Army paid Native Hawaiian liaison $742,392

Through the Freedom of Information Act, the AFSC Hawai’i recently obtained the contract between the Army Garrison Hawai’i and Annelle Amaral (W912CN-08-C-0051), the Army’s Native Hawaiian liaison in Hawai’i. The original contract and its eight modifications are worth $742,392 until August 15, 2010.

Download the contract and modifications here.

The statement of work states:

(a) Prepare a written Community Relations Plan (CRP) which shall present a clear, comprehensive and responsive program to present and explain the issues of the presence of the Army in Hawaii to the affected communities, neighborhood boards, special interest groups, resource agencies at all levels of government, and interested individuals.

(b) Represent USAG-HI leadership at community meetings with community groups to provide information to community on the Army’s positions, activities, accomplishments as they relate to Native Hawaiian issues and other concerns;

(c) Obtain outside points of view, opinions, or advice of noted community leaders, organizations, or experts to avoid too limited judgment on critical community and transformations issues, and provide feedback to USAG-HI leadership;

(d) Enhance USAG-HI’s understanding of, and develop alternative solutions to, complex community issues, and provide advice on Native Hawaiian issues and concerns, and propose a way-ahead;

(e) Provide training or workshops to USAG-HI or Army personnel on Native Hawaiian issues and concerns.

(f) Attend monthly USAG-HI command and staff meetings or special topic planning meetings. The SP shall attend meetings and serve as the subject matter expert and provide technical and functional advice and assistance on community support and related special project issues. Meetings will be held on the Islands of Oahu and Hawaii.

Her job is primarily to “fix” the Army’s community relations problem with Kanaka Maoli and organize a pro-military Native Hawaiian front. The “Native Hawaiian Covenant” and the Makua community leaders media event were examples of this tactic.

These are the same counterinsurgency methods used in Afghanistan and Iraq to try to win over a segment of the native population as a fig leaf of legitimacy for what is an illegal occupation. As is true for people around the world, no amount of community relations can change the basic historical truths and the material consequences of imperialism in Hawai’i. The Army cannot “P.R.” away a peoples’ hunger for justice.

As expected, the line of discourse has been “Can’t we all get along?”; “How can we have a win-win situation?”; “Can’t we have reconciliation?” The Army has acknowledged some of its past harm, and expressed an openness to listening and doing things better. But ultimately, the message is an appeal to support the troops, our loved ones in the military who need to train before they are put in harm’s way.

But there cannot be a real reconciliation without sincere and just resolution of the historical wrongs committed by the U.S. and its military in Hawai’i, or without addressing the immorality and illegality of the current policies/wars. As long as the military occupies hundreds of thousands of acres of Hawaiian national land and uses these lands to practice invading and waging wars against other countries, how can anyone seriously believe there can be reconciliation? The people of Hawai’i did not declare a war or launch an invasion of other peoples’ countries. The way to keep our loved ones safe is by keeping them out of the war.

In March, Annelle Amaral was quoted on KITV as saying

The relationship between Native Hawaiians and the military becomes increasingly hostile as the years progress. Enough already. It’s time for us to learn to work on building bridges instead of blowing them up.

The only ones blowing things up is the military. Is the military “building bridges” by continuing destruction of sacred sites on land that was stolen from the Hawaiian Kingdom?

Some questions that emerge: Was this a congressional earmark or sole source (no-bid) contract? If so, who directed the earmark? Since the contract is listed as an “NHO award” (Native Hawaiian Organization), it was most likely awarded as a sole source contract, that is a contract that is awarded by the government without any request for proposals or competition, and an unlimited size award. Alaska Native and Native Hawaiian Organizations are given special contracting privileges – called “Special 8A” under the minority contracting set-asides.

The community relations plan developed by the Native Hawaiian liaison must be released to the public. What advice was given to the Army to solve it’s problem with the Kanaka Maoli?

