The Truth About Drones (*NOT* APPROVED by the US Air Force)

National Bird screened this week in Berkeley. It gives first hand accounts of the way the US drone program ruins the lives of drone operators, undermines any real attempt to "defend" the US, and -- most of all -- massacres innocents.

More on
Drone Pilots Speaking Out

National Bird contrasts the "excitement and glory" of Air Force and Army recruiting with the reality people face when they enlist and serve in the US military.

Young people toying with the idea of becoming a drone operator will drop it like a hot potato after seeing what it's done to others. "The drone program gives people PTSD [post-traumatic stress disorder]," says a former operator in the film, against the background of her attempt to get the VA (Veterans Administration) to acknowledge her condition. "What's so surprising about that?"

Another participant in the drone program -- someone who appears again and again as calm, cool, and collected on screen -- talks in the film about his suicidal ideation. Yikes.

Can't they put it behind them? Yet another former participant in the drone program, who came in person to participate in the discussion period following the screening, put it this way: "Once you're in the drone program, there's no escape."

No wonder more and more former drone operators are speaking out . . . .

U.S. "Precision Strikes" in a Nutshell

National Bird also sums up why the officer class has become more and more skeptical about drones.

All you have to do is watch the film's clip of Gen. Stanley McChrystal going on national TV in Afghanistan to apologize for the February 21, 2010, massacre of innocent Afghans to understand why no being an officer in the US military is becoming a fool's errand.  (In an appearance at a book talk in San Francisco, McChrystal offers the understatement of the year: the drone program needs to do a better job of "not generating ill-will.")

What happens when large numbers of people decide it just isn't a good idea to become an officer because the technology and systems and approaches and policies of the US "defense" establishment are programming massive blowback into everything the military does?

Drone Victims: Just Dots? Just Dirt?

National Bird is dedicated to the people killed in the February 21, 2010, massacre, and it is the recounting of that event that is the most difficult part of the film to watch.

This film is essential watching for anyone who still thinks US air strikes kill "bad guys."


"I lost part of my humanity working in the drone program," says one of the operators profiled in National Bird. She's got company: the drone program is being carried out in the name of everyone in the US; losing our humanity has become a national condition.


Related posts

Leveling Up is the creative work that demonstrates just how thoroughly America's new ways of warfare have become intertwined with the other dominant strands in our culture.

(See Level Up, Step Up, Grow Up, Man Up . . . Wake Up)












Anyone who cares about stopping drone killing should take a friend and go see Good Kill, and then do it again, and again.

(See GOOD KILL: Struggling to Bring the Truth of Drone Killing Out of the Shadows )







Grounded raises tough questions. I was hoping that the play would challenge the idea that killing people with drones is good. It's a reflection of the seriousness of this work that that is just one of the issues it raises; others include our society's willingness to destroy the people who we employ to "serve" ("serve our country," serve us in general), our culture's worship of violence / use of force, and the consequences of pervasive surveillance.

(See Why GROUNDED Is Soaring: Putting Drone Dilemmas In Your Face )

DRONE WARRIORS: Say Hello to the DoD's $125,000 Ostrich Feather

Anubis weighing the heart of the recently deceased.
(Image sourced from The Haunted Shoreline blog.)

In ancient Egypt, there was a highly-developed idea of how to assess the deep meaning of thoughts and acts during life. "The critical scene depicting the weighing of the heart, in the Book of the Dead, shows Anubis performing a measurement that determined whether the person was worthy of entering the realm of the dead (the underworld, known as Duat). By weighing the heart of a deceased person against Ma'at (or "truth"), who was often represented as an ostrich feather, Anubis dictated the fate of souls." (Wikipedia)

The US Department of Defense has replaced the ostrich feather with $125,000.

A recent report in The Fiscal Times says the drone pilots are being induced to re-enlist with bonuses of $125,000. Apparently, even though the military is moving as fast as it possibly can toward robotic killing, it still can't get the small number of people it needs to come volunteer and operate the controls. ("The service trained 180 new pilots in fiscal year 2014, while 240 retired, according to data provided to The Los Angeles Times.")

The situation is likely to become especially dire, now that drone operators are coming forward and saying what many have been suggesting for a long time: it's not worth it.

Hey, we live in a free market economy, and some people think that means everything has its price. It shouldn't be surprising that the military thinks it can buy off drone operators.

