Karshi-Khanabad, better known as K2, is an
air base in southeastern
Uzbekistan
Uzbekistan (, ; uz, Ozbekiston, italic=yes / , ; russian: Узбекистан), officially the Republic of Uzbekistan ( uz, Ozbekiston Respublikasi, italic=yes / ; russian: Республика Узбекистан), is a doubly landlocked cou ...
, just east of
Karshi
Qarshi ( uz, Qarshi/Қарши, ; fa, نخشب ''Nakhshab'') is a city in southern Uzbekistan. It is the capital of Qashqadaryo Region. Administratively, Qarshi is a district-level city, that includes the urban-type settlement Qashqadaryo. It ...
. It is home to the 60th Separate Mixed Aviation Brigade of the
Uzbek Air Force.
History
From 1954 to 1981, the 735th Fighter Aviation Regiment of the
Soviet Air Defence Force
The Soviet Air Defence Forces (russian: войска ПВО, ''voyska protivovozdushnoy oborony'', ''voyska PVO'', ''V-PVO'', lit. ''Anti-Air Defence Troops''; and formerly ''protivovozdushnaya oborona strany'', ''PVO strany'', lit. ''Anti-Air De ...
was stationed at the base. It was equipped with
MiG-15 (July 1950 – 1955),
MiG-17 (1955-1969), and then
Sukhoi Su-9 (Fishpot) aircraft (1961-1978).
The regiment replaced the Su-9 in 1978 with the
MiG-23M (Flogger-B).
In 1981 it was renamed the 735th Fighter-Bomber Aviation Regiment, and in 1984 the 735th Bomber Aviation Regiment. Until 1984 the regiment was equipped with the
MiG-23M, and from 1984 to 1992 with the
Su-24. The regiment was under control of the
Soviet Air Forces
The Soviet Air Forces ( rus, Военно-воздушные силы, r=Voyenno-vozdushnyye sily, VVS; literally "Military Air Forces") were one of the air forces of the Soviet Union. The other was the Soviet Air Defence Forces. The Air Forces ...
of the
Turkestan Military District from April 1980 to May 1988, and then under 49th Air Army and
73rd Air Army The 6th Air Army was an air army of the Red Army's Air Force during the Second World War and from 1946-1949.
It was formed twice : in 1942 as part of the Red Army's Air Forces, and redesignated in 1944, and in 1946 and redesignated in 1949.
The 6 ...
.
On 30 June 1992, control of the base passed from the dissolved
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...
to
Uzbekistan
Uzbekistan (, ; uz, Ozbekiston, italic=yes / , ; russian: Узбекистан), officially the Republic of Uzbekistan ( uz, Ozbekiston Respublikasi, italic=yes / ; russian: Республика Узбекистан), is a doubly landlocked cou ...
. From 1992 changes began to affect the regiment before it was merged with other units into the 60th Separate Mixed Aviation Brigade.
Between 2001 and 2005 seven thousand
United States Department of Defense
The United States Department of Defense (DoD, USDOD or DOD) is an executive branch department of the federal government charged with coordinating and supervising all agencies and functions of the government directly related to national secu ...
personnel were assigned to the base,
also known as K2 and "Camp Stronghold Freedom", for support missions against the
Taliban
The Taliban (; ps, طالبان, ṭālibān, lit=students or 'seekers'), which also refers to itself by its state (polity), state name, the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, is a Deobandi Islamic fundamentalism, Islamic fundamentalist, m ...
and
al-Qaeda
Al-Qaeda (; , ) is an Islamic extremism, Islamic extremist organization composed of Salafist jihadists. Its members are mostly composed of Arab, Arabs, but also include other peoples. Al-Qaeda has mounted attacks on civilian and military ta ...
in neighbouring
Afghanistan
Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan,; prs, امارت اسلامی افغانستان is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central Asia and South Asia. Referred to as the Heart of Asia, it is bordere ...
during
Operation Enduring Freedom
Operation Enduring Freedom (OEF) was the official name used synonymously by the U.S. government for both the War in Afghanistan (2001–2014) and the larger-scale Global War on Terrorism. On 7 October 2001, in response to the September 11 at ...