Annelle Amaral was on “First Friday” on 8/6/10, a live call-in program on ‘Olelo Community Television, Channel 53. The taped program will run on subsequent Fridays for the month of August. It is also available online on-demand:

http://olelo.granicus.com/MediaPlayer.php?view_id=30&clip_id=15103

August 8, 2010February 14, 2011

Strykers: Following public outcry, OHA calls on Army to honor 2008 agreement

The Hawaii Independent published another piece on the Army’s failure to conduct cultural surveys for the areas affected by its Stryker brigade expansion and the follow up action by the Office of Hawaiian Affairs calling on the Army to honor terms of a 2008 settlement agreement. The Hawaii Independent reports: “According to the settlement, OHA does have the option, if the two parties cannot come to a consensus on the identification of historic properties eligible for the Register, of seeking an injunction to halt construction should attempts at mediation prove unsuccessful.”

>><<

http://thehawaiiindependent.com/story/stryker-update/

Strykers: Following public outcry, OHA calls on Army to honor 2008 agreement

Aug 08, 2010 – 02:06 PM | by Samson Kaala Reiny

HONOLULU—Amid public outcry, the Office of Hawaiian Affairs (OHA) has requested that the U.S. Army honors a 2008 agreement that helps identify and protect cultural sites.

A week after OHA officials met face-to-face with concerned members of the Hawaiian community over a damning archaeological report the organization sat on for almost a year, a letter was sent to the Army on Friday, August 6, requesting that the military “promptly evaluate the historic properties” discovered.

Download OHA’s letter to Army Garrison_8-6-10

Download the 2008 settlement agreement between OHA and the Army.

Christopher Monahan’s full report on the Stryker vehicles and cultural sites can be viewed at http://www.scribd.com/doc/48829377/09-Monahan-Report.

August 3, 2010February 14, 2011

OHA ‘drops the ball’ in protecting cultural sites from Stryker brigade

The Hawaii Independent has published an exclusive article about a formerly secret archaeological and cultural report contracted jointly by the Army and the Office of Hawaiian Affairs (OHA) for areas affected by the Army’s Stryker Brigade expansion. The article states:

The report, written by independently contracted archaeologist Christopher Monahan, comments on the Army’s numerous shortcomings in its attempts at documenting cultural sites, which, if included on the National Register of Historic Places, offers them various protections from being disturbed.

The report was the end result of a lawsuit OHA filed against the Army in November 2006 alleging violations against the NHPA and the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA). Cultural monitors claimed that numerous sites were being mistreated or were endangered, including Haleauau heiau near Schofield Barracks, whose protective buffers were razed by bulldozers in July of that year.

In October 2008, a settlement was reached where OHA would drop its lawsuit based on its then knowledge of the existing surveys and reports. In return, the Army allowed the independently contracted archaeologist, Monahan, as well as OHA staff, access to Stryker Brigade sites for a total of 50 days in order to draw up an objective second opinion. OHA had the option then to proceed with mediation or litigation based on the new findings.

The article describes some of the findings and conclusions in the archaeologist’s report:

Monahan is critical of the methods used in the previous surveys conducted by the military and its hired firms, recognizing there are issues with the competency of the field personnel involved. It also notes a general lack of subsurface testing, or excavating, to locate such sites. Instead, there are “mere guesses … and based on relatively little scientific data.”

At some locations, Monahan’s findings more than doubled the number of known features the Army had previously reported.

There is also concern regarding numerous earlier reports—ones that evaluated surveys taken of impacted areas—that were not made available to him because they were in draft form. Most problematic was a major report on the Kahuku Training Area, which was completed six years ago but is still not available.

The Army is systematically erasing the history and sacred places in Lihu’e, Kahuku, Pohakuloa and the other areas impacted by its Stryker Brigade expansion. The report by an independent archaeologist blasts the Army for numerous violations and failings and calls for protection of the vast and important cultural site complex in Lihu’e, O’ahu, once the ancient seat of government for O’ahu chiefs. Meanwhile OHA sat on this urgent information.

