction Battalions 1, 5, 10, 40, 62, 71, 133, Amphibious Construction Battalion 2, Seabee Detachments and Seabee Details continued to rotate through Diego Garcia through the 70s and into the 80s building the base. However enough was built of the of the Naval Communications Station, Diego Garcia, for a commissioning, which was conducted two years later in March of 1973. Naval Support Facility Diego Garcia, was commissioned and established as the senior United States Navy command on the island on 1 October 1977. Eventually enough coral runway was built to land something bigger then a C-130 Hercules, that in 1981, the Naval Air Facility Diego Garcia was commissioned. It was decommissioned in 1987 and its responsibilities returned to the Naval Support Facility Diego Garcia. In 1982, construction activities were transferred from the Seabees to a consortium of civilian contractors, Raymond International, and Brown and Root and Molem, a joint venture, whom wanted apiece of the action also.
In 1980, the United States Navy established the Near-Term Prepositioned Force of 16 ships. Then NTPF became the Afloat Prepositioning Force (AFP) and eventually Maritime Prepositioning Ship Squadron Two (MPSRON 2) consisting of 20 deep-water pre-positioned logistics ships anchored in the lagoon.
On 26 March 1982, five women were assigned to the Naval Support Facility Diego Garcia. Prior to this assignment, no women had lived on the island since those on the plantation in 1971.
In 1985; the new port facilities were completed and the USS Saratoga (CV-60) was the first aircraft carrier to tie up. The USS Saratoga was docked at the island when it was called away to respond to threats by Lybian Leader Momar Kadaffi and the "Line of Death" in the Gulf of Sidra (also known as the Gulf of Sirte). The carrier left its port while many of its 4500 sailors were still on the island, which subsequently had to be airlifted via helicopter as the ship made its way to the Mediterranean. The Saratoga spearheaded the assault on the African Nation.
The Strategic Air Command began deploying Boeing B-52 Stratofortress bombers and aerial refueling aircraft to the newly completed airfield facilities in 1987.
Following the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in August 1990, three ships of COMPSRON 2 sortied, delivering a Marine Expeditionary Brigade to Saudi Arabia for participation in the Gulf War. Other COMPSRON 2 ships offloaded the ammunition and fuel on Diego Garcia that were required for the American bomber fleet that deployed to the airfield. Subsequently, B-52G bombers flew more than 200 17-hour bombing missions over 44 days and dropped more than 800,000 short tons of bombs on Iraqi forces in Iraq and Kuwait. One of the B-52s crashed from mechanical failures just north of the island with the loss of three of its six-man crew.
Beginning on 7 October 2001, the United States again commenced military operations from Diego Garcia using B-1, B-2, and B-52 bombers to attack enemy targets in Afghanistan following the attacks on New York City and the Pentagon. On 12 December 2001, a B-1 bomber was lost to mechanical failures just after takeoff from the island, but the crew survived and was rescued by the USS Russell (DDG-59). Four B-2 Shelter System Extra Large Deployable Aircraft Hangar Systems were erected at Diego Garcia to support the bombers' operations. Combat operations resumed in the spring of 2003, with MPSRON 2 sortieing to the Persian Gulf for the Iraq War, and bombing operations began again, this time against Iraq. Bomber operations ceased from Diego Garcia on 15 August 2006.
However from 1971 on through the 70s, life on Diego was more similar to a penal colony then today's vacation resort. The newbs talk centered about partying every night and the daytime heat. Many of the Seabees just out of high school - becoming young men from their life and death adventures on Diego. At that time they all hated the place, but I believe it changed all of them, most guys off of Diego Garcia could handle most anything thrown at them on Adak.
The few things the guys talked about - was long hard hours in the sun during the day and then the last evening's party - which was just about every night. Drugs and booze were cheap and available. Stationed on any other Seabee base, if a Seabee got caught with just a joint more then once, and they got kicked out of the Seabees and sent to the fleet. To this very day I still cannot believe the Federal Government and US Navy turned a blind eye to the drugs and booze, then sent everyone to Bangkok for R&R. Some said they thought it was part of a government experiment studying how young men can survive addictions and sexual diseases.
Luckily they survived - I hope all my fellow SeaBees are as lucky. What's more surprising is that everyone I knew from back in the day in the Seabees is still alive, with the exception of one, and he'd probably still be alive, if he learned to stop partying.
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