. The
United States Air Force
The United States Air Force (USAF) is the air service branch of the United States Armed Forces, and is one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Originally created on 1 August 1907, as a part of the United States Army Signal ...
used the base for
combat search and rescue
Combat search and rescue (CSAR) are search and rescue operations that are carried out during war that are within or near combat zones.
A CSAR mission may be carried out by a task force of helicopters, ground-attack aircraft, aerial refuelin ...
missions.
The
416th Air Expeditionary Group 416th may refer to:
* 416th Air Expeditionary Operations Group, provisional unit assigned to the United States Air Force Air Mobility Command
* 416th Bombardment Wing, inactive United States Air Force unit
* 416th Engineer Command (TEC), US Army Re ...
was the host unit. The base also contained 1,000
10th Mountain Division
The 10th Mountain Division (Light Infantry) is a light infantry division in the United States Army based at Fort Drum, New York. Formerly designated as a mountain warfare unit, the division was the only one of its size in the US military to re ...
troops to defend Uzbekistan against incursions by the
Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan and other
Islamist militant groups based in Afghanistan.
On 29 July 2005, amid strained relations caused by the
May 2005 unrest in Uzbekistan
On 13 May 2005, protests erupted in Andijan, Uzbekistan. At one point, troops from the Uzbek State Security Service (Uzbekistan), National Security Service (SNB) fired into a crowd of protesters. Estimates of those killed on 13 May range from 187, ...
, the United States was told to vacate the base within six months. It was vacated by the United States in November 2005.
Facilities
The airport resides at an
elevation
The elevation of a geographic location is its height above or below a fixed reference point, most commonly a reference geoid, a mathematical model of the Earth's sea level as an equipotential gravitational surface (see Geodetic datum § Vert ...
of above
mean sea level
There are several kinds of mean in mathematics
Mathematics is an area of knowledge that includes the topics of numbers, formulas and related structures, shapes and the spaces in which they are contained, and quantities and their changes. ...
. It has one
runway
According to the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), a runway is a "defined rectangular area on a land aerodrome prepared for the landing and takeoff of aircraft". Runways may be a man-made surface (often asphalt concrete, as ...
designated 07/25 with a
concrete
Concrete is a composite material composed of fine and coarse aggregate bonded together with a fluid cement (cement paste) that hardens (cures) over time. Concrete is the second-most-used substance in the world after water, and is the most wi ...
surface measuring .
Pollution
In November 2001, the US Army Center for Health Promotion and Preventive Medicine-Europe performed an environmental baseline survey and found widespread
jet fuel
Jet fuel or aviation turbine fuel (ATF, also abbreviated avtur) is a type of aviation fuel designed for use in aircraft powered by gas-turbine engines. It is colorless to straw-colored in appearance. The most commonly used fuels for commercial a ...
plumes, usually 1–3 meters under ground, most likely from a leaking Soviet-era underground fuel distribution system and smaller, localized areas of surface dirt contaminated with
asbestos
Asbestos () is a naturally occurring fibrous silicate mineral. There are six types, all of which are composed of long and thin fibrous crystals, each fibre being composed of many microscopic "fibrils" that can be released into the atmosphere b ...
and low-level radioactive processed
uranium
Uranium is a chemical element with the symbol U and atomic number 92. It is a silvery-grey metal in the actinide series of the periodic table. A uranium atom has 92 protons and 92 electrons, of which 6 are valence electrons. Uranium is weak ...
, both from the destruction of Soviet missiles several years prior.
[ ]
United States Armed Forces
The United States Armed Forces are the military forces of the United States. The armed forces consists of six service branches: the Army, Marine Corps, Navy, Air Force, Space Force, and Coast Guard. The president of the United States is the ...
veterans who served at the base while it was used by the U.S. military described "black goo" oozing out of the soil, appearing to be a mixture of solvents, oils and other chemicals. Noxious vapors were also reported, along with radiation warning signs and a nearby pond that glowed green. Rainwater would reportedly flood tents and appeared contaminated with various chemicals.
