Military to Conduct "training exercises" in US cities
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Democrat
Colorado Springs, CO
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RT, March 29, 2015: March to martial law? Undercover Special Forces to sweep US Southwest
Okay this article is from RT and can be somewhat biased, but I hadn't read much about this in the US media.
As elite branches of the US military prepare to hold military training in seven southwest states, with some troops operating incognito among civilians, some Americans fear the training is actually preparation for imposing martial law. Operation Jade Helm, which is scheduled to kick off in July and run for eight weeks, will involve the participation of 1,200 troops from the US military’s most elite fighting forces, including Green Berets, Navy SEALS and Special Operations from the Air Force and Marines.
The troops will be participating in what has been called Realistic Military Training in towns in Arizona, California, Colorado, New Mexico, Nevada, Texas and Utah. In an effort to simulate the type of battlefield conditions soldiers may face in foreign countries, the US military has designated the remote training areas where they will operate as in a “hostile" territory, a description that has irked some residents.
So one has to ask. Why is it necessary for some of America's most elite fighting forces, including the Navy Seals, to conduct training exercises in US cities. Training for what foreign countries? As the article suggests, perhaps instead martial law in America? Note that the exercise is being conducted in the southwestern US states, all of which have been experiencing prolonged drought, especially California. Next year, California, by some experts analyses, is going to run out of water. What happens when the civilian population runs out of water?
Just wondering...
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From Newswire.net:“This exercise is routine training to maintain a high level of readiness for Army Special Operations Forces because they must be ready to support potential missions anywhere in the world on a moment’s notice,” Lastoria told Shadow Spear.
Paul Pape, a Bastrop County judge, however fears that the training was in reality rehearsal for full-blown martial law on the streets of America.
“What I see here is an opportunity for a portion of our military to be better prepared and better trained to do work that has to be done to secure America’s interests around the world and here at home,” Pape told KEYE television in Austin, Texas.
A number of citizen groups and media also speculate on why the entire states of Texas and Utah, as well as a section of southern California, have been declared “hostile.”
“They're having Delta Force, Navy SEALS with the Army trained to basically take over,” Info Wars' Alex Jones railed Sunday. “Texas is listed as a hostile sector, and of course, we are... here defending the republic.”
While anything Alex Jones says should be taken with a whole salt shaker, as a former Army officer, I understand the logic of what they are trying to do, somewhat. The Southwest is the best place, not because of impending drought, but because the conditions simulate those of the current hottest sector in the world, the Middle East. Any training exercise that involves brigade level or higher planning is going to pick a region of the world to 'simulate'. I've been involved in simulated invasions of Azerbaijan, Laos, Romania, Ghana, etc. all under different names. Its much easier to just pull up a map with roads and borders already on it than draw something up from scratch. For what it's worth, we 'invaded' Columbus, Georgia and Tacoma, Washington too.
What the Alex Jones and Stormfront groups don't seem to understand is that the US military had a VERY difficult time suppressing an insurrection of a nation of 30 million (Iraq) with no major mountain ranges and a very low ratio of armed populace. How exactly is it possible for our army to install martial law over a nation 10 times that, covered in mountains, forests, large urban sprawl, and with ready access to firearms and ammunition?
Now, as long as they have informed the locals and gotten permission, (which, if they hadn't, would [a] mean that we wouldn't have heard about this and [b] would defeat the purpose of doing the infiltration training, since most rural areas in the southwest would likely give the SF dudes a ticker-tape parade if they found one on the street and didn't know they were supposed to help) this shouldn't been more than a minor inconvenience. I will say that the SF guys are crazy to a man, and this is just the kind of thing they would think would be a great training event, without thinking how it would be perceived.
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Democrat
Colorado Springs, CO
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Mephistopheles Wrote: From Newswire.net:“This exercise is routine training to maintain a high level of readiness for Army Special Operations Forces because they must be ready to support potential missions anywhere in the world on a moment’s notice,” Lastoria told Shadow Spear.
