Domestic Use of Military
A Homeland Is a Country That Allows Domestic Use of Military
________________________________________
By davidswanson - Posted on 12 January 2016
Have you seen Dahr Jamail's report on U.S. military plans for war games in
Washington state? I'm sure some observers imagine that the military is
simply looking for a place to engage in safe and responsible and needed
practice in hand-to-hand combat against incoming North Korean nuclear
missiles, or perhaps to rehearse a humanitarian invasion of Russia to uphold
the fundamental international law against Vladimir Putin's existence.
But if you look over the history of domestic use of the U.S. military --
such as by reading the new book Soldiers on the Home Front: The Domestic
Role of the American Military -- it's hard not to wonder whether, from the
U.S. military's point of view, at least a side benefit of the coming war
game isn't rehearsing for the next time citizens in kayaks interfere with a
corporation intent on poisoning the earth's climate with fossil fuels.
Soldiers on the Home Front is almost rah-rah enthusiastic in its support for
the U.S. military: "Our task here is to celebrate the U.S. military's
profound historical and continuing contribution to domestic tranquility,
while at the same time ... ." Yet it tells a story of two centuries of the
U.S. military and state militias and the National Guard being used to
suppress dissent, eliminate labor rights, deny civil liberties, attack
Native Americans, and abuse African Americans. Even the well-known
restrictions on military use put into law and often ignored -- such as the
Posse Comitatus Act -- were aimed at allowing, not preventing, the abuse of
African Americans. The story is one of gradually expanding presidential
power, both in written law and in practice, with the latter far outpacing
the former.
Some of us are grateful to see restraint in the approach to the men
occupying a federal facility in Oregon. But we are horrified by the lack of
similar restraint in using the military or militarized police against
peaceful protesters in U.S. cities. Police departments as we know them
simply did not exist when the U.S. Constitution -- virtually unaltered since
-- was cobbled together in an age of muskets, slavery, and genocide. Among
the developments that concern me far more than the authors of Soldiers on
the Home Front:
Numerous drills and practices, and the locking down of Boston, desensitizing
people to the presence of the U.S. military on our streets.
Congress members threatened with martial law if they vote against their
oligarchs.
The legalization of lawless military imprisonment without charge or trial
for U.S. citizens or anyone else.
The legalization of murder by drone or any other technology of U.S. citizens
or anyone else, with arguments that apply within the Homeland just as
anywhere else, though we've been told all the murders have been abroad.
Nuclear weapons illegally flown across the country and left unguarded.
Mercenaries on the streets of New Orleans after a hurricane.
Northcom given legal power to illegally act within the United States against
the people of the United States.
Fusion centers blurring all lines between military and domestic government
violence.
Secret and not-so-secret continuity of government plans that could put
martial law in place at the decision of a president or in the absence of a
president.
The militarization of the Mexican border.
The gruesome history and future of the attack on the Bonus Army, the bombing
of West Virginia, Operation Northwoods, tin soldiers and Nixon coming, and
Franklin Roosevelt's actual and Donald Trump's possible internment camps.
The authors of Soldiers on the Home Front claim that we must balance all
such dangers with the supposed need for a military to address "storms,
earthquakes, cyber attacks ..., bioterrorism." Why must we? None of these
threats can be best addressed by people trained and armed to kill and
destroy. When only such people have funding and numbers and equipment, they
can look preferable to nothing. But what if we had an unarmed, nonviolent
green energy brigade taking on the protection of the climate, and
non-military police ready to enforce laws in crises, a major new Civilian
Conservation Corps trained and equipped and funded to provide emergency
services, a computer whiz team dedicated to fending off cyber attacks and
preventing their ongoing provocation by U.S. government cyber attackers, a
publicly funded healthcare system prepared for health emergencies, and a
State Department redirected away from weapons marketing and into a new
project of building respectful and cooperative relations with the world?
If the United States were to move from militarism to all of the above, the
main problem would be what to do with all of the remaining money.
.