The US government has done us a favor: they've said what they really think the conscience of a drone operator is worth.

Now it's up to us to do something about it.


Related posts

Operating drones and other robotic killing machines still requires some human operators. And despite all their hopes to the contrary, the military establishment has discovered that human operators have consciences.

(See THIS CHANGES EVERYTHING: Drone Pilots Speaking Out)



With drones, people become just dots. "Bugs." People who no longer count as people . . . .

(See Drone Victims: Just Dots? Just Dirt? )











"Once the boat went to full pressure, there was really no other option."

(See In Whose Machine Will YOU Be a Cog? )

THIS CHANGES EVERYTHING: Drone Pilots Speaking Out

"Why focus on drone attacks?"

I have written over and over again that people who want peace and an end armed conflict need to push back against the "dronification" of war.

The people who want to perpetuate (and worsen) the state of perpetual war that we have become embroiled in love drones -- maximum killing, maximum terrorizing subject populations, maximum overlordship -- all with a minimum of asking for the consent of the US general public.

"Hey: there are no 'boots on the ground'! Isn't that what you wanted?"

(Out of sight, out of mind . . . . )

It turns out there was just one little problem with their scheme.

Operating drones and other robotic killing machines still requires some human operators. And despite all their hopes to the contrary, the military establishment has discovered that human operators have consciences.

"Have we forgotten our humanity in the pursuit of vengeance and
security?" Former Drone Operators Speak Out Against Drone Killings

Two years ago, I attended the CODEPINK Drones Conference in Washington, DC, and saw the ex-drone operator Brandon Bryant speaking out about how killing people with drones is wrong. At the time I thought, "How many more are there like him . . . ?"

Now, three more former drone operators have come forward to blow the whistle on the US drone killing program.

At the end of March, 2016, there will be another major US mobilization against drone warfare. Now I'm wondering, "If there are four, is it possible there are even more? Could there be ten . . . ?"

I encourage everyone to read the stories of the courageous drones whistleblowers, and share this information widely.

It's not just about them; it's not just about drones. It's about whether the people can wrest back control of the killing power of the state from those who think they've found the way to conduct 24/7/326 permawar with no opposition.


Related posts

In my opinion, the reason to focus on drones is this: when we focus on drones, the general public is able to "get," to an unusual extent, the degree to which popular consent has been banished from the process of carrying out state violence. (Sure, it was banished long ago, but the absence of a human in the cockpit of a drone suddenly makes a light bulb go off in people's heads.) It takes some prodding, but people can sense that drone use somehow crosses a line. And that opens up the discussion about how our consent has been eliminated from the vast range of US militarism.

(See "Why focus on drone attacks?")

The U.S. military is desperately trying to beef up the ranks of its drone pilots - to meet a "near insatiable demand for drones." There's only one way that's going to happen, and that's if we let our young people think that it's okay to sign up. The world of military service is more abstracted and foreign than ever. If ever there was a time that young people needed guidance from others about what military service might mean for them, that time is now.

(See Mothers Don't Let Your Children Grow Up to Be Drone Pilots)

Anyone who cares about stopping drone killing should take a friend and go see Good Kill, and then do it again, and again.

(See GOOD KILL: Struggling to Bring the Truth of Drone Killing Out of the Shadows )







Apparently, even though the military is moving as fast as it possibly can toward robotic killing, it still can't get the small number of people it needs to come volunteer and operate the controls.

(See DRONE WARRIORS: Say Hello to the DoD's $125,000 Ostrich Feather)







Today we live in a different world. Without the draft, the people have "checked out." It is like Rome ... the legions do the work of empire and the people are kept happy with bread and circus. (Or Starbucks and "Dancing With the Stars," if you prefer.)



(See Not Your Father's Antiwar Movement )

In Whose Machine Will YOU Be a Cog?

Rowing

When I was a college freshman, I rowed on the crew team for a brief time.

Before long, I realized that I couldn't memorize thousands of Chinese characters and plumb the depths of the writing of Flannery O'Connor and also exhaust myself every day out on the Charles, and the rowing went away. But before that happened, I developed a memory in my body of being in a boat with seven others rowers, doing everything I could to keep my oar moving in unison with theirs and also pulling for dear life against the water that felt thick and immovable as concrete.