Paul Pape, a Bastrop County judge, however fears that the training was in reality rehearsal for full-blown martial law on the streets of America.
“What I see here is an opportunity for a portion of our military to be better prepared and better trained to do work that has to be done to secure America’s interests around the world and here at home,” Pape told KEYE television in Austin, Texas.
A number of citizen groups and media also speculate on why the entire states of Texas and Utah, as well as a section of southern California, have been declared “hostile.”
“They're having Delta Force, Navy SEALS with the Army trained to basically take over,” Info Wars' Alex Jones railed Sunday. “Texas is listed as a hostile sector, and of course, we are... here defending the republic.”
While anything Alex Jones says should be taken with a whole salt shaker, as a former Army officer, I understand the logic of what they are trying to do, somewhat. The Southwest is the best place, not because of impending drought, but because the conditions simulate those of the current hottest sector in the world, the Middle East. Any training exercise that involves brigade level or higher planning is going to pick a region of the world to 'simulate'. I've been involved in simulated invasions of Azerbaijan, Laos, Romania, Ghana, etc. all under different names. Its much easier to just pull up a map with roads and borders already on it than draw something up from scratch. For what it's worth, we 'invaded' Columbus, Georgia and Tacoma, Washington too.
What the Alex Jones and Stormfront groups don't seem to understand is that the US military had a VERY difficult time suppressing an insurrection of a nation of 30 million (Iraq) with no major mountain ranges and a very low ratio of armed populace. How exactly is it possible for our army to install martial law over a nation 10 times that, covered in mountains, forests, large urban sprawl, and with ready access to firearms and ammunition?
Now, as long as they have informed the locals and gotten permission, (which, if they hadn't, would [a] mean that we wouldn't have heard about this and [b] would defeat the purpose of doing the infiltration training, since most rural areas in the southwest would likely give the SF dudes a ticker-tape parade if they found one on the street and didn't know they were supposed to help) this shouldn't been more than a minor inconvenience. I will say that the SF guys are crazy to a man, and this is just the kind of thing they would think would be a great training event, without thinking how it would be perceived. NUTS. Why don't they do it in Detroit; the city is broke and plenty of boarded up houses,so you can shoot rats. Indeed let's make this whole country a war zone; enough guns around to do that. The militarism in this country has reached a new level of sickness; lets spent another trillion on some new wars and training for it. Hitler would be proud of us.
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Mmmm, I'm not sure what you mean. We've reduced the Army size by another division due to the sequester, and from what I can tell on the DOD website, we're going down even further.
http://www.defense.gov/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=121703Under a Pentagon budget that will shrink by more than $75 billion over the next two years -- with deeper cuts expected if sequestration returns in fiscal year 2016 -- Hagel and other senior defense and military officials acknowledged that some of the budget choices will create additional risks in certain areas.
Some of that risk, Hagel said, is associated with a sharp drawdown in the size of the Army, which the proposed budget calls for reducing to as low as 440,000 active duty soldiers from the current size of 520,000, while ensuring the force remains well trained and equipped.
Now, our total numbers on most metrics include our Navy, USMC, and Air Force personnel too. That's why we still look so large.
For comparison, the total Army size of other countries (I'm assuming a minimum navy, which in the Russians' case who knows?):
http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/armies.htm
Pakistan: 550,000
Iran: 350,000
Russia: 415,000
Turkey: 400,000
Vietnam: 410,000
I don't think it is a problem reducing Army size to our current levels, or even further. A mechanized division and associated equipment can be built from the ground up within about 6-12 months, much faster if it is a light infantry division. What would be much more troublesome is a reduction in Carrier Fleets. It takes over 10 years to build a state of the art carrier fleet (1 supercarrier with 5-10 cruiser escorts, plus supply ships, smaller screens, and aircraft squadrons) and that is truly where our super power status lies. Carrier fleets are what allow us to project power to protect allies throughout the world, and without them we are a regional power in north america, at best. We currently have 11, with all of them being outdated Nimitz design from the 1970s. We have plans to update with the new Ford class, but cuts to the Navy's budget might scrap it.