READ THE FULL ARTICLE HERE

DOWNLOAD THE MONAHAN REPORT HERE

July 28, 2010

Top Secret America in Hawai’i

The Hawaii Independent published an article exploring the Hawai’i connections to the Washington Post series on the growth of secret government programs since 9/11. An earlier post on this website also discussed the size of the secret government connected to the US Pacific Command.

The Hawaii Independent article reported that of the 127 top secret work locations in Hawai’i, only six could be identified using the Washington Post online database. These companies include Akimeka, DS Information Systems (DSIS), JTSI Inc, Omega Federation Team, Referentia Systems, and Ventura Technology. The Hawaii Independent reports:

There are odd similarities in all the businesses appearing on Priest and Arkinʻs list. They are all “8(a) companies,” which means they are part of a federal program that aids privately owned companies run by economically and socially disadvantaged individuals. The companies also all aid the military with “advanced technology” support.

Some of the companies are “special” 8(a), Native Hawaiian owned companies that have special advantages in government contracting similar to the advantages given to Native American and Alaska Native Corporations (ANC). A Government Accounting Office report from June 21 , 2006, entitled “ALASKA NATIVE CORPORATIONS – Increased Use of Special 8(a) Provisions Calls for Tailored Oversight” reported that:

ANC firms are permitted to receive noncompetitive contracts for any amount, whereas other 8(a) companies are subject to competitive thresholds of $3 million or $5 million for manufacturing contracts. ANCs can also own multiple subsidiaries participating in the 8(a) program, 1 unlike other 8(a) firms that may own only one and no more than 20 percent of another 8(a) firm.

These special advantages have led to a proliferation of native owned companies in Hawai’i specializing in securing military contracts. There has been abuses of this system, whereby the sole source contract advantage of native owned companies has led to these companies becoming fronts for larger contractors to get the subcontracts.

July 22, 2010

TONIGHT: OHA to hold informational meeting on cultural study of Kūkaniloko

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
July 19, 2010

COMMUNITY INVITED TO PARTICIPATE IN UPCOMING OHA MEETING ON KŪKANILOKO

OHA to hold informational meeting on cultural study of Kūkaniloko

WAHIAWĀ – The Office of Hawaiian Affairs (OHA) is conducting a study of Kūkaniloko, and is encouraging and welcoming the surrounding communities of Wahiawā and central O‘ahu to attend an informational meeting and provide ideas about the site’s importance and management needs. The meeting is free and open to the public on Thursday, July 22, 2010 at Wahiawā District Park in the Hale Ho‘okipa Room from 6 to 8:30 p.m.

OHA beneficiaries, community members and organizations urged OHA to conduct a Traditional Cultural Property Study (TCP study) of Kūkaniloko. A TCP study is a more holistic approach to studying, protecting and perpetuating wahi kapu and wahi pana (sacred and celebrated places) while focusing on why a community values the area. OHA has contracted Hui ‘Imi ‘Ike to perform the study and plans to start documenting collective knowledge of Kūkaniloko through meeting with people in the surrounding communities to gain a sense of Kūkaniloko’s role in Wahiawa, O‘ahu and all of Hawai‘i.

An extremely important cultural site, Kūkaniloko, still survives near the Wahiawā area of O‘ahu. When O‘ahu was a famous and powerful kingdom in these islands from the 1400s until the late 1700s, the area today referred to as the Wahiawā-Schofield–Wheeler area was one of its royal centers, where the ruler and high chiefs often resided. A vital part of this royal center was Kūkaniloko, which had birthing stones where the nobility frequently came to have their children born. This cultural site was one of the most sacred on the island of O‘ahu, famed into the time of Kamehameha and through the 1800s. Today it is little known, and needs better protection.

