The USS Nimitz visit to Hong Kong this week reminds me of an item I wrote in 2002 for my  regional column in the International Herald Tribune. At the time, I found it highly ironic that Tony Wong and others were selling the same cigars to sailors in the Pacific Fleet that the US Atlantic fleet blockades. The biggest customers of Cuban cigars, Tony said at the time, were Congressional delegations!

SCUTTLED SANCTIONS: While the U.S. Navy’s second fleet patrols Atlantic waters to monitor Cuba — whose cigars are banned from the United States — sailors in the Pacific fleet freely purchase and puff on Cuban stogies at a U.S. government-managed facility in Hong Kong. The cigars are sold at the pier-side Fleet Arcade, a short stumble from Club Hot Lips and other bars in the Wanchai red-light district. A servicemen’s commissary that also serves as the embarkation point for boats out to visiting navy ships, the Fleet Arcade’s shops pay rent to the U.S. government at well below market rates. Numerous sailors on leave in Hong Kong from the USS Kitty Hawk battle group have stocked up on Cohibas and Romeo Y Julieta cigars. Some probably brought them back on board, a violation of American law. Nonetheless, the battle group’s commander, Rear Admiral Steve Kunkle, said the navy had more urgent concerns than conducting a body search of more than 7,000 personnel for smuggled smokes. The admiral’s effective establishment of a “don’t ask, don’t tell” cigar policy for the navy’s Seventh Fleet certainly pleased Tony Wong, the biggest seller of Cuban cigars in the Fleet Arcade. But, Wong added, sales don’t just spike for the navy. China’s frequent cancellations of naval visits have forced him to rely heavily on the ever-eager buyers among delegations from the U.S. Congress. Link to original article here.

PS: If you want to buy cigars from Tony, here is his website, complete with a page of compliments from the US Navy and Airforce personnel.

PPS: Lest there be any misunderstanding, I fully support allowing our hard-working men (and women) in uniform to freely smoke cigars and agree with many of the sentiments expressed by Thomas Friedman’s draft Nobel acceptance speech for Obama:

“Let me begin by thanking the Nobel committee for awarding me this prize, the highest award to which any statesman can aspire. As I said on the day it was announced, ‘I do not feel that I deserve to be in the company of so many of the transformative figures who’ve been honored by this prize.’ Therefore, upon reflection, I cannot accept this award on my behalf at all.

“But I will accept it on behalf of the most important peacekeepers in the world for the last century — the men and women of the U.S. Army, Navy, Air Force and Marine Corps.

“I will accept this award on behalf of the American soldiers who landed on Omaha Beach on June 6, 1944, to liberate Europe from the grip of Nazi fascism. I will accept this award on behalf of the American soldiers and sailors who fought on the high seas and forlorn islands in the Pacific to free East Asia from Japanese tyranny in the Second World War.

“I will accept this award on behalf of the American airmen who in June 1948 broke the Soviet blockade of Berlin with an airlift of food and fuel so that West Berliners could continue to live free. I will accept this award on behalf of the tens of thousands of American soldiers who protected Europe from Communist dictatorship throughout the 50 years of the cold war.

“I will accept this award on behalf of the American soldiers who stand guard today at outposts in the mountains and deserts of Afghanistan to give that country, and particularly its women and girls, a chance to live a decent life free from the Taliban’s religious totalitarianism.

“I will accept this award on behalf of the American men and women who are still on patrol today in Iraq, helping to protect Baghdad’s fledgling government as it tries to organize the rarest of things in that country and that region — another free and fair election.

“I will accept this award on behalf of the thousands of American soldiers who today help protect a free and Democratic South Korea from an unfree and Communist North Korea.

“I will accept this award on behalf of all the American men and women soldiers who have gone on repeated humanitarian rescue missions after earthquakes and floods from the mountains of Pakistan to the coasts of Indonesia. I will accept this award on behalf of American soldiers who serve in the peacekeeping force in the Sinai desert that has kept relations between Egypt and Israel stable ever since the Camp David treaty was signed.

“I will accept this award on behalf of all the American airmen and sailors today who keep the sea lanes open and free in the Pacific and Atlantic so world trade can flow unhindered between nations.

“Finally, I will accept this award on behalf of my grandfather, Stanley Dunham, who arrived at Normandy six weeks after D-Day, and on behalf of my great-uncle, Charlie Payne, who was among those soldiers who liberated part of the Nazi concentration camp of Buchenwald.

“Members of the Nobel committee, I accept this award on behalf of all these American men and women soldiers, past and present, because I know — and I want you to know — that there is no peace without peacekeepers.

“Until the words of Isaiah are made true and lasting — and nations never again lift up swords against nations and never learn war anymore — we will need peacekeepers. Lord knows, ours are not perfect, and I have already moved to remedy inexcusable excesses we’ve perpetrated in the war on terrorism.

“But have no doubt, those are the exception. If you want to see the true essence of America, visit any U.S. military outpost in Iraq or Afghanistan. You will meet young men and women of every race and religion who work together as one, far from their families, motivated chiefly by their mission to keep the peace and expand the borders of freedom.

“So for all these reasons — and so you understand that I will never hesitate to call on American soldiers where necessary to take the field against the enemies of peace, tolerance and liberty — I accept this peace prize on behalf of the men and women of the U.S. military: the world’s most important peacekeepers.”