According to a 2015 Army study, 61 of the K2 veterans had been diagnosed with
cancer
Cancer is a group of diseases involving abnormal cell growth with the potential to invade or spread to other parts of the body. These contrast with benign tumors, which do not spread. Possible signs and symptoms include a lump, abnormal b ...
or died of the disease, not counting the special operations forces.
The
United States Department of Veteran's Affairs
The United States Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) is a Cabinet-level executive branch department of the federal government charged with providing life-long healthcare services to eligible military veterans at the 170 VA medical centers and ...
and
U.S. Army Public Health Center
The U.S. Army Public Health Center (APHC) is a United States Army element headquartered at Aberdeen Proving Ground, Maryland, United States. As a forward operating agency of the United States Army Medical Command, APHC is responsible for providing ...
had denied that an increased rate of cancers exists or that any contamination at the base posed any serious health problems.
The US military took steps to reduce possible sources of contamination, such as filling trenches with soil to create a cap to hold vapors underground, covering radioactive soil and asbestos,
which were criticized as ineffective by veterans.
On 18 November 2020, the
US House Committee on Oversight and Reform held a hearing on "Karshi-Khanabad: Honoring the Heroes of Camp Stronghold Freedom".
A fact sheet was released detailing the health risks at the camp:
* Petrochemical Contamination and
Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs)
*
Particulate Matter 10 (PM10) and
Tetrachloroethylene
*
Burn Pits
A burn pit is an area of a United States military base in which waste is disposed of by burning.
According to the United States Army field manual, there are four other ways outside of burn pits to dispose of nonhazardous solid waste: incinerators ...
*
Radiation exposure
Radiation is a moving form of energy, classified into ionizing and non-ionizing type. Ionizing radiation is further categorized into electromagnetic radiation (without matter) and particulate radiation (with matter). Electromagnetic radiation con ...
As of the November 2020 hearing, the
Department of Veterans' Affairs
Veterans' affairs is an area of public policy concerned with relations between a government and its communities of military veterans. Some jurisdictions have a designated government agency or department, a Department of Veterans' Affairs, Minist ...
denied that the illnesses suffered by veterans at K2 suffered were service-connected.
See also
*
Karshi Airport
Karshi Airport is an airport in south eastern Uzbekistan, south-west of Karshi.
Airlines and destinations
See also
* Karshi-Khanabad Air Base
* List of the busiest airports in the former USSR
A ''list'' is any set of items in a row. List ...
*
Manas Air Base
Transit Center at Manas (formerly Manas Air Base and unofficially Ganci Air Base) is a former U.S. military installation at Manas International Airport, near Bishkek, the capital of Kyrgyzstan. It was primarily operated by the U.S. Air F ...
,
Kyrgyzstan
Kyrgyzstan,, pronounced or the Kyrgyz Republic, is a landlocked country in Central Asia. Kyrgyzstan is bordered by Kazakhstan to the north, Uzbekistan to the west, Tajikistan to the south, and the People's Republic of China to the east. ...
*
New Great Game
In the late 1990s, some journalists used the expression "The New Great Game" to describe what they proposed was a renewed geopolitical interest in Central Asia based on the mineral wealth of the region.
The name is a reference to the original Gre ...
*
Craig Murray
Craig John Murray (born 17 October 1958) is a Scottish author, human rights campaigner, journalist, and former diplomat for the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office.
Between 2002 and 2004, he was the British ambassador to Uzbekistan during whi ...
*
Islam Karimov
References
External links
Satellite photo with annotationsExplanation of annotations
{{authority control
Military installations of Uzbekistan
Airports in Uzbekistan
Qashqadaryo Region
Military
Soviet Air Force bases
Installations of the United States Air Force
Overseas or abroad military installations