Rowers in a shell move forward and backward with the movement of the boat on sliding seats; they wield long oars that have to move in unison in order to avoid colliding with each other. You don't just pull with your arms; it's a coordinated thrust of your entire body. The shell doesn't just move forward; if surges up out onto the surface of the water with every stroke, gliding at top speed.

It's exhilarating -- but also terrifying. Years later, I was reading a book about rowers -- Red Rose Crew: A True Story Of Women, Winning, And The Water by Daniel J. Boyne -- and I read a sentence that helped me understand that experience of being in a speeding crew shell, pulling for dear life on that oar, and knowing you just had ... to keep ... going ....

Once the boat went to full pressure, there was really no other option.

When everybody rows, you row too.

It makes me think of the inside of an internal combustion engine, and the way the components are moving out of each other's way just in time.

There's a joy to being part of a beautiful machine. But it comes with a price.

Watch this video to feel this sensation:

I thought of this again this past weekend when I went to see a film about drone pilots: Good Kill.

Among the many ways in which Good Kill succeeds is the way it makes it clear that drone pilots are cogs in a tightly controlled machine, and they have no room to exercise judgement or make ethical decisions.

Ethan Hawke portrays a former fighter pilot who has become part of the "chair force," operating a drone out of a cubicle in Nevada. Every move he makes is observed by his co-pilot, plus two analysts looking over his shoulder, plus (in the instances depicted in the film) his commanding officer standing behind his chair, as well as an unseen team of CIA operatives connected electronically from Langley, VA, plus who-knows-how-many other participants in the kill chain.

Good Kill: the order has been given

Without giving anything away, I can tell you that there are a series of events in the film that show the Ethan Hawke character struggling with just what a tightly controlled cog in the machine he is -- and looking for any little bit of wiggle room to be his own person.

Being a cog in a certain kind of machine is very appealing -- working with others, being super efficient, achieving synergy, having impact: teamwork. It's what attracts so many young people to consider the military.  These are many of the same people who find exhilaration in sports like rowing.

Films like Good Kill are essential for helping young people see what the military machine is really like. Sure: be a cog in the machine. But in whose machine do you really want to be a cog?


Related posts

The U.S. military is desperately trying to beef up the ranks of its drone pilots - to meet a "near insatiable demand for drones." There's only one way that's going to happen, and that's if we let our young people think that it's okay to sign up. The world of military service is more abstracted and foreign than ever. If ever there was a time that young people needed guidance from others about what military service might mean for them, that time is now.

(See Mothers Don't Let Your Children Grow Up to Be Drone Pilots)

A person may not feel that s/he is another Daniel Ellsberg ... or Paul Revere ... or Otto and Elise Hampel ... or Ai Weiwei ... or Bradley [Chelsea] Manning. But these are heroes we can aspire to emulate.

(See I am (I will become) Bradley Manning )

Consider the moment in the film All Quiet On the Western Front when the young soldier returns to visit his old high school. The soldier visits the class of the teacher who had goaded him and many of his classmates to enlist in the first place. Encouraged by his teacher to tell about the "glories" of being a soldier, he delivers a damning verdict . . . .

(See Back to School (All Quiet On the Western Front))

Stop Playing "Ender's Game" With Chicago's Young People

I was startled yesterday to see that Harrison Ford has drawn a clear, direct connection between the upcoming major film release, Ender's Game, and drone warfare -- "I don't think it's a metaphor" -- and that the film's promoters have seen fit to create a "recruiting" video to whip up interest prior to the film's premiere in the fall.

"Battle School Needs YOU!"

I have been very concerned about the way the "dronification" of the military plays hand-in-glove with the "video-game-ification" of military recruiting. Video battle and the notion that "this is all just a game" is being used to suck our young people into this country's war-making ways using a veneer of "cool" and "awesome." (See Mothers Don't Let Your Children Grow Up to Be Drone Pilots . )

Look at all the cool stuff you get! Call of Duty Black Ops II "care package"

When we see the military and the entertainment industry ganging up to sell high-tech war to our kids -- whether through films like Ender's Game or video games like "Call of Duty" or other aspects of popular culture -- we need to push back.

There are some powerful forces marshalled against us. But the one place we should expect to be able to make progress is in our schools. So I was jolted into action when I saw this alert from a friend today:

Ames Middle School
belongs to the Community.
But Ald. Maldonado wants
to give it to Marine Military HS.

