US Searches for New Anti-Drug Air Base

[Judi Lynn]

Source: Associated Press

US Searches for New Anti-Drug Air Base
By LOLITA C. BALDOR – 12 hours ago

LIMA, Peru (AP) — The United States is moving cautiously to find a new air base for anti-drug surveillance in South America in the face of vocal opposition to the idea in Peru and Colombia.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates met Friday with Peruvian Defense Minister Allan Wagner, who told reporters a day before Gates arrived here that the topic would not come up in their meetings.

Both Peru and Colombia have offered to talk to the Pentagon about a new base location, a senior U.S. defense official said earlier this week, but he also noted that it wasn't on Gates' agenda Friday.

Gates has said the Pentagon is still looking at alternatives for a new air base site, and no proposals have been made to anyone yet.

Ecuador President Rafael Correa said in August that the U.S. should move its anti-drug flights to Columbia after the lease runs out on the Manta air base in his country in 2009. Correa, who took office in January, has said repeatedly that he won't extend the agreement that lets the U.S. military use the base for surveillance flights.



Read more: http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5gnPpwRiOsjgI0z57NytZve0-sHMgD8S3BJ7G0

[MADem]

1. Say, doesn't some American Asshole own a million hectares in Paraguay? Gee, maybe the US govt could

lease that property at a hefty annual fee?

:shrug:

[Festivito]

5. I hear ya, but, too far south and already next to an airbase. /nt

[MADem]

9. Well, with the new fuel efficient VSTOL aircraft under development, who knows?

And all they'd have to do is make a big ass runway extending from their next door neighbor's, and they'd have a HOST of possibilities for the facility!!

[Festivito]

16. Gotta have several to insure secret drug sales, er ah, I mean...

not secret drug sales. Open, honest, drug proliferation, opps, nope, umm, prevention policy.

Yeah, that's the ticket.

[Maribelle]

8. Precisely my first thoughts, as well,

Millions, even perhaps billions, are to be made with the property.

[HysteryDiagnosis]

2. The pilots will not be under the influence themselves... I hope.

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines02/0801-06.htm


WASHINGTON — U.S. jet fighter pilots, responsible for at least 10 deadly "friendly fire" accidents in the Afghanistan war, have regularly been given amphetamines to fly longer hours.

Then when they return to base, the pilots are given sedatives by air force doctors to help them sleep, before beginning the whole cycle again on the next mission, often less than 12 hours later.

The exact drugs pilots are given and how they're taken is outlined in a 24-page document obtained by The Star, produced by the Top Gun fighter training school and the Naval Aerospace Medical Research Laboratory in Pensacola, Fla.

A spokesperson for the U.S. Air Force Surgeon-General's Office in Washington confirmed pilots are given the stimulant Dexedrine, generically known as dextroamphetamine, to stay alert during combat missions in Afghanistan.

Pilots refer to Dexedrine as "go-pills." The sleeping pills they are given, called Ambien (zolpidem) and Restoril (temazepam), are referred to as "no-go pills."

[fed-up]

3. Jan 2005 article-"Meth reportedly fueling fanaticism in Iraq"-North County Times (CA)

http://www.nctimes.com/articles/2005/01/07/news/columnists/another_tilt/20_38_341_6_05.txt

Meth reportedly fueling fanaticism in Iraq
Last modified Thursday, January 6, 2005 11:45 PM PST

By: J. STRYKER MEYER - Staff Writer

As the war in Iraq goes on, it's interesting to note that our combat troops are finding a chemical element used by enemy combatants that is commonly used by crooks, thieves and other social degenerates in the United States: forms of the illegal stimulant methamphetamine.

..snip

One military man told me: "It was surprising to us as to how much crystal meth, or some other form of methamphetamine, that the bad guys had in Fallujah. ... Sometimes it was hard understanding what to us was insane conduct ---- even in combat situations ---- until we realized many of them were hyped on meth. They acted as though they were impervious to our gunfire sometimes, which meant it might take a few extra rounds to kill 'em."