. davidswanson's blog
. Email this
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You are hereBlogs / davidswanson's blog / A Homeland Is a Country That
Allows Domestic Use of Military
A Homeland Is a Country That Allows Domestic Use of Military
By davidswanson - Posted on 12 January 2016
Have you seen Dahr Jamail's report on U.S. military plans for war games in
Washington state? I'm sure some observers imagine that the military is
simply looking for a place to engage in safe and responsible and needed
practice in hand-to-hand combat against incoming North Korean nuclear
missiles, or perhaps to rehearse a humanitarian invasion of Russia to uphold
the fundamental international law against Vladimir Putin's existence.
But if you look over the history of domestic use of the U.S. military --
such as by reading the new book Soldiers on the Home Front: The Domestic
Role of the American Military -- it's hard not to wonder whether, from the
U.S. military's point of view, at least a side benefit of the coming war
game isn't rehearsing for the next time citizens in kayaks interfere with a
corporation intent on poisoning the earth's climate with fossil fuels.
Soldiers on the Home Front is almost rah-rah enthusiastic in its support for
the U.S. military: "Our task here is to celebrate the U.S. military's
profound historical and continuing contribution to domestic tranquility,
while at the same time ... ." Yet it tells a story of two centuries of the
U.S. military and state militias and the National Guard being used to
suppress dissent, eliminate labor rights, deny civil liberties, attack
Native Americans, and abuse African Americans. Even the well-known
restrictions on military use put into law and often ignored -- such as the
Posse Comitatus Act -- were aimed at allowing, not preventing, the abuse of
African Americans. The story is one of gradually expanding presidential
power, both in written law and in practice, with the latter far outpacing
the former.
Some of us are grateful to see restraint in the approach to the men
occupying a federal facility in Oregon. But we are horrified by the lack of
similar restraint in using the military or militarized police against
peaceful protesters in U.S. cities. Police departments as we know them
simply did not exist when the U.S. Constitution -- virtually unaltered since
-- was cobbled together in an age of muskets, slavery, and genocide. Among
the developments that concern me far more than the authors of Soldiers on
the Home Front:
Numerous drills and practices, and the locking down of Boston, desensitizing
people to the presence of the U.S. military on our streets.
Congress members threatened with martial law if they vote against their
oligarchs.
The legalization of lawless military imprisonment without charge or trial
for U.S. citizens or anyone else.
The legalization of murder by drone or any other technology of U.S. citizens
or anyone else, with arguments that apply within the Homeland just as
anywhere else, though we've been told all the murders have been abroad.
Nuclear weapons illegally flown across the country and left unguarded.
Mercenaries on the streets of New Orleans after a hurricane.
Northcom given legal power to illegally act within the United States against
the people of the United States.
Fusion centers blurring all lines between military and domestic government
violence.
Secret and not-so-secret continuity of government plans that could put
martial law in place at the decision of a president or in the absence of a
president.
The militarization of the Mexican border.
The gruesome history and future of the attack on the Bonus Army, the bombing
of West Virginia, Operation Northwoods, tin soldiers and Nixon coming, and
Franklin Roosevelt's actual and Donald Trump's possible internment camps.
The authors of Soldiers on the Home Front claim that we must balance all
such dangers with the supposed need for a military to address "storms,
earthquakes, cyber attacks ..., bioterrorism." Why must we? None of these
threats can be best addressed by people trained and armed to kill and
destroy. When only such people have funding and numbers and equipment, they
can look preferable to nothing. But what if we had an unarmed, nonviolent
green energy brigade taking on the protection of the climate, and
non-military police ready to enforce laws in crises, a major new Civilian
Conservation Corps trained and equipped and funded to provide emergency
services, a computer whiz team dedicated to fending off cyber attacks and
preventing their ongoing provocation by U.S. government cyber attackers, a
publicly funded healthcare system prepared for health emergencies, and a
State Department redirected away from weapons marketing and into a new
project of building respectful and cooperative relations with the world?
If the United States were to move from militarism to all of the above, the
main problem would be what to do with all of the remaining money.
