Omaha: Root of All Evil?
By David Swanson
What if a single nation on this planet were to pour more resources into its military than the rest of the nations combined, set up military bases in 80 percent of the other nations, stockpile more nuclear weapons than all other nations combined, develop new nuclear weapons intended for aggressive first-strike use, completely dominate the militarization of space, erase any policy lines between space and ground warfare and between nuclear and conventional weapons, and establish the goal of being able to quickly destroy any target anywhere on earth in order to protect its military and corporate investments?
I know what you're thinking: "Those Iranians may be evil, but I didn't know they'd advanced as far as all that. Do they still wear turbans?"
I don't know how to break this to you, so I'm just going to say it: The nation that has done everything I mentioned is the United States of America.
Now, here's a second riddle for you: What if the United States of America were to establish a command center outside of the Pentagon from which to run Bush and Cheney's illegal spying programs, the targeting of targets around the globe via satellite, and the full range of aggressive nuclear and conventional warfare, a command center that will control the next war against Iran or whatever other nation is chosen? Where would that Strategic Command center be located?
I know what you're thinking: "Isn't it in Dick Cheney's basement?"
But that's where they've fooled you. All they need to place in Dick Cheney's basement is a telephone into which our Ruler can utter things like "Take out Tehran." Dick Cheney's basement is hardly a suitable venue for annual weapons makers conventions or huge glossy displays of futuristic weaponry on which good patriotic Americans can spend their grandchildren's money, now is it?
That's where Omaha, Nebraska, comes in, and Stratcom, the Strategic Command center located 10 miles to its south, and the root of all evil, the hub of the greatest purveyor of violence in the world, what Bruce Gagnon calls the most dangerous place on earth.
Gagnon is the coordinator of the Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Power in Space, which has decided to hold its annual conference this year in the same place where war profiteers so often gather: Omaha. At http://www.space4peace.org you'll find plans for the April 11th to 13th conference, which will include activists from around the world, including the leaders of groups that are opposing the construction of new "missile defense" and other U.S. military bases near their homes.
On the agenda for April is a rally in front of Stratcom, a manned terrestrial protest of a form of warfare that sends unmanned arial vehicles controlled by satellite to kill people in Iraq and Afghanistan. While other nations push for a ban on weapons in space, the United States is already using space and investing billions in plans to use it in new ways.
Some of the citizens of Omaha may drive past the front gates of Hell and have no idea what's inside. Others have produced a documentary telling the story of Stratcom. "Stratcom, the Gun That's Still Loaded" is a 58 minute DVD produced by Frances Mendenhall, who describes it as follows:
"Offutt AFB, 10 miles south of Omaha, Nebraska, has long caught the attention of the peace movement, since it has historically been tasked with targeting the nuclear arsenal of the US. But after 9/11 its missions grew nightmarishly in complexity and scope, so that it is now being called 'the most dangerous place on the planet.' Learn the details of this danger and why the Global Network is planning its April conference in Omaha. Even better, contact your public access station and get it aired." Request a DVD: francesmendenhall@yahoo.com
OR READ THE STRATCOM CARTOON BOOK:
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/downloads/stratcomcartoon.pdf
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www.VelvetRevolution.us
Obama is the root of all evil?
Well, that is what I thought I saw in your headline, which made me read this very well written and funny article.
I don't know what to tell you about what you wrote but it seems you are asking the USA to stand down on her military superiority?
We all know war is big business so if you are looking for a reason why we are so big on war it is the all mighty dollar.
Sure it is wrong but it is reality, maybe we should consider cut backs in this sort of spending but I imagine it will be meet by a great deal of resistance and that my friend is the root of all evil.
best regards from www.bdogmania.com ps. watch what you say on the phone:)
i'm saying
the best defense is not a good offense
Big D
The best defense is a good defense! You know it is the Russians behind the Iranians hence while we play checkers they play chess? Anyway, you don't defeat terrorists with conventional wars, you beat them with with special forces, good intel and surgical strikes! Putting a big Army in a lawless nation like Iraq is more than likely a bad move.
no one
is arguing about having a good defense, but don't you see that the gruesome excess in military might that david has described above is so over the top that in turn it creates a situation in which other nations are forced to see us as a constant threat? how does our country handle other countries whom we see as a threat?
and by the way, have you noticed the condition our country is in these days? our economy is in the toilet, millions without health care, our educational system "ain't so good," how many times should one country be able to blow up the earth before you feel safe?
cheryl
We Has Seen the Enemy...