..snip

Additionally, methamphetamine abusers in the United States are capable of heinous crimes against friends, relatives and neighbors, all in the quest to get money to feed their nasty drug habit. Ask any cop on the street. They can tell you that they can pick out most methamphetamine abusers in a matter of seconds, compared with people who abuse heroin, cocaine or ecstasy.

...snip
In Iraq, the military is running into an enemy who is driven not only by religious fanaticism, but whose motivation to harm U.S. troops is fueled by methamphetamine.

This isn't the first time U.S. military forces have run into combatants using some version of methamphetamine to get their high before going into combat. During the Vietnam War, Marines fighting outside of Da Nang and later in Khe Sahn reported combating communist troops who were high on some sort of stimulant.

..snip

[formercia]

4. I think it was called Nationalism.

"This isn't the first time U.S. military forces have run into combatants using some version of methamphetamine to get their high before going into combat. During the Vietnam War, Marines fighting outside of Da Nang and later in Khe Sahn reported combating communist troops who were high on some sort of stimulant."

[mallard]

6. They could use a better program out in Afghanistan

Now producing most of the world's heroine. WTG Bush - implant those operators but don't give up the mainline.

[Toots]

7. I loved the quote from the President of Ecuador in this weeks Newsweek

If the USA will let Ecuador build a base in Florida we will let them build one here. We are not part of any drug problem..

[Maribelle]

10. President Correa is kicking Bush out of Ecuador - and this will cost US taxpayers millions

The largest U.S. base on South America's Pacific coast, the Manta installation was ostensibly set up to monitor narco-trafficking over the ocean and in the nearby Amazon basin. But it has become a major operations center for U.S. intelligence-gathering and coordinating counterinsurgency efforts against the leftist guerrillas in neighboring Colombia.

The base's $80-million runway, can accommodate the largest and most sophisticated U.S. spy aircraft. Manta is also used as a port for U.S. naval operations in the Pacific. Upwards of 475 American military personal are rotated between Manta and the U.S. Southern Command headquarters in Florida.

Popular sentiment in Ecuador overwhelmingly supports the closure of the Manta base.


http://news.newamericamedia.org/news/view_article.html?article_id=93764d3693fc43fb0aa988c854cb8a3f

[Judi Lynn]

11. Great article, Maribelle! Unspun articles are almost impossible to find, as you no doubt know. n/t

[Toots]

12. 80 million dollars, hell that is only twelve hours of Iraqi funding..

Tax payers won't even blink at that loss in terms of dollars. It's only a couple of hours of Interest on the National Debt..:shrug: It is the spying loss that will upset the wing nuts here.

[Zorro]

13. I would dispute the "popular sentiment" contention

The Manta base has helped the local economy tremendously.

[Maribelle]

14. I wouldn't. Correa's party just won a landslide victory in the Constituent Assembly

That means the governing party and allied leftist and centre-left forces will have the absolute majority they need to push through their projected reforms, since the redrafted constitutional articles will be approved by 50 percent-plus one of the votes in the assembly.

Correa’s proposals could be supported by as many as 85 of the delegates in the assembly if they are backed by the representatives of small parties like the Marxist Popular Democratic Movement, the Pachakutik indigenous movement, and the social democrats in the Democratic Left of former president Rodrigo Borja (1988-1992) and the Ethical and Democratic Network of former vice president León Roldós.

The new constitution, which will require the votes of two-thirds of all voters in a referendum, should guarantee the right to work, Acosta maintained.

He said this means that those seeking to make a living in the informal sector, like street vendors, would no longer be harassed, "as they often are because they supposedly make the city ugly."

"Work does not make any city ugly," Acosta said emphatically.

"Human beings are also the most important aspect in terms of production, because work is the main factor in production, and the new constitution must eliminate all factors that tend to make jobs precarious, such as outsourcing and subcontracting, which are systems of overexploitation," he said.