“Our beneficiaries’ request to do the TCP study was timely and fit into OHA’s vision to develop ways to understand the sacredness and breath of a landscape and its role in informing our collective sense of place. This is especially so in regard to the use of land as a foundation and empowering tool for the heritage of Hawaiian people,” said Kevin Chang, Land Manager of OHA’s Land and Property Management Program, we believe this study will be of great interest to our beneficiaries, cultural practitioners, hula hālau, long term residents, scholars, historians and the greater community alike.”

Contact:
Lloyd Yonenaka
Media Relations and Messaging Manager
Office: 808-594-1982
Cell: 808-754-0078
Email: lloydy@oha.org

June 21, 2010June 21, 2010

Army tries, but fails to pacify Native Hawaiians in Makua, Lihu’e and Pohakuloa

http://www.armytimes.com/news/2010/06/ap_army_hawaii_native_ties_062010/

Army seeks better ties with Native Hawaiians

By Audrey McAvoy – The Associated Press

Posted : Sunday Jun 20, 2010 14:14:17 EDT

HONOLULU — The people of Waianae believe the first Hawaiians were created in Makua, a lush valley about 30 miles from downtown Honolulu. The valley is also home to three large heiau, or ancient stone platforms used for worship. So it’s no surprise many Native Hawaiians consider the valley to be sacred.

The Army, though, sees Makua as a prime spot for soldiers to practice firing live ammunition.

These widely divergent perspectives illustrate the gulf between the Army and Hawaiians that have contributed to an often antagonistic and deeply distrustful relationship between the two.

Now the Army is trying to narrow the gap. In a series of firsts, the Army Garrison Hawaii commander hired a liaison for Hawaiian issues, formed a council of Hawaiians to advise him, and brought Army and Hawaiian leaders together to sign a covenant in which both sides vowed to respect and understand one another.

“Instead of going back and rehashing the past, I’m trying to make a fresh start, trying to make that relationship positive, make things better down the line,” said Col. Matthew Margotta.

But the Army did not invite several Hawaiians embroiled in ongoing disputes with the Army to join the council or sign the covenant, prompting critics to question how effective these initiatives will be.

“You want to work together but you only want to work with people who don’t disagree with you. How good is that?” said William Aila, whose uncle was ousted from Makua during World War II and who is fighting for the Army to return the valley.

The military took control of Makua in 1943 when Hawaii was under wartime martial law. Authorities told residents to leave, and the Army and Navy began using the valley for bombing practice.

The explosions damaged homes and the community’s church and cemetery. Interviews for a 1998 oral history commissioned by the Navy showed residents were embittered by the destruction and the takeover that severed their families, who had once fished and farmed in Makua, from the land.

Today the Army still controls Makua under a lease with the state that expires in 2029.

In recent years, the Army and Hawaiians have clashed over the Army’s restrictions on access to sites in the valley. The Army cites safety for the limits, although Hawaiians say they’ve long visited these sites and understand the risks.

Hawaiian anger also mounted in 2003 when the Army’s planned burn of brush raged out of control and scorched more than half of the 7-square-mile valley.

Elsewhere in the islands, Hawaiians and the Army have butted heads over the appropriate use of lands at Schofield Barracks, which is home to several thousand soldiers in the 25th Infantry Division, and Pohakuloa Training Area on the Big Island.

Last month, several Hawaiians objected when an army contractor leveling land for a new Schofield training ground unearthed an ancient bone fragment. They had opposed the construction of the training ground precisely because they feared human remains would be found if the soil was disturbed.

Hawaiian tradition says bones must stay in the ground until they’re dissolved so the deceased can complete his or her journey to the afterlife.

Margotta says the covenant, signed in March, will contribute to better relations by committing future commanders to partner and cooperate with Hawaiians. This should impose some consistency even as leaders rotate posts every two to three years.

“There’s been commanders out there who have embraced the Hawaiian community and partnered with them and worked with them. And there have been others who have been not so inclined,” Margotta said. “We wanted to codify it for successive generations.”

