Description Camp Justice is a United States military base on Diego Garcia, a small, strategically located, isolated island in the Indian Ocean. The island is in the Chagos Archipelago, part of the British Indian Ocean Territory. American forces have used the Island since at least the mid-1960s, under lease from the United Kingdom. The island has both port facilities and an airstrip, capable of handling the largest aircraft.
The population is estimated at 1700 military personnel with a further 1500 civilian contractors, which are mostly American with around 50 British troops stationed there.
Starting as early as 2004 rumors began to surface that the USA had been using Diego Garcia for the detention and torture of individuals captured in the "Global War On Terror". In 2006 Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, one of the "high-value detainees," was suspected to have been held in Diego Garcia.
The camp was renamed to "Camp Thunder Cove" in July 2006.
Formally, the base is known as Naval Support Facility Diego Garcia (the U.S. activity) or Permanent Joint Operating Base (PJOB) Diego Garcia (the UK's term).
My Participation in This Battle or Operation
From Month/Year
January / 2002
To Month/Year
December / 2002
Last Updated: Mar 16, 2020
Personal Memories
People You Remember CHB-5 air det (at the time we were the air det). We were mobilized a few days before Christmas to deploy to DG for a little over 3 weeks. We were to return home then re-deploy for 6 months back there. I remember getting the call and my family and I were returning from my sister in laws house. My wife's grandmother had just passed away so this was a tough time already. My brother in law was a few days from coming home. He was stationed at Ali Al Salem, had been there since August. So things were very tough. I remember having Christmas the Saturday before I left and that same day my wife took all the xmas stuff down and put it away. SHE WAS MAD. So we left for DG by way of Seattle, Tokyo, Yakota air base and Singapore. Well we got stuck in Singapore as the KC-10 we were hitching a ride on conveniently broke in Sing. (they were headed for Afghanistan,hmmm). We spent xmas in Singapore along with all of our cash. We finally made it to DG and got to work. A whole 6 days during this MOB. The work was hard but the play was harder at times. We had it good. Decent rooms, good food courtesy of whichever merchant ship's galley we were working on. Nice equipment. One of the merchant ships even had a swimming pool in it and a bar. Well toward the end we were working 2 ships at a time and managing quite well. I remember having to tie down cans while our ship got underway from the pier to make anchorage in the lagoon. When we finished the tie down we had chow and then departed the ship by way of a liberty launch that runs to all the ships for the MM's to go ashore. Well while we were going from ship to ship, a nasty little squall came up and was rocking that little launch BAD. I remember my buddy Wiseman hunched over with his face in his hardhat trying not to lose his lunch. Sorry Dave but that was funny. Anyway, It was a great time. I wish I could have gone to the big deployment but had to tend to things back home.
