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Worldwide heads of the National Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), military generals, heads of state from the alliance’s twenty-eight member countries will be coming to Chicago for a summit on May 20-21. The city will be put on lockdown all so the military arm of the G8—a group that can dial up a “humanitarian intervention” or war when it wants it—can further expand their military agenda and plot the next steps of perpetual war for Afghanistan and the wider Asian continent at the McCormick Place convention center.
I am in Chicago and will be covering developments during and in the buildup to the summit. Infrastructure for security is already going up. Shedd Aquarium employees are planning on moving in during the summit. Another train line that runs into and out of Chicago is adopting tight and unnecessary security measures. Parking restrictions have already gone into effect. Eight-foot-tall barricades are being rolled out for McCormick Place. Protests by people who have come to Chicago to show the world that not all US citizens consent to NATO have begun.
Here’ are updates of actions related to the upcoming summit:
—Four arrested in immigrant rights protest at ICE headquarters in Chicago
Occupy Chicago and others engaged in a “No Human is Illegal” protest against “Juan Crow” laws that “destroy lives and break up families.” They marched and gathered at the headquarters for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in Chicago. In solidarity with immigrants, they denounced the “unjust and inhumane decisions” that immigration judges make on a daily basis, which result in deportations.
According to the Chicago Tribune, four people were arrested. The protest went on for an hour outside the building before management had police get on the bullhorn and order them to leave the property. A few proceeded to engage in civil disobedience and were arrested and two people were arrested on a march that left the scene shortly after. The Tribune reports that Federal Protective Services were on the scene monitoring the protest.
—Out-of-state police come to Chicago to patrol protests
The Chicago Sun-Times reports police from Philadelphia, Milwaukee and Charlotte-Mecklenburg, North Carolina, will be here to help the city with protesters. They will join “as many as 700 state troopers” and “dozens of suburban officers.” Milwaukee is sending 100 officers. Philadelphia is sending 68 officers. The officers coming to Chicago from Charlotte will be getting experience handling a “National Special Security event” that they will then be able to use when Charlotte hosts the Democratic National Convention September 3-6 of this year.
—Boeing employees are told to work from home next Monday
The company that has been called the “CIA’s travel agency,” is, according to NBC Chicago, encouraging all of its five hundred or so employees to work “remotely” from home on Monday, May 21. This is because a major protest is planned for the day and thousands are expected to descended on Boeing’s headquarters to protest the manufacturer’s production of military equipment.
—The bodyguard battalion has purchases a “high-tech video camera device” to provide security
From Crain’s Chicago Business, Paul Merrion reports the US Army’s Protective Service Battalion, which guards the Defense Secretary and other top Pentagon and State Department officials, will have “high-tech security gear” to help with security. It is a special video camera that was procured from Gans Pugh & Associates.
Here’s what the Army bought: a “Panther P4Me-u-Intrusion & Video System Kit, and integrated wireless and/or hardwired video monitoring and intrusion detection system with monitor with alarms, integrated Dual Channel SD Card DVR, Integrated Quad Band GS/Remote Monitor, 2 camera indoor RACyl wireless cam Kit, 2 cameras indoor RACyl wired camera kit, lens kit for RACyl Camera, 2 indoor 55 Deg Remote head Wired Cameras, Over-pack Rolling Case, 20 Micro view w/lock II video scrambling.”
—Media here in Chicago continue to publish violence-baiting articles on protesters.
The local CBS affiliate has a story that they published under the headline, “Protest Organizer: Violence by NATO Outweighs Any Violence Over Summit.” They quote lead protest organizer Andy Thayer, “I think any discussion of violence that focuses on what’s happening here in Chicago so totally misses the boat…I’d like you guys to start putting out statistics such as the record number of Afghans who lost their lives in America’s war – the longest-ever war – last year.” And they end with a quote that is surely taken out of context: “Yes, there will be some conveniences. There may even be some violence.”
Not only does that probably misrepresent what he said, it seems to have been written down incorrectly. Thayer probably said “inconveniences,” not conveniences. Thayer was probably talking about police committing violence. There is nothing about police attached to this quote. It is dangling out in thin air with no qualifiers. But this isn’t surprising. Media have been trying to get every protester they interview to give them some sensational nugget they can run that shows they got the scoop on where violence is going to happen this weekend.
—NATO uses summit invitation to badger and intimidate Pakistan into opening NATO supply routes.
Pakistan has been extended a last-minute invitation to attend the summit. The invitation is being extended as a way to convince Pakistan to reopen NATO supply routes that have been closed as a way of trying to leverage power against the United States. Pakistan has been engaged in talks with US, where they are trying to get the US to stop drone strikes or respect the country’s sovereignty and let the country launch attacks on “suspected militants.”