For those not already familiar with the situation in Chicago: at a time when the City cannot be bothered to figure out how to run its own schools, but is instead closing dozens at a time, our leaders somehow think it's appropriate to let branches of the U.S. military have the run of the school and recruit kids -- and in some cases outright convert the school into a military academy. Parents in the Logan Square neighborhood are fighting a valiant effort to stop that from happening to the Ames School.

Ames Belongs to the Community!

As the neighborhood association website makes clear, "Logan Square Neighborhood Association fought to get Ames (1920 N. Hamlin) built to serve the entire community. Over the last 12 years, LSNA, Elev8 and Ames have built comprehensive community school programs—including PrimeCare Health Center, mentoring, sports, art, tutoring, counseling and university campus trips—for students and their families. All of this work could be dismantled if a military school is imposed at Ames without a real community process."

Think twice, Chicago! Is this what we want our schools to look like?

Drone pilot cockpit: just another video game?

Join the campaign to keep the military out of Ames! And make a commitment to get the military out of all of our schools. Tell them to stop playing "Ender's Game" with our young people!


More on Ender's Game . . . .


Related posts

A big Hollywood production of Ender's Game is scheduled for release on November 1. It's a perfect opportunity for us to ask: Are we happy seeing our schools turned into "Battle Schools"?

(See "Ender's Game" and the Militarization of Youth: Can We Talk About This? )





What are the 2 or 3 -- or 5, or 10 -- biggest lessons about "collaborating in peaceful mode" that we might be able to witness if we were to seek the answers in Minecraft worlds?

(See Go dig up the solution to world peace in a video game environment )

There are many books proffered to children that provide justifications for the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The discourse on the use of atomic weapons is certainly a worthy topic of study for young people of a certain age. However, there is a distinction between critical reading of atom bombing history and passive receiving of atom bombing dogma. I am wondering about how this can be effectively broken down.

(See Approaching Hiroshima: A Challenge for Children's Literature and Peace Education )

Do We Have a Drone Problem at Midwest Colleges and Universities?

During the April (2013) Days of Action Against Drones, people started to dig into the problem of how pervasive drone research, development, and training has become at institutions of higher learning across the United States. (See Call for "No Drones" at U.S. Colleges, Universities, and Research Institutions.)

In the preparation for the upcoming Midwest Action Against Drones (MAAD), I've suggested that we need to take a close look at what is happening at our Midwest colleges and universities. I'm concerned that our our Midwest schools are being drawn into the military-industrial complex with the promise of the "opportunity" to get in on the ground floor of the "drones revolution."

Do we really want the American heartland serving as the brain-trust for the U.S. global project of drone surveillance and killing?

As a start, below is a round-up of research, development, and training activity connected to drones at Midwest colleges and universities. I've indicated those schools that are land-grant universities. There appears to be a high concentration of drone work at land-grant universities.

The list below is just a sampling.  Discovery continues . . . .


ILLINOIS

University of Illinois - Urbana-Champaign, IL (a land-grant university)

Engineering at Illinois Students Enter Drone in National Challenge - "A team of Engineering at Illinois students, including six Aerospace Engineering undergraduates, have designed and built a small drone aircraft to participate in a national Unmanned-Aerial-Surveillance (UAS) competition."

(More at the UI-UC Aerospace Robotics and Control website.)


INDIANA

Indiana State University

ISU Drones Create 'World's Largest Video Game' - Indiana State University hopes to turn its unmanned aerial systems minor into a four-year bachelor's degree program.


IOWA

Iowa State University - Ames, IA (a land-grant university)

ISU drones for peaceful uses only - Drones will one day dot Iowa’s skies, saving lives and improving the environment one unmanned flight at a time, dreamers at Iowa State University say.


KANSAS

Kansas State University (a land-grant university)

Drones flying in Kansas skies as well - "Kansas State University has about a dozen drones, ranging in weight from 2 pounds to just under 50 pounds, said Josh Brungardt, unmanned aircraft systems program director at K-State-Salina . . . . 'We specialize in civilian use of drones, not military use of drones,' he said.


MICHIGAN

Northwestern Michigan College

Drones in Michigan skies raise hopes, concerns - "[I]n Traverse City, students at Northwestern Michigan College can fly their unmanned aircraft in a small field outside the city where no manned vehicles are permitted to fly. The college’s FAA permit remains active."


