This is a letter to Jim Gray from Tim Taramasso,  Friends who's careers crossed paths several times. They served together on WBVII in 1988. Taramasso was AOIC of PB757 during Operation Earnst Will, Then Tim went back in 89 with SBUXI’s PBR det.

The letter shows the SBU XI  Boat Commitment during Earnest Will and the winding down of the First USSOCOM Commitment.

GMC Tim Taramasso AOIC SBUXI PBR det. ASU Bahrain  13 Feb 1989 

Jim, 

We have 4 PBR MKIIs the Color still green. The gunmounts are in place, but we can’t carry the 50 cals. There are several reasons why we don’t carry the 50s. The big one is Political. We don’t want to offend the Bahrain Government or effect their standing in the Persian Gulf. Number 2 is the range of the 50s…we do inter-harbor patrol and if we have to use our weapons we don’t want to shoot up half of Bahrain. When the Boats go out for their Patrols they carry a light weight M-60 E3, M-16/203gl, and a Remington 870 shotgun.

The Boats have been here about a year and a half (1987) They were the first to arrive in the Gulf for Operation Earnest Will….even before the PBs. Minor repairs are keeping the crews busy in the last month and we had to replace one engine, and well get one boat back for the local ship yard which repaired leaks in the fuel tanks.

We made a good impression on people here, Boats look good and keep them running, and the crews looking good and uniforms squared away.

Honestly the boats are holding up not bad considering we beg borrow and steal everything we need. We made some good contacts and most of the time payment is just a boat ride.

We have four 3 man boat crews vice the standard 4man PBR crew (just as well we don’t have the rooms at ASU to house more). The boat crews work Port and Starboard two crews on for 24 hours and two crews off for 24 hours. Crews change over at 1200 everyday. During the morning the on duty crew does the post underway maintenance (PMS)

and get their part of the pier cleaned up.. which is the end of the Mina Sulman Pier.

After turnover the oncoming crews gets their boats pre-underwayed PMS and etc.

PATROLs  one random patrol on the inter harbor – Sitra Anchorage in the morning no time set and takes about an hour.  In the afternoon another random patrol.

At Night patrols run from Sunset to Sunrise one around the Pier and one out in Sitra Anchorage. The only time we secure a patrol is if no ships are in, or the weather.. even in the harbor the weather has been bad for our boats. (you know what the winds and seas can be like here.) and this time of year its cool and in the 50s not like the hot summers and wearing UDTs.

The people from SBU-20 just left and their PBs will be loaded on the Raleigh for their trip back to the East Coast..  My Det rotates out sometime in May but no firm date. Yep SBUXI will be the last to leave.. First in and last out.