—Secrecy News has obtained a congressional report that indicates what will be the main summit agenda
The Congressional Research Service (CRS) report reads:
- Defining the next phase of formal transition in Afghanistan and shaping a longer term NATO commitment to the country after the planned end of combat operations by the end of 2014;
- Securing commitments to maintain and develop the military capabilities necessary to meet NATO’s defense and security goals, including through a new “Smart Defense” initiative; and
- Enhancing NATO’s partnerships with non-NATO member states.
Here is Col. Ann Wright at the People’s Summit, which Occupy Chicago recently hosted. She talks about how NATO is essentially a front for US wars and foreign policy that gives the US the ability to say it is not going it alone when it takes action.
And here is my presentation at the People’s Summit on what WikiLeaks revealed about the Afghanistan War. I talk about revelations but also get into how the American public reacts to soldiers that reveal what is really happening in a war zone. The presentation concludes with a side-by-side comparison of platitudes uttered by President Barack Obama and President George W. Bush on the “war on terrorism.”
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from John Robles at Rozoff’s Stop NATO blog:
As scheduled, on Thursday evening at 6 o’clock in downtown Chicago at what’s called the Pritzker Military Library – it’s probably an apt site for a discussion of NATO – as of last heard, two spokespeople advocating the NATO position, and those are R. Nicholas Burns, former Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs in the State Department, and current NATO Deputy Assistant Secretary for Political and Security Affairs James Appathurai, are going to be presenting the NATO position. I’ve been asked to be one of two what are identified in the Chicago media as protesters who are going to be speaking against NATO. Initially Andy Thayer, who is a leader in the Coalition Against NATO G8 War and Poverty Agenda, CANG8, for short, was to be the other speaker from the anti-NATO position. I now hear that a representative from either Iraq or Afghanistan war veterans, is going to be speaking instead of Andy Thayer, so it will be the two of us.
http://rickrozoff.wordpress.com/
Definitely going to have to attend this.
Can’t really understand why a protest over illegal immigration is wrapped into the context of the anti-NATO event. But I guess the thrust is, everyone in the world who wants to come to the U.S. should be allowed to do so, because we have enough jobs and educational resources and health care for every single person in the world right here. (And space for them, too!)
It’s definitely odd to be here as a resident … folks I work with are reporting that their apartment buildings are saying they will require ID to get home, etc. The hyper security talk has created a general irritation with the whole event for most folks – which of course is the point.
Actually, we pretty much do.
Immigration, documented and undocumented, is closely tied to economic conditions… it’s a feedback loop and adjusts itself.
What the demonstrators are protesting is the ICE’s full-throated adoption of the “boot stamping on a (brown) human face — forever” regime.
Speaking of face stomping… any word on how many Homeland Insecurity types will be dressed in CPD gear and ready to fire grenade launchers at protestor’s heads at point-blank range?
thanks.
Burns is a piece of work. He was an Bush-43 “diplomat,” now at Harvard.
R. Nicholas on Iran:
“[The revolution] was 30 years ago,” said ambassador Nick Burns, a former State Department under secretary for political affairs in the George W Bush administration. “We have a whole generation of foreign service officers who didn’t learn Farsi.”
Furthermore, while there have been some diplomatic contacts with Iran on matters such as Afghanistan – before 2003 when Bush placed Iran in the “axis of evil” – and later Iraq, those contacts were uncommon and narrow in scope.
“I was the point person on Iran from 2005 to 2008, and I never once met an Iranian official,” said Burns.
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/KF27Ak03.html
On Afghanistan:
In Afghanistan, the President met with President Karzai and pledged continued American support to help stabilize that country through the presence of our 16,000 American soldiers and the increasing union that our soldiers and our military command have with the NATO forces in the region. The security situation in Afghanistan is quite challenging; we’ve seen an increase in the number of attacks by the Taliban and al-Qaeda on both the NATO force, as well as the American-led coalition force, and on Afghan civilians and Afghan authorities over the past year. We do not see this as a strategic threat to the government, meaning we believe that the government can withstand these attacks; but we certainly want to do everything we can to diminish them, and you can be assured that we are dedicated to maintaining a strong, credible, very aggressive military force along with our European allies and NATO in Afghanistan for the foreseeable future.
We also pay a lot of attention to trying to help the Afghan government deal with its other problems in building up the infrastructure of the country; in providing assistance in democracy and the rule of law, both at a central government level as well as among the regional governments; and, of course, dealing with the very difficult problem of opium production and the sales of narcotics from Afghanistan itself. But I think in his first visit to Afghanistan, the President was able to reassure President Karzai that our relations are very strong, that the American commitment is undiminished, and that we intend to be a very good friend and partner to Afghanistan for the period ahead. –Mar 6, 2006
https://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/bush/indpak.htm
Actually, you should be deported so we can make space for someone with a shared sense of common humanity.
The US is far from broke and far from out of “space”