MINNESOTA

University of Minnesota (a land-grant university)

University of Minnesota researchers demo AR.Drone controlled by thought - "Using the same brain-computer interface technique, [a team at the University of Minnesota] was able to successfully demonstrate full 3D control over an AR.Drone 1.0, using a video feed from its front-facing camera as a guide."


MISSOURI

University of Missouri (a land-grant university)

Missouri Drone Journalism - "The Missouri Drone Journalism Program is a partnership between students at the Missouri School of Journalism, the University of Missouri Information Technology Program and NPR member station KBIA"


NEBRASKA

University of Nebraska-Lincoln (a land-grant university)

Drone Journalism Lab - "Links, thoughts and research into using drones, UAVs or remotely piloted vehicles for journalism at the Drone Journalism Lab at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln's College of Journalism and Mass Communications."


NORTH DAKOTA

University of North Dakota - Grand Forks, ND

UND Aerospace - "The Center for Unmanned Aircraft Systems Research, Education and Training will provide a conduit between private industry and UAS researchers, promoting commercialization of new UAS-related products and services while bringing new UAS-related business ventures to North Dakota."


OHIO

Ohio State University - Columbus, Ohio (a land-grant university)

OSU sees farming uses for drones - "The university this week put its inaugural drone prototype on public display for the first time at the Farm Science Review, an annual showcase of ag technology that runs through Thursday at the Molly Caren Agricultural Center in Madison County."


SOUTH DAKOTA

South Dakota School of Mines - Rapid City, SD

South Dakota School of Mines and Technology’s Unmanned Aerial Vehicle team - "The unmanned aerial vehicle team was formed for several reasons. The primary reason, for at least the first few years, is to compete in and win the International Aerial Robotics Competition. We would also like to gain some real world experience that we can take to our jobs after graduation. Another important reason for the SDSM&T UAV team is to explore the frontier of aerial robotics. The team would like to someday develop some new technologies which will be used in both commercial and military UAV’s."


WISCONSIN

University of Wisconsin–Madison (a land-grant university)

UW Physics Garage - "This project will explore the limits of small drone (quadcopter, maple seed) observations for environmental and archeological survey and other applications."



Related posts

It is time now to turn to the dirty secret of American life and the primary dilemma of the antiwar movement: the military money that flows to EVERY Congressional district, and in particular the "good jobs" that members of Congress think they are protecting when they vote for ever-higher levels of military spending.

(See Drones, Permawar, and the Problem of "Good Jobs")









What are some of the forms that campus activism might take? Since Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory has a contract to do drone research, the National Campaign for Nonviolent Resistance [NCNR], on May 1, sent a letter to Ronald J. Daniels, JHU president, and Dr. Ralph Semmel, director of the APL, seeking a meeting . . . .

(See Anti-Killer Drone Activists Seek Meeting with Johns Hopkins University President ) 

Did you know there is an online resource FULL of materials to use in organizing your local activism against drones?

(See Organizer Manual on the NSDSW wiki)

Mothers Don't Let Your Children Grow Up to Be Drone Pilots

The New York Times is trying to tell us something. "Look, I'm not your conscience," it seems to be trying to say. "I'm not responsible for getting everything ethically right: that's your job. I just lob stuff up for you to react to. Have you got a pulse? REACT!"

Let's start with the title of the article that appeared on the front page of today's Times. When a major newspaper uses the term "kill shot" in a headline without irony -- without quotation marks, as I just used -- it screams out for us to say "WAIT A MINUTE! We don't talk about killing and injury so glibly!" (See Elisabeth Bumiller, "A Day Job Waiting for a Kill Shot a World Away".)

Drone pilot console

Moving on to the first paragraph, we are reminded that the nation's newspapers long ago abandoned any pretense of judiciousness in reporting about the combatant status of the targets of the U.S. military and the C.I.A. The people in the story are "insurgents" and "militants" -- apparently because the military says so. The words "alleged" and "reported" and "suspected" are nowhere to be seen. And that's why we, the readers, need to mentally supply those words and restore some semblance of reality to the story.

The story goes on to report that drone operators might feel empathy for the people they follow with their video eyes ... but, on the other hand, they claim they don't lose any sleep over the attacks they carry out ... and yet they do know that it's more than just a video game ... at least when commanders "beat into their crews" the message that it's not just a video game.

