More Arrests at Creech Air Force Base Trying to Stop Drone Warfare

From: The Nuclear Resister

April 2, 2016

from Nevada Desert Experience

Indian Springs, NV – On Friday, April 1, morning traffic at Creech Air Force Base was diverted by dozens of peace and justice activists attempting to shut down the armed drone attack program through nonviolent civil resistance. At 7:45 a.m., eleven peaceful resisters were arrested at the two main gates of Creech. At 10:00 a.m. another six were arrested at the main East Gate while blocking the entrance with “crime scene” tape, referring to the criminal activity of weaponized drone terrorism conducted at Creech, killing thousands of non-combatants and civilians over the past decade.

These arrests, conducted by Las Vegas Metropolitan police, were the last waves of repression this week from Clark County, which has failed to investigate or stop the alleged extra-judicial assassinations conducted at Creech. Fourteen of the justice and peace activists arrested on April 1 received citations for jaywalking, and three received citations for trespassing on federal property.

The 17 activists arrested on April 1 were: Toby Blome, MaryKate Glenn, Shirley Osgood, Chris Nelson, Mahaia Oliveira, Tyler Schaefer, Dennis Duvall, Susan Witka, Fred Bialy, Ron Foust, Arla Ertz, Brian Terrell, Leslie Angeline, Cynthia Papermaster, John Ford, Rene Espleland and Flora Rogers. Some of the activists are being held in jail over the weekend.

Nevada Desert Experience (NDE) is an active non-profit organization in support of this week’s anti-killer-drone protests at Camp Justice. Camp Justice is organized by Veterans For Peace, Code Pink, NDE, and Voices for Creative Nonviolence. For more information, see NevadaDesertExperience.org or call 702-646-4814.

Nevada Desert Experience to serve Creech AFB with a War Crimes Indictment

On Wednesday, April 16, 2014, between 6:30 and 8:00 AM, the Sacred Peace Walk conducted by Nevada Desert Experience (NDE) will serve a War Crimes Indictment to Creech AFB Commander Colonel Jim Cluff. The Indictment can be viewed online. Arrests seem likely when Sacred Peace Walk Representatives attempt to deliver this indictment in person. There will also be a vigil in front of the base.

Brandon Bryant, a former US Predator operator, in the newly released motion picture, DRONE, said, “There is a lie hidden within that truth. And the lie is that it’s always been the air force that has flown those missions. The CIA might be the customer but the air force has always flown it. A CIA label is just an excuse to not have to give up any information. That is all it has ever been.” (See reference below.)

In light of yesterday’s breaking revelations about the “secretive cluster of units with the wing call the 732nd Operations Group”, where the CIA is using Creech Air Force Pilots to carry out drone strikes in Pakistan, NDE’s War Indictment could not be delivered at a more timely moment. Clearly the illegality of the largest targeted drone killing program can no longer be denied or covered up.

“We also are here to call upon the airmen and airwomen to consider the spiritual impact of the horrifying physical violence conducted by Creech AFB,” said NDE Council member Marcus Page-Collonge.

Local Peace Group Welcomes Pakistan Peace Delegates for Air Force anti-Drone Demonstrations This Week

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Local Peace Group Welcomes Pakistan Peace Delegates for Air Force anti-Drone Demonstrations This Week;
Prepares for “Sacred Peace Walk” Stepping Off on March 24

CONTACTS:
Jim Haber, 415-828-2506
Nevada Desert Experience Coordinator
Toby Blome, 510-541-6874
Ann Wright, Ret., 818-741-1141

March 18, 2013

As Nevada Desert Experience makes final preparations for its annual desert sojourn known as the “Sacred Peace Walk,” a group of demonstrators are converging on the gates of Creech Air Force Base to hold constant vigil against the rising tide of robotic hunter-killer air systems like the Predator and Reaper “drones” controlled by crews at the Indian Springs installation.

The Sacred Peace Walk begins on Palm Sunday, March 24, with a day of marching in Las Vegas taking in the Strip and Fremont Street Experience and a stop at the Dept. of Energy’s North Las Vegas facility. Then the group moves to the desert for its walking meditation and peace demonstrations at Creech and the Nevada National Security Site (NNSS).

