Emergency Deployment Exercise at Ft. Ord Becomes the Real Thing

FT. ORD, Calif. — Ft. Ord was in the midst of an emergency deployment exercise Wednesday when word came that two of its battalions, consisting of about 1,500 soldiers, would be sent to Honduras as a show of force in response to an incursion of Nicaraguan forces.

Spokesman Paul Boyce said that all 11,400 members of the Rapid Deployment Force here participated in the daylong exercise, which involved recalling troops to the base for the checking of weapons, vehicles, identifications and other equipment.

The Rapid Deployment Force is supposed to respond on short notice to assignments throughout the world.

There are 21,000 soldiers at Ft. Ord, about 80 miles south of San Francisco, and 11,400 belong to the 7th Infantry Division Light, which is part of the Rapid Deployment Force.

The troops are expected to leave California sometime this morning, according to the White House. Other details of the troop transfer were not immediately available. Other units are going to Honduras from Ft. Bragg, N.C.

Boyce said the emergency deployment exercise, which he called routine, had started early Wednesday.

However, coastal residents reported they had heard there were other major training exercises all through the Monterey Bay region last week, in an area stretching from Monterey to Santa Cruz. Several residents told an Associated Press reporter that the scope of the exercises appeared unprecedented.

The first sign that something unusual was happening Wednesday came about 6 p.m. at the Northridge Shopping Center in Salinas, about 15 miles east of Ft. Ord. Loudspeakers at the large, regi1869504876ordering them to report back to their base, according to witnesses interviewed by the Monterey Herald newspaper.