This paper outlines the several experiences of SFC Todd Wilhite while assigned to the US Embassy in Ndjamena, Chad as the Special Forces Liaison Officer to oversee the Humanitarian Demining Program, July 1998. From 1965 to 1979, the country of Chad was engaged in a civil war, leaving behind one of the largest Unexploded Ordinance (UXO ) and land-mined battlegrounds in the world. The unofficial count of landmines was between 800 and a million and an additional one to two million pieces of UXO to include wire guided missiles similar to the US TOW Weapons System. In the late 1990s, the governments' of the United States and Chad agreed to a bilateral training program focused on training Chadian military personnel on Humanitarian Demining Operations (HDO) to mitigate the landmine threat. 3d Special Forces Group (Airborne) from Fort Bragg, North Carolina was tasked as the executing unit to combine operations with the Higher Commission of Nation Demining (HCND) to build a humanitarian demining capacity and capability to clear the main supply routes of outlying areas, as well as, develop a Mine Awareness Program to educate the populace to mitigate the growing casualty rate associated with landmines and UXO. This was the only US bilateral program with Chadian government, placing the United States' strategic and political influences in the hands of a Special Forces Operational Detachment - Alpha (ODA); a Captain, and 10 NCOs.

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