The Vermont Air National Guard is deploying to a military base in Puerto Rico, and some members have already departed for the American territory, Seven Days has confirmed.
A close family member of a Chittenden County Guard member said the air wing was notified last weekend that members were being deployed to the Roosevelt Roads Naval Station, a facility that closed in 2004 but reopened last month.
Advance teams from Vermont are already on the ground there preparing for the arrival of the bulk of the 158th Fighter Wing next week, including most of its 20 F-35 fighter jets, the family member said.
“Puerto Rico is definitely, 100 percent where they are going. I’m just not supposed to say,” the person said.
Seven Days is granting the person anonymity to discuss deployment details that have not yet been made public. Guard officials confirmed on Tuesday, December 9, that the Wing had been “federally mobilized” but provided no other information.
National Guard troops serve under the command of governors unless they are called upon by the Pentagon to deploy under federal military commanders, which happens often for the Vermont National Guard. The guard’s adjutant general, Greg Knight, is currently in Austria.
Gov. Phil Scott has said he has no additional information about the deployment and referred questions to the Pentagon.
U.S Sen. Peter Welch (D-Vt.), however, told Seven Days that he was proud of the state’s airmen and acknowledged the difficulty they have leaving families in the holiday season.
“At the same time, I strongly oppose President Trump’s mobilization of the Vermont Air National Guard alongside thousands of other U.S. military units in what appears to be a relentless march to war,” the senator said in an emailed statement. “An undeclared war against the Venezuelan regime would be illegal under our Constitution. If this president — or any president — wants to start a war with Venezuela, which has not attacked us and is not a source of the fentanyl that is killing Americans, then he needs to seek authorization from Congress, as the authors of the Constitution intended.”
The family member told Seven Days on Friday that the entire 1,000-person strong wing was informed of the deployment last weekend, but that some Guard members were staying back to maintain operations at the South Burlington base.
Lt. Col. Meghan Smith, a Guard spokesperson, said Friday that she had no additional information to share about the destination, length or numbers of airmen involved in the deployment but expected to be able to do so eventually.
Members were informed they should expect to be gone for at least 100 days, though such assurances don’t mean much, the person said.
The deployment location aligns with a story by the War Zone , an online military news site, which reported on Thursday that an anonymous U.S. official had confirmed the Vermont air wing was taking part in what is being called Operation Southern Spear.
That’s the name the Pentagon gave the monthslong military buildup in the Caribbean to counter narcotic trafficking and pressure Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro.
The information also aligns with recent military air traffic between Vermont and Puerto Rico. The website Flightradar24 showed that a C-17A Globemaster III, one of the nation’s largest military transport aircraft, left the eastern Puerto Rican city of Ceiba, where the Roosevelt Roads Naval Station is located, at 8:51 a.m. on Friday and landed in Vermont at 11:55 a.m., according to the site.
Because the military station had been closed for more than 20 years, the airmen have been told to expect to be sleeping in tents for the duration of their deployment, the family member said.
Got something to say?
Send a letter to the editor and we'll publish your feedback in print!