Acosta added that respect for the environment is a crucial aspect of the solidarity economy.

"The environment is one of the basic focuses of our proposed structural changes," he said. "Human beings are at the centre, but coexisting with nature without destroying it. That is why we are pushing forward with the plan to refrain from exploiting the oil reserves in the Yasuní National Park."


http://upsidedownworld.org/main/content/view/921/68/

[Judi Lynn]

15. More on Manta:

Anti-Base Conference in Ecuador Highlights Strength of Demilitarization Movement
Harold Jordan and Amy Holmes
May 2007

~snip~
Ecuador was the perfect setting for such a gathering, as its new government has taken a stance against the renewal of the US military base at Manta beyond 2009. The international gathering celebrated this commitment to end the US military presence. Indeed, the involvement in the conference of key governmental officials – the Mayor of Quito, himself a retired general; the governor of the province of Manabi; and the deputy minister of defense - was an affirmation of the significance of the Manta base decision.
(snip)

Legitimacy of U.S. Base at Manta Questioned

In 1999, the US made an agreement to lease the Eloy Alfaro Air Base in Manta for a period of ten years, but this agreement was never taken to the Ecuadorian parliament for approval. For this reason, the legitimacy of the base has been questioned by many Ecuadorian citizens from its very inception.

After 9/11, SOUTHCOM began expanding its operations as part of the war on terror to include drug interdiction in Colombia and the targeting of alleged terrorist groups. Although the agreement with Ecuador was that the Forward Operating Location (FOL) would be used only for the surveillance of drug-related activities, many have become concerned that it is also used as a base for counterinsurgency operations in Colombia. At the time, the US government promised that it would simply refurbish an old air field for daytime anti-narcotics surveillance and that no US personnel would be permanently housed at the facility. By 2004, base operations had expanded to include regular visits by US naval war and Coast Guard ships and the stationing of 475 US military personnel.

Base Operations Violate Ecuadorian Sovereignty, Security, Environment

Ecuadorians are beginning to associate a number of problems, either directly or indirectly, with the base in Manta:

- The US Coast Guard has become involved in patrolling the waters off the coast of Ecuador - violating Ecuador’s sovereign right to patrol its own territorial waters - although the FOL permits only the aerial detection of drug-trafficking.

- The US Coast Guard has sunk Ecuadorian fishing vessels on the grounds that they were involved in drug trafficking. In many cases, no drugs were found on the boats and no compensation was paid to the fishermen.
(snip)

- The US military has hired DynCorp, a company that is heavily involved in US activities in Colombia, to run base operations. The company is also involved in US military activities in Iraq, where it provides border security advisors. In the words of Gustavo Larrea, of the Quito-based Latin American Association for Human Rights, “Here we have a company of mercenaries that has been accused of human rights abuses across the globe operating an illegal American base on Ecuadorian territory.”2

Base Issue Enters the National Elections

The continued presence of the Manta base became an issue in the Presidential elections last November. National newspapers ran articles featuring the position of each Presidential candidate on the Air Base in Manta. Although some observers have pointed to the leftward turn in Latin America as contributing to the heated political atmosphere in the southern hemisphere, in fact candidates from across the political spectrum announced their intention to terminate the agreement with the United States.

Rafael Correa stood out from the rest of the candidates with his particular position on the basing issue. During his campaign he told the New York Times: “Of course we are willing to negotiate with the United States about extending the lease for the base in Manta. If they let us build an Ecuadorian base in Miami, if it is no problem, we’ll extend their lease.” Correa was elected and, as of the time of writing, he has so far stuck by his anti-base position. According to recent polls, some 65% of Ecuadorians, and 45% of Manta residents, oppose the renewal of the Manta base agreement.
(snip)http://www.tni.org/detail_page.phtml?act_id=17048&username=[e-mail]&password=9999&publish=Y