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Payback Time – (from a reader)
Always be careful what you ask for, you just may get it!
One of the many headaches that George W. Bush inherited from his predecessor
was the Puerto Rican island of Vieques. In the waning years of the Clinton
administration, protesters demanded that the U.S. Navy abandon bombing and
naval gun fire exercises that had taken place on the largely uninhabited
island for nearly seventy years. It became a leftist cause. Liberal icons
bumped into one another to fly to Puerto Rico, boat over to the island,
trespass (but never on a day that there was an exercise scheduled) and get
arrested for the benefit of the New York Times or Newsweek. They included the
Reverend Al Sharpton, Mrs. Jesse Jackson, Joan Baez, Robert F. Kennedy,Jr.,
Edward Olomos, Michael Moore and Ramsey Clark, just to name a few. Hillary
Clinton, then running for the U.S. Senate in New York, chastised the U.S. Navy for not bowing to the "will of the citizens of Puerto Rico", until her husband, a week before the election, issued an executive order to phase out the facility by 2003, despite pleas from his own Secretary of Defense and the Chief of Naval Operations.
In 2002, the bombing exercises were transferred to an Air Force bombing range
in central Florida, not far from the Jacksonville and Pensacola Naval Air
Stations. In January, many of the protesters were back in Puerto
Rico, celebrating the final bombing exercise on Vieques and waving Puerto
Rican flags and placards that read "U.S. Navy, get out of Puerto Rico."
On February 21, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld announced that the U.S.
Navy will close the Roosevelt Roads Naval Air Station in Puerto Rico in 2004,
eliminating 1200 civilian jobs as well as 700 military positions.
This naval facility is estimated to put nearly $300 million annually into
the local economy. The next day, a stunned Governor Sila Calderon held a news
conference in San Juan, protesting the base closure as a serious blow to the
Commonwealth's fragile economy. The governor stated that "The people of Puerto
Rico don't now or never did have an interest in closing the Vieques bombing
range or the Roosevelt Roads naval base. We are interested in both staying in
Puerto Rico." When asked, the Commander-in Chief, Western Atlantic Command,
said, "Without Vieques, I see no further need for the facility at Roosevelt
Roads. None." So, Yanqui go home? Fine. But we'll take our dollars with us.
Hasta la vista . . . baby!
On February 21, the Secretary of Defense also announced that starting
this year, the U.S. European Command would begin moving most if not all of
its active combat and support units from bases in Germany to others
being established in Poland, The Czech Republic, Hungary and Turkey to
"better position them for rapid deployment to likely hot spots in those parts
of the world". Immediately, the business and government leaders in the German
states of Hesse, Rhineland and Wurttemburg, protested the loss of nearly $6
billion in revenue each year from the bases and manpower to be displaced. A
spokesman for the Foreign Ministry speculated that the move may be "what the
Americans call 'payback' for the actions of this government in opposing
military action in Iraq." Whatever. Does anyone know the German translation
for "Hasta la vista . . . baby?"
Oh ? ain't it nice to see a government with guts (and a good memory)
What fun.
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