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You are hereBlogs / davidswanson's blog / A Homeland Is a Country That
Allows Domestic Use of Military
A Homeland Is a Country That Allows Domestic Use of Military
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
----
By davidswanson - Posted on 12 January 2016
Have you seen Dahr Jamail's report on U.S. military plans for war games in
Washington state? I'm sure some observers imagine that the military is
simply looking for a place to engage in safe and responsible and needed
practice in hand-to-hand combat against incoming North Korean nuclear
missiles, or perhaps to rehearse a humanitarian invasion of Russia to uphold
the fundamental international law against Vladimir Putin's existence.
But if you look over the history of domestic use of the U.S. military --
such as by reading the new book Soldiers on the Home Front: The Domestic
Role of the American Military -- it's hard not to wonder whether, from the
U.S. military's point of view, at least a side benefit of the coming war
game isn't rehearsing for the next time citizens in kayaks interfere with a
corporation intent on poisoning the earth's climate with fossil fuels.
Soldiers on the Home Front is almost rah-rah enthusiastic in its support for
the U.S. military: "Our task here is to celebrate the U.S. military's
profound historical and continuing contribution to domestic tranquility,
while at the same time ... ." Yet it tells a story of two centuries of the
U.S. military and state militias and the National Guard being used to
suppress dissent, eliminate labor rights, deny civil liberties, attack
Native Americans, and abuse African Americans. Even the well-known
restrictions on military use put into law and often ignored -- such as the
Posse Comitatus Act -- were aimed at allowing, not preventing, the abuse of
African Americans. The story is one of gradually expanding presidential
power, both in written law and in practice, with the latter far outpacing
the former.
Some of us are grateful to see restraint in the approach to the men
occupying a federal facility in Oregon. But we are horrified by the lack of
similar restraint in using the military or militarized police against
peaceful protesters in U.S. cities. Police departments as we know them
simply did not exist when the U.S. Constitution -- virtually unaltered since
-- was cobbled together in an age of muskets, slavery, and genocide. Among
the developments that concern me far more than the authors of Soldiers on
the Home Front:
Numerous drills and practices, and the locking down of Boston, desensitizing
people to the presence of the U.S. military on our streets.
Congress members threatened with martial law if they vote against their
oligarchs.
The legalization of lawless military imprisonment without charge or trial
for U.S. citizens or anyone else.
The legalization of murder by drone or any other technology of U.S. citizens
or anyone else, with arguments that apply within the Homeland just as
anywhere else, though we've been told all the murders have been abroad.
Nuclear weapons illegally flown across the country and left unguarded.
Mercenaries on the streets of New Orleans after a hurricane.
Northcom given legal power to illegally act within the United States against
the people of the United States.
Fusion centers blurring all lines between military and domestic government
violence.
Secret and not-so-secret continuity of government plans that could put
martial law in place at the decision of a president or in the absence of a
president.
The militarization of the Mexican border.
The gruesome history and future of the attack on the Bonus Army, the bombing
of West Virginia, Operation Northwoods, tin soldiers and Nixon coming, and
Franklin Roosevelt's actual and Donald Trump's possible internment camps.
The authors of Soldiers on the Home Front claim that we must balance all
such dangers with the supposed need for a military to address "storms,
earthquakes, cyber attacks ..., bioterrorism." Why must we? None of these
threats can be best addressed by people trained and armed to kill and
destroy. When only such people have funding and numbers and equipment, they
can look preferable to nothing. But what if we had an unarmed, nonviolent
green energy brigade taking on the protection of the climate, and
non-military police ready to enforce laws in crises, a major new Civilian
Conservation Corps trained and equipped and funded to provide emergency
services, a computer whiz team dedicated to fending off cyber attacks and
preventing their ongoing provocation by U.S. government cyber attackers, a
publicly funded healthcare system prepared for health emergencies, and a
State Department redirected away from weapons marketing and into a new
project of building respectful and cooperative relations with the world?
If the United States were to move from militarism to all of the above, the
main problem would be what to do with all of the remaining money.