Until then an additional set of actions are taking place at Creech including three members of the activist group CODEPINK who went to Pakistan in October, 2012 as part of a peace delegation there to show solidarity with Pakistanis who are suffering under the constant threat of “death by drone.z’ People there are marching in the tens of thousands against the Pakistan and United States wink-and-a-nod targeted assassinations. Retired Army Col. Ann Wright of Honolulu, HI, Toby Blome of El Cerrito, CA and JoAnne Lingle of Indianapolis, IN also were all arrested in Washington DC recently during the Senate hearings for John Brennan’s appointment to direct the Central Intelligence Agency.

Col. Wright explained “I came to Creech Air Base to challenge the US drone program at a base from where pilots fly drones in Afghanistan and other places–killing innocent civilians. The anger of the world is focused on the US assassin drone program and is making the United States less safe.” Lingle added, “It is vitally important that we address both drone crews as well as policy-makers to say these surveillance and attack drones are illegal and immoral. We have a responsibility to do all we can to stop them nonviolently. That includes standing up in Washington and here at Creech.”

Wright added that the CIA’s drone strikes in Pakistan–and other countries the US isn’t officially at war with–are dwarfed by the number of strikes in Afghanistan. Dept. of Defense statistics available on their website until late February according to the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, showed that of the missile strikes in Afghanistan in 2012, 25% of them, almost 500, were fired from drones. There were 46 CIA drone strikes in Pakistan in the same year. “Creech drone crews have fired 10 times as many missiles into Afghanistan as CIA operators have into Pakistan,” added Wright.

The Sacred Peace Walk began as the “Lenten Desert Experience” in 1982 with prayer times and acts of resistance to full-scale nuclear weapons testing being conducted at the Nevada Test Site that time. Over the years, the annual pilgrimage to the United States nuclear sacrifice zone has expanded to raise concerns about other emerging arms races with activities in southern Nevada. “When I came to Las Vegas five years ago, I couldn’t work to resist nuclear weapons and just walk past the air force’s ‘drone central’. Unfortunately, we’re still developing new bombs and warheads, so that race continues too. In any arms race, there are no winners. ”

For route and schedule details of the walk and other background information, visit NevadaDesertExperience.org. Over 30 walkers are already signed up for this year’s walk.

Terminator Planet: the first History of Drone Warfare

Terminator Planet: the first History of Drone Warfare
By Nick Turse and Tom Engelhardt

From the Blurb on Amazon:

The first history of drone warfare, written as it happened. From the opening missile salvo in the skies over Afghanistan in 2001 to a secret strike in the Philippines early this year, or a future in which drones dogfight off the coast of Africa, Terminator Planet takes you to the front lines of combat, Washington war rooms, and beyond.

Drawing on several years of research — including official documents, open-source intelligence, and interviews with military officers — two of the foremost analysts specializing in drone war offer a sobering, factual account of robot warfare combined with critical analyses found nowhere else.

Packed with rarely seen Pentagon photos, Terminator Planet provides a rich history of the last decade of drone warfare, a clear-eyed look at its present, and a far-reaching guide to its future. You used to have to watch science fiction movies to imagine where that future was headed, now you can read Terminator Planet — and know.

Another day at the office of bombing people

So you want to be a drone pilot? Have a seat in the operator’s control station that guides the remotely piloted aircraft. You could be sitting in a trailer on Creech Air Force Base in Nevada or doing your duty at CIA headquarters in Langley, Va. From this perch, you can see a battle space on the other side of the world. You are virtually on the front lines of war.

One of the screens in front of you has a live full-motion video feed from the aircraft (perhaps showing the home of an anti-American sheik and his family in Pakistan or Afghanistan). A second screen has mission data like the altitude of the drone and its fuel level. A third screen displays multilayered menus of more data. You can steer the drone with the joystick in your right hand; the pedals beneath your feet control its rudder. But if you want to turn on the autopilot, it will require 22 keystrokes on one of several available keyboards.

Your partner, the “sensor operator” seated next to you, controls the camera. He or she can zoom in on the face of the man you are hunting. Is this target a danger to the United States?

Further reading.

Knowdrones

What you should know about drones and what you should do.

Ten things you did not know about drones

For example “they were created” and they probably have a “father”.
Further reading.