While it’s true Omaha is the center of the universe of Hell the entire mid section of America takes part in the nuclear hell waiting to happen. In an area stretching from Colorado to Montana to North Dakota to Nebraska over 500 hundred nuclear missile sites sit in fields of American farms looking very innocent except for the chain link fences surrounding them.
Every one of those missiles is on “ready alert” even after the fall of the evil empire once known as USSR fell. Communism became terrorism and the aging missile systems have new targets and maintain many of the old targets. One of the 530 missiles is ten times more powerful than the bomb dropped on Hiroshima.
Despite all attempts to cover up the truth by the military and our “leadership” in D.C., several former service people, who had the key of nuclear winter in their hands, have talked about the times they witnessed near misses in launching one of those missiles. If you think that number is extremely low, you’re wrong.
Sisters Ardith Platte, Carol Gilbert and Jackie Hudson, Dominican nuns, have been imprisoned for their passionate resistance to these sites. They are now free but face another term in federal prison for their refusal to pay for the chain link fence the military destroyed in arresting the elderly sisters after they had entered a site near Greeley, Colorado by using bolt cutters to open the gate. Their story is documented in the movie, Conviction.
Colorado is also home to several other secret facilities that guide and monitor nuclear sites as well as satellites in space. Every day we have people drive by our missile sites and our secret bases without a clue the end of the planet is one mistake away at any one of the sites. Imagine those who work in these places. How much must a person have to be in denial or totally oblivious to reality? Or totally sold on the propaganda of the liars-in-chief.
One common theme has kept these true “weapons of mass destruction” in place. Fear. The American people have been led to believe their lives were in peril from some evil force outside their borders since the days of the founding fathers. Since World War II that fear has been stoked and manipulated by politicians to feed the omnipresent military-industrial-complex Eisenhower warned about during his Presidency. Before Eisenhower, George Washington warned about the military being too powerful. But fear has festered and Americans have failed to have faith in the very God they claim to believe in. They have failed to have faith in people of other nations and in the process alienated enough people to create powerful enemies.
A professor at our state university in Boulder had the audacity to say 9-11 was a case of the “chickens coming home to roost” in America. He added references to the victims of the twin towers being like little “Eichmanns” because of their participation in carrying out American policies. Unfortunately, the message was lost in the hyperbole of the professor’s choice of analogy. Americans failed to process why we’re hated by others in the world. Instead they allowed the “Madmen of Crawford” to seek revenge. Instead they willingly gave up essential rights and freedoms to be “safe”.
We can put on all the helmets, knee pads and chest protectors we want but we won’t find safety until we begin to participate in the world as responsible citizens of the world. Parents in this country have created “the nanny generation” because the world is perceived as evil and dangerous and fear dominates them. The fear of Americans is cynically orchestrated by the rich and powerful and directed away from the true sources of evil that should elicit fear. As Pogo once said in the comics, “we has seen the enemy and he is us”.
If we look at our state of the union from politics to environment, from human suffering to humanity the genius of Walt Kelly’s comic character rings as true today as it did back in my childhood of the late fifties and early sixties.
Wm. Terry Leichner, RN
Denver VVAW member
Vietnam combat vet
Wherever whoever it is...
...that Bush and Cheney work for lives, and moves, and has their being--that place would be the root of a hell of a lot of evil.
If it's us, as in We The People, that they work for--at least that part of us that buys into, and voted for, National Security (if those elections weren't rigged)--then it's that part of us that's wrong with us; that's evil about us.
If it's the USA, as in the Corporation, that they work for, then it's far-flung and way more of a problem than just Omaha (and Stratcom), and We The People are next to powerless against it. Just look at what they did to Kucinich.
I live maybe three hours from Omaha, and I know protesters who've been going down to Offutt for years, and stepping across a yellow line they have painted on the ground down there, and doing federal time for it.
I'm pretty sure those protesters would be glad to see this kind of an article come out on a forum like this one, but I believe that the root of this evil runs way deeper than just what they're doing in Omaha. It might be running deep inside us, of the USA.
Strength Through Peace!
Dennis had it right, all along.
R Ap