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FROM INDIAN COUNTRY TODAY
Homeless In Hawai'i: More Land For The Military Than For Hawaiians
By Winona LaDuke - Guest Columnist
It’s summer in Hawai'i, the state is considering another generous land donation to the military and has made homelessness a crime. Under the cover of the term "Military Transformation" and with the blanket of 9/11, the military is taking a wide berth in land stealing. And, recently enacted Act 50 makes criminals out of people who have been displaced by the military itself, many of them Native Hawaiian.
"They bombed the houses in the l940s and took over the entire valley," explained Sparky Rodrigues, one of many Makua residents still waiting to move home. "The government moved all of the residents out and said after the war, you can move back - and then they used the houses for target practice. The families tell stories that the military came with guns and said, ‘Here’s $300, thank you,’ and ‘You’ve got to move.’ Those people remain without their houses, and for years, many lived on the beaches in beautiful Makua Valley, watching the bombing of their land.
"Tomorrow morning they’re going to detonate a 1,000 pounder, a 500 pounder and a 100 pound bomb," Rodriques mused. Such detonations are part of the military cleanup of the site before, apparently, any new maneuvers. "We’ve gone in and observed them detonate those bombs," said Rodriques. More than once, live ammunition has washed up on the beaches at Makua.
Malu Aina, a military watchdog group from Hawai'i reported:
"Live military ordnance in large quantities has been found off Hapuna Beach and in Hilo Bay. Additional ordnance, including grenades, artillery shells, rockets, mortars, armor piercing ordnance, bazooka rounds, napalm bombs, and hedgehog missiles have been found at Hilo airport in Waimea town, Waikoloa Village, in North and South Kohala at Puako and Mahukona, in Kea’au and Maku’u farm lots in Puna, at South Point in Ka’u, and on residential and school grounds. At least nine people have been killed or injured by exploding ordnance. Some unexploded ordnance can be set off even by cell phones.
"Since the end of World War II, Hawai'i has been the center of the United States military’s Pacific Command (PACOM), from which all U.S. forces in the region are directed. Hawai'i serves as an outpost for Pacific expansionism, along with Guam, the Marshall Islands, Samoa and the Philippines. PACOM is the center of U.S. military activities over more than half the earth, from the west coast of the U.S. to Africa’s east coast, from the Arctic to Antarctica, covering 70 percent of the world’s oceans.
The military controls more of Hawai'i than any other state, including some 25 percent of Oahu, valuable "submerged lands" (i.e. estuaries and bays), and until relatively recently, the island of Kaho’olawe. The island was the only National Historic Site also used as a bombing range. Finally, after years of litigation and negotiations, Congress placed a moratorium on the bombing, but after $400 million already spent in cleanup money, much remains to be completed.
Part Two Tomorrow...