Gloucester (England): public meeting and peace vigil about drones

"Hancock 38" Defendants Found Guilty for Bold Army Base Protest Against U.S. Drone Attacks Abroad

From: DemocracyNow.org:

Thirty-one of 38 accused activists were found guilty on Thursday for their role in a protest against U.S. drone attacks in Pakistan and Afghanistan. The activists were arrested on April 22 at the New York Air National Guard base at Hancock Field near Syracuse, New York, after trespassing to protest the MQ-9 Reaper drones, which the 174th Fighter Wing of the Guard has remotely flown over Afghanistan since late 2009. The protesters draped themselves in white clothes splattered with blood-red pigment and then staged a “die-in” at the main entrance to the base. They said their act of nonviolent civil disobedience aimed to visualize the indiscriminate killing of civilians in Afghanistan and Pakistan by drones operated by personnel sitting in front of computers thousands of miles away. The group calls themselves the Hancock 38 Drone Resisters. Following the guilty verdict, four of the activists were sentenced to 15-day terms in prison while a number of others were given fines and community service. We speak to Ramsey Clark, the former U.S. attorney general turned outspoken human rights activist, who testified at the trial that the drones violate international law. We’re also joined by Harry Murray, one of the Hancock 38 and a co-defendant in the trial. “Having a drone control center established at Hancock Air Base has really brought the war home to central New York,” Murray says. “Having people who are actually killing human beings in Afghanistan working right in Syracuse really makes Syracuse and upstate New York a war zone.” Clark says drones are “a weapon of extreme provocation and extreme danger, extreme inaccuracy… International law, I believe, does prohibit the use of drones.”

Guests:
Ramsey Clark, lawyer and former U.S. attorney general.

Harry Murray, one of the Hancock 38 Drone Resisters and a co-defendant in the trial. He is professor of sociology and anthropology at Nazareth College, where he also serves as director of the peace and justice studies major.

Read the whole interview here…

Unoccupy Creech

Catholic Worker-Led Protests Against Nukes & Drones in Nevada
WHAT: Demonstration/Protest
WHEN: Sunday October, 9, 2011
WHERE: 9:00 a.m. Gate of Nevada National Security Site, Mercury, NV
1:00 p.m. Gates of Creech Air Force Base, Indian Springs, NV
***VISUALS: Signs, Banners, Puppets and Props, Civil-Resistance***

(Las Vegas) The largest anti-war demonstration ever at Creech Air Force Base in Indian Springs, Nevada, and the largest anti-nuclear civil resistance action in at least six years at the Nevada Test Site (now officially called the Nevada National Security Site or NNSS) will take place on Sunday, October 9. Over 200 radical pacifists from across the globe will swell the ranks of local activists because of the International Catholic Worker (CW)gathering in Las Vegas October 7 and 8. The CW gathering culminates with the antinuclear, anti-drone demonstrations which also mark the 10th tragic anniversary of the US
invasion of Afghanistan.

Creech Air Force Base is the headquarters of the USAF’s 432nd Air Wing of Predator and Reaper drones which operates armed remotely piloted aircraft in various foreign countries.
The NNSS continues to support the country’s nuclear weapons programs, has a mandate to restart full-scale nuclear bomb tests within two years if so ordered by the President,and receives and stores radioactive waste on land that legally belongs to the Western Shoshone Nation.

Jim Haber, Coordinator of Nevada Desert Experience which has a long history of peace activism in Nevada commented, “We are making connections to the Occupy Everywhere movement as well, but our prime focus is against war and killing as epitomized first by nuclear weapons and now drone assassins. Both rely on anti-democratic, secretive sites like these, the militarization of space, the desecration of ecosystems, and the swallowing of money that could otherwise be used to solve, rather than create social problems.”

“We are at an important milestone with 10 years of occupation in Afghanistan (and 8 in Iraq), expending millions of our tax dollars on unmanned aerial vehicles which are responsible for thousands of civilian deaths. The wars have bankrupted our country. It’s time to stop the deadly drone strikes,” states Nancy Mancias, CODEPINK Ground the Drones campaigner.

The protests are also part of the Keep Space for Peace Week: International Week of
Protest to Stop the Militarization of Space taking place between October 1-8. Keep Space for Peace Week is co-sponsored by the Women’s International League for Peace &
Freedom, Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (UK), Swedish Peace Council, Drone
Campaign Network (UK), and United Against Drones (U.S.). A complete list of global
protests can be found here.

Information contact:
Jim Haber, Nevada Desert Experience, 702-646-4814 (office), 415-828-2506 (mobile)
Brian Terrell, Catholic Worker, 773-853-1886 (mobile)