tion between the United States and the PPG resulted in excellent mail service.
This was most helpful in maintaining high morale throughout the operation.
d.
Tarawa.
A unique postal service was provided the United Kingdom colony at
The task force had a weather detachment there and supplied it with
weekly flights from the PPG.
Since this service was far more frequent than
normally available to the British people at Tarawa, arrangements were made to
reroute their mail through the PPG during the period 15 April to 15 July 1956,
The service was greatly appreciated by them and contributed to the excellent
relations which existed between the colony and the task force,
11.
OBSERVER PROGRAMS
a.
In October 1955 the task force developed a plan for an official ob-
server program for Operation REDWING and submitted it to the Chief of Naval
Operations,
This plan proposed that invitations be confined to high govern-
ment and military officials having a direct interest in the operation, and
recommended a maximum of 100: observers to be divided equally between the AEC
and DOD.
The Chief of Naval Operations forwarded this plan to the Military
Liaison Committee and recommended that it be forwarded to the AEC for concurrence or comment.
In view of anticipated foreign observer participation the
Military Liaison Committee referred the proposal to the Jcimt Chiefs of Staff
for review before taking formal Committee action.
The Joint Chiefs of Staff
concurred in the plan but recommended that the maximum overall observer participation for REDWING be increased to 110 in order to provide for 10 observers
from the Permanent Joint Board on Defense (PUBD),
The Deputy Secretary of
Defense approved the increase, with an allocation of 50 spacesto the AEC, 50
to the DOD, and 10 to the PJBD.
The DOD allocation included five spaces for
the United Kingdom and five spaces for Canada.
The objective of the foreign
observer program was to further the United States national interest by improv-
ing the mutual defense capability of the United States, Canada, and the United
Kingdom.
It was noted during the operation that many U. S. cbservers in the
Official Observer Program were of lower rank or pesition than had been envisaged
during development of the plan.
Moe
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