Is that all clear?

Anyone trying to get a moral bead on the issue of drone operation could be forgiven for getting dizzy. Perhaps the most honest sentence in the whole article is this:

In his 10 years at Creech, he said without elaborating, "I've seen some pretty disturbing things."

Figure it out, reader!

The U.S. military is desperately trying to beef up the ranks of its drone pilots - to meet a "near insatiable demand for drones." There's only one way that's going to happen, and that's if we let our young people think that it's okay to sign up. The world of military service is more abstracted and foreign than ever. If ever there was a time that young people needed guidance from others about what military service might mean for them, that time is now.

The New York Times is putting us on notice -- this is where the real battleground is -- at the recruiting station. It's not the job of The New York Times -- or any other part of the media -- to pass judgement on the state of the world. Their job is just to tee up the issue. It's up to us, on the other hand, to face those issues head on, and to do something about them.

JOIN OTHERS NEAR YOU to oppose drones! See the full state-by-state list on the No Drones Network website.


Related posts

Grounded raises tough questions. I was hoping that the play would challenge the idea that killing people with drones is good. It's a reflection of the seriousness of this work that that is just one of the issues it raises; others include our society's willingness to destroy the people who we employ to "serve" ("serve our country," serve us in general), our culture's worship of violence / use of force, and the consequences of pervasive surveillance.

(See "Everything Is Witnessed": Searching for "the Guilty" in GROUNDED )


We need to do several things for our young people. First of all, we need to show them pictures of war and explain: "This is what real chaos looks like." And then we need to ask, "Still think this sounds appealing?"

(See The Few, the Proud ... and the Chaos)

A big Hollywood production of Ender's Game is scheduled for release on November 1. It's a perfect opportunity for us to ask: Are we happy seeing our schools turned into "Battle Schools"?

(See "Ender's Game" and the Militarization of Youth: Can We Talk About This? )

Ames serves a largely Spanish-speaking community. Is the militarization of Ames anything other than a signal of what the Democratic party means by equitable treatment for immigrants?

(See The Militarization of Ames: The Real Meaning of the DREAM Act )

Not Your Father's Antiwar Movement

I have very clear memories of the '60s and '70s, when the antiwar movement was driven by fear of the draft.

Today we live in a different world. Without the draft, the people have "checked out." It is like Rome ... the legions do the work of empire and the people are kept happy with bread and circus. (Or Starbucks and "Dancing With the Stars," if you prefer.)

You can't get good help these days . . . .

Of course, our government now has to go to the trouble of recruiting volunteers, but our leaders have figured out that they can get most of the work done by a class that supplies its sons (and some daughters) as soldiers, and doesn't really figure out what's happening until those kids' deployments are over or kids themselves become casualties. (See the great new film "Where Soldiers Come From" for a brutal depiction of this reality.)

And we are moving away from even that inconvenience, by figuring out ways to get more and more of our killing done by robots. The fundamental problem of drones is that their pervasive use cuts the people's last ties to their feelings of responsibility for the most serious acts of their government.

The challenge of the antiwar movement is to stop fighting the battles of the past -- addressing a populace that is afraid of the draft -- and to start dealing with this new reality: a populace that has been reduced to being one rung above being robots themselves.


Related posts

In my opinion, the reason to focus on drones is this: when we focus on drones, the general public is able to "get," to an unusual extent, the degree to which popular consent has been banished from the process of carrying out state violence. (Sure, it was banished long ago, but the absence of a human in the cockpit of a drone suddenly makes a light bulb go off in people's heads.) It takes some prodding, but people can sense that drone use somehow crosses a line. And that opens up the discussion about how our consent has been eliminated from the vast range of US militarism.

(See "Why focus on drone attacks?")

Leveling Up is the creative work that demonstrates just how thoroughly America's new ways of warfare have become intertwined with the other dominant strands in our culture.

(See Level Up, Step Up, Grow Up, Man Up . . . Wake Up)

If the public will join us in asking the question "Who decides?" about drone executions, I believe they will rapidly come to realize that they are utterly dissatisfied with what the government is saying.

