NO DRONES Protest at Beale AFB

CodePINKers protest drones at Beale AFB this week. One soldier writes the following paragraph protesting our presence there:

I just wanted to know why you were protesting. There is nothing on this base that kills anyone. The RQ-4 Drones do not carry weapons, they are strictly reconnaissance, along with the U-2. As a matter of fact, the RQ-4 from Beale found the pilot that crashed in Alaska. I live on base, so what you guys were doing, was practically outside my house. It's not what I want to see when I leave base, and I won't change my views about my career. Yes, we fight for your ability to protest, don't abuse it by attacking us. I just wanted to let you know that I believe it was rude. I'm not standing out in your lawn saying support death. I don't believe that we should use death as power, but we use it to protect us. All you did was make a fool of yourselves. I'm asking, please, use your heads and don't attack us for "drones that kill" when we don't have them here. That is all.

This is my response:

Dear Eric:

We so appreciate you taking the time to write.

I would like to answer your question and to respond to your comments, even though I was not physically at this protest.

Why you were protesting?: We were protesting because 1) we are anti-war activists and we are working to END WAR NOW! And 2) drones are one of the most abhorrent weapons of war and we are committed to ending the use of drones as weapons of war.

You say the RQ-4 does not carry weapons, which we are well aware, therefore we should not be at Beale protesting. First of all, many many pieces uphold war. All the pieces together make war doable. And this drone is one of those pieces, as are you and I.

In addition, “reconnaissance” includes the spying on people, and incredibly 'sophisticated' “target surveillance”. Without “reconnaissance” and “surveillance” other drones that do carry weapons would not have as great an ability to hunt down and kill people.

We understand protesters are not what you want to see when you leave the base. Imagine how people who are living in countries occupied by u.s. troops feel seeing u.s soldiers outside their door – or banging down their door – every day. 

So if you help get our soldiers to leave other peoples' countries, we will certainly stop protesting at your front door.

And please, Eric, do not kid yourself or make yourself feel better about participating in our war machine by somehow convincing yourself that anything you are doing is fighting for our ability to protest. 

There is no way imaginable that you can begin to explain how killing non-white women, children, and men in tiny countries that have even tinier military power and occupying their countries contributes anything to our ability to protest.

The people who have fought for our ability to protest have been CIVILIANS right here on this land: Sojourner Truth, Dolores Huerta, Mother Jones, Martin Luther King, for example. 

The military fights for the rights of our corporations to exploit, conquer, abuse any resource that any other nation, weaker than ours, has and we want. History shows that very, very, very clearly – as history shows the many brave u.s. civilians who stood up and fought for our rights here at home.

And if you did think you were fighting for our right to protest, are you saying that right is limited to protesting everyone but the military? Come on Eric, then you really don’t think you’re fighting for our right to protest but our right to be on the same page as you are.

If polite means not holding the military accountable for the abuse of drones as horrific killing machines, then please let us be counted as VERY VERY VERY VERY RUDE!

You say you don’t think we should use death as power. The military believes power is death, killing, destruction, domination, might, rape, torture, terror, war. 

We believe power is holding all life sacred, eliminating violence, truly caring for people.

How is killing so many innocent and very poor people in Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan “protecting” us? Protecting us from what? 

No country’s military has ever attacked us. We are the only country who has sent our military around the world attacking over 28 brown, black, red and yellow nations and peoples since the end of WWII – oh, yes, one sort of white nation, but Muslim, Bosnia.

Again, what the military is protecting – and always has been used to protect – is the power of u.s. corporations to go and do whatever they want to and in other nations. 

We ask you to use your heart and your head and join us on the front lines of ENDING WAR NOW!

Until the next NO DRONES protest, Xan