The great thing about Naval spending is the Navy is unlikely to be able to run a martial law over the US, and doesn't have the footprint overseas that land posts do.While the terrain may be good for conducting mock drills, I have a harder time understanding how our cities and towns would be comparable to any of the cities and towns where conflicts are currently underway in Iraq and other areas. Tikrit and Mosul don't look like any US cities I have seen in the southwest.
Yes but I guess they'd be the closest to it? Not defending SOCOM's decision making here, but I don't think this is a sinister plot. It's just dumb leadership on their part.
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Mephistopheles Wrote: Mmmm, I'm not sure what you mean. We've reduced the Army size by another division due to the sequester, and from what I can tell on the DOD website, we're going down even further.
http://www.defense.gov/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=121703Under a Pentagon budget that will shrink by more than $75 billion over the next two years -- with deeper cuts expected if sequestration returns in fiscal year 2016 -- Hagel and other senior defense and military officials acknowledged that some of the budget choices will create additional risks in certain areas.
Some of that risk, Hagel said, is associated with a sharp drawdown in the size of the Army, which the proposed budget calls for reducing to as low as 440,000 active duty soldiers from the current size of 520,000, while ensuring the force remains well trained and equipped.
Now, our total numbers on most metrics include our Navy, USMC, and Air Force personnel too. That's why we still look so large.
For comparison, the total Army size of other countries (I'm assuming a minimum navy, which in the Russians' case who knows?):
http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/armies.htm
Pakistan: 550,000
Iran: 350,000
Russia: 415,000
Turkey: 400,000
Vietnam: 410,000
I don't think it is a problem reducing Army size to our current levels, or even further. A mechanized division and associated equipment can be built from the ground up within about 6-12 months, much faster if it is a light infantry division. What would be much more troublesome is a reduction in Carrier Fleets. It takes over 10 years to build a state of the art carrier fleet (1 supercarrier with 5-10 cruiser escorts, plus supply ships, smaller screens, and aircraft squadrons) and that is truly where our super power status lies. Carrier fleets are what allow us to project power to protect allies throughout the world, and without them we are a regional power in north america, at best. We currently have 11, with all of them being outdated Nimitz design from the 1970s. We have plans to update with the new Ford class, but cuts to the Navy's budget might scrap it.
The great thing about Naval spending is the Navy is unlikely to be able to run a martial law over the US, and doesn't have the footprint overseas that land posts do.While the terrain may be good for conducting mock drills, I have a harder time understanding how our cities and towns would be comparable to any of the cities and towns where conflicts are currently underway in Iraq and other areas. Tikrit and Mosul don't look like any US cities I have seen in the southwest.
Yes but I guess they'd be the closest to it? Not defending SOCOM's decision making here, but I don't think this is a sinister plot. It's just dumb leadership on their part. The "budget" is not what you think it is. First of all they spent a TRILLION since 2001 in Afghanistan, this is indeed a reduction in our welfare. Also programs like the F35 are ridiculous; using a "tool" of $400 million a piece to kill; what is the return on investment? Then the navy ships they will be rust buckets which only have cost fortunes to maintain. No it is impossible to make the whole world as we want it and dictate our worthless culture to others. Napoleon and Hitler thought they could do it; we will end up the same if we continue on this path. The Pentagon is a uncontrolled arrogant dinosaur, they run their own show. The militarism in this country is way out of bounds.
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Democrat
Colorado Springs, CO
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Mephistopheles Wrote: From Newswire.net:
While anything Alex Jones says should be taken with a whole salt shaker, as a former Army officer, I understand the logic of what they are trying to do, somewhat. The Southwest is the best place, not because of impending drought, but because the conditions simulate those of the current hottest sector in the world, the Middle East. Any training exercise that involves brigade level or higher planning is going to pick a region of the world to 'simulate'. I've been involved in simulated invasions of Azerbaijan, Laos, Romania, Ghana, etc. all under different names. Its much easier to just pull up a map with roads and borders already on it than draw something up from scratch. For what it's worth, we 'invaded' Columbus, Georgia and Tacoma, Washington too.