(See Who Decides? (When Drones are Judge, Jury, and Executioner) )

I { love | hate } the Chicago Air & Water Show

Ever since I moved to Chicago about 15 years ago, I've participated in one of the great summer rituals here: the annual Chicago Air and Water Show. It takes place on a mid-August weekend every year, and by Thursday afternoon the week of the show, the skies over Chicago are filled with the thunder of jets warming up for their performances on Saturday and Sunday.


Several million people will go to the lakefront for the show -- the operative word is "throng" -- and there is no denying that the events are eye-popping. If you don't think jets are cool, you haven't seen a Blue Angel fly 100 feet above the beach upside down.

I remember being flabbergasted when a stealth bomber lumbered down the lakeshore. It was massive.

And I remember being mystified when a stealth fighter passed. Unlike all the other rumbling and roaring planes, it snuck by in silence.


More than anything, I have a visceral memory of lying in the grass in Lincoln Park as a jet streaked east towards the lake, and the thought occurred to me, "This would be terrifying if I were a rice farmer in a paddy somewhere and I didn't know what this is all about."

Yes, I confess, up until that moment, I had approached the Chicago Air and Water Show with very little perspective, or awareness, or empathy for others.

There are people who stand up every year to add needed perspective to the event.

This is important, because the Chicago Air and Water Show is a glorification of our power to make war. It says, "Look how powerful we are. Look how clever we are. Aren't you glad you're a part of this? (Maybe if you're lucky, you could actually join the team!) Here come the jets -- flexing their muscles so you don't have to ...." Bread and circus updated for the 2000s . . . .

What does it say about us that millions turn out to enjoy the war machine spectacle, and only a handful come to protest it?


And the part about "joining the team" is especially important, because the Chicago Air and Water Show is a critical moment to directly and indirectly recruit young people to be absorbed into the American war machine. All the services will have their recruiting booths there. This juxtaposition of entertainment and recruiting pitch is always obscene, but especially so as our government sidles into its fourth (Iraq*, Afghanistan, Libya**, Pakistan***) concurrent war while watching the civilian economy continue to shrivel and the jobs for young people all but dry up.

C'mon Chicago - do you think the Blue Angels exist because it's patriotic to give midwesterners free entertainment in the summer? Do you think they fly up and down the lakefront because they need the practice?

Now, when I see those jets, I think, "I do know what this is all about, which is precisely why I find it terrifying!"

-----------------------------------------------------------------

* Well, only still an American "war" in the sense that it is still producing American "casualties".

** The Obama administration says that, far from being a "war," Libya doesn't even count as "hostilities," because it only involves an air campaign. Think about this assertion as you watch the jets streak by at the Chicago Air & Water Show.

*** I don't know if there will be a Predator drone in the Chicago Air & Water Show this year. It would certainly seem odd to leave the drones at home, considering the degree to which drones have come to define America's posture toward the rest of the world!

Related posts

Coming off our experience this past weekend once again protesting against drone killing, drone surveillance, and related acts of militarism at the Chicago Air and Water Show, I am more confirmed than ever in my view that air shows are a very effective place to get our message out to the public.

(See Why Air Shows Are a Very Effective Place to Protest Drone Killing and Drone Surveillance )

Now that the Israeli government's killings in Gaza are front-page news -- particularly the way military aircraft is being used to mow down innocent men, women, and children -- Boeing's involvement is in everyone's face.

(See Boeing Has an Israel Problem . . . and Chicago Has a Boeing Problem)






I'm trying to understand: "What was Hayao Miyazaki thinking (when he made his latest animated film, The Wind Rises)?" How can this most humane (and antiwar) of artists created an homage to the creator of the Japanese Zero fighter plane?

(See Boys and Their Toys (Trying to Understand "The Wind Rises"))



We're out here today
to highlight a contradiction
that we sit here in comfort
and ooh and ahh over these war machines.
We think it's important that we remember
that when the rest of the world hears these sounds
it means that their lives may soon be ending.

(See Taking the NO DRONES! Message to the Masses at Chicago's Air and Water Show)

The U.S. military is desperately trying to beef up the ranks of its drone pilots - to meet a "near insatiable demand for drones." There's only one way that's going to happen, and that's if we let our young people think that it's okay to sign up. The world of military service is more abstracted and foreign than ever. If ever there was a time that young people needed guidance from others about what military service might mean for them, that time is now.

(See Mothers Don't Let Your Children Grow Up to Be Drone Pilots)