Defense officials last month awarded $200 million in contracts to revamp the base‘s power plants and build a multistory operations center, aircraft hangar, living quarters, gym and other facilities on a sun-scorched 20-acre site next to the tiny country‘s only international airport (with which it shares a runway).

The projects are part of $1.2 billion in planned improvements over the next 25 years that will accelerate Camp Lemonnier‘s transformation from a makeshift installation where a few hundred Marines once slept in tents into an enduring 600-acre base that now houses about 4,000 U.S. military personnel and civilian contractors.