What the Alex Jones and Stormfront groups don't seem to understand is that the US military had a VERY difficult time suppressing an insurrection of a nation of 30 million (Iraq) with no major mountain ranges and a very low ratio of armed populace. How exactly is it possible for our army to install martial law over a nation 10 times that, covered in mountains, forests, large urban sprawl, and with ready access to firearms and ammunition?
Now, as long as they have informed the locals and gotten permission, (which, if they hadn't, would [a] mean that we wouldn't have heard about this and [b] would defeat the purpose of doing the infiltration training, since most rural areas in the southwest would likely give the SF dudes a ticker-tape parade if they found one on the street and didn't know they were supposed to help) this shouldn't been more than a minor inconvenience. I will say that the SF guys are crazy to a man, and this is just the kind of thing they would think would be a great training event, without thinking how it would be perceived. Mephistopheles --
I will reiterate my original concern that the military exercise may indeed be related to the drought in the southwest. I don't find many Republicans that are willing to have an intellectual discussion with me on anything, but I'll try again. First please read this article in Rolling Stone:
Rolling Stone, February 12, 2015: The Pentagon & Climate Change: How Deniers Put National Security at Risk
It's a long article, but very educational. I'll just highlight a couple of key points. First Climate Change denial now is so ingrained into the Republican ideology, that no Republican member of Congress is even allowed to mention it. And Republican budgets cannot provide any funds for Climate Change whatsoever. It doesn't exist in their vocabulary. And of course that new ideology is dictated by the Koch brothers who are some of the biggest contributors to greenhouse gases and Climate Change on this planet...and also contributors to the campaign coffers of Republicans in Congress. They have all been bought including some Democrats. The Koch brothers own them.
Now I have been an outspoken critic of the Pentagon and their seemingly unlimited budgets, but I do have to give them kudos for trying to plan for Climate Change even with the obstacles placed in their way by Congressional Republicans. Their ingenuity in doing a work around to raise piers in the Norfolk Navy base is one example highlighted by Rolling Stone:
But out on the base, nobody wants to talk directly about spending money to deal with sea-level rise, mostly because they are worried about drawing scrutiny from climate deniers in Congress, who are happy to redline any expenditure with the word "climate" in it. Instead, many people in the military end up talking about the climate similar to the way eighth-graders talk about sex — with code words and suggestive language.
"We didn't raise the piers because of climate change," Capt. Rios tells me during my visit to the base. He doesn't quite wink, but almost.
"Then why did you raise them?" I ask.
"Because we needed new piers. And as long as we were building them, it didn't cost much more to build them higher."
The military has been conducting exercises in Florida, which is highly susceptible to Climate Change and now the Southwest. The Pentagon is not allowed to talk about Climate Change, so they couch these exercises ostensibly as needed to be better prepared for foreign engagements. To make it seem more plausible to members of Congress they even include the Navy Seals in the exercise. These exercises provide valuable learning about the logistics of maneuvering in this part of the USA should the drought conditions exasperate the situation sooner than later. When large masses of people run out of basic necessities such as water, many of them can revert to their primal roots. Mass insurrection is possible, and the military will be asked to bring the populace under control.
So is this far fetched? Not if you are in the Pentagon engaged in long range planning of what might happen. Several years ago I read Fred Pearce's 2006 book, When the Rivers Run Dry. He painted a dire picture about how our rivers are drying up and aquifers are being depleted around the world. Looking at what has transpired in the eight years since his book was issued, the situation is even worse.
I'm not a big fan of the military, but in this case I support the planning that they are undertaking for Climate Change. It's our Republican members of Congress that live in la la land on Climate Change.
Read the Rolling Stone article and we can discuss.
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