Col. Douglas Mulbury, who took over from Margotta in a change of command ceremony last week, agrees with the initiatives and hopes to build on them, spokesman Loran Doane said.

Neil Hannahs, the director for the land assets division of Kamehameha Schools, said the council and covenant may help ameliorate conflict by spurring dialogue.

“Let’s just get together and talk before we’re at a point of crisis and conflict,” Hannahs said.

Hannahs is on the advisory council. He also signed the covenant, although as an individual and not as representative of Kamehameha Schools, an education institution and trust established by the will of a 19th century Hawaiian princess.

Aila isn’t optimistic. He wasn’t invited to join the advisory council or to sign the covenant even though he has long clashed with the Army over access to Makua and, more recently, the treatment of human remains found at Schofield last month.

“It’s great for PR,” he said, “to give the impression that things are hunky-dory here in Hawaii. But it doesn’t reflect the reality on the ground.”

The Army would do more to improve relations by leaving Makua, Aila said. He argues soldiers can train elsewhere.

Annelle Amaral, the Hawaiian liaison for Army Garrison Hawaii, said she didn’t invite people to join the council who have “site specific” concerns. She instead gathered Hawaiians who represent fields including education, business, and religion.

She denied the council omitted people who disagree with the Army, noting it includes Rev. Kaleo Patterson. The minister has vocally opposed ballistic missile testing on Kauai and pushed for the “decolonization and total independence” of Hawaii.

For some Hawaiians, the covenant fails to address the fundamental problem as they see it: the Army is part of an illegal occupation that began when U.S. businessmen, supported by U.S. Marines, overthrew Hawaii’s queen in 1893.

“Instead of having a covenant that sort of says you know ‘we promise to be really nice and do our best to protect sacred places,’ I’d rather get a timetable for when they’ll actually stop and leave us,” said Jonathan Osorio, a University of Hawaii professor of Hawaiian studies.

June 3, 2010

Video posted: Army desecration of burials angers Native Hawaiians

Army desecration of burials angers Native Hawaiians from kyle kajihiro on Vimeo.

The Army Stryker brigade expansion in Hawai’i was a 25,000 acre land grab, the largest military buildup since WWII. Many cultural sites were damaged or destroyed by the project despite community protest. Despite warnings that a vast cultural site complex would be harmed by the Army construction, on May 14, 2010, the Army unearthed human remains. Digging continued after the first bone was found. On May 27, 2010, Native Hawaiian cultural practitioners conducted a site visit to survey the desecration site.

May 20, 2010

Army finds human remains at Oahu base

http://www.mauinews.com/page/content.detail/id/531657.html?nav=5031

Army finds human remains at Oahu base

By AUDREY McAVOY, The Associated Press

POSTED: May 19, 2010

HONOLULU – Army contractors discovered human remains believed to be ancient Hawaiian while workers were excavating at a Schofield Barracks construction site, officials said Tuesday.

The Army hasn’t determined the remains are Hawaiian, but it’s assuming they are just to be safe as it investigates the site. William Aila of the group Hui Malama I Na Kupuna O Hawaii Nei said the fragility and deteriorated state of the bones indicate they’re ancient, and thus Hawaiian.

Cultural and archaeological monitors hired by the Army to look out for bones and cultural artifacts found the remains Friday as workers were using a front-end loader to level and clear land for the construction of a training site.

A forensic anthropologist from the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command confirmed the bones were human Saturday.

It’s important in Hawaiian culture to leave bones undisturbed because of the belief that people infuse their life force into the ground once they are buried. Since this process isn’t finished until the bones have dissolved, digging them up interrupts a person’s journey in the afterlife.

Aila said the disturbed remains should be put back where they were found so the individual can continue on his or her journey.

”It’s like being ripped from the dark and put back into the bright sunlight where they don’t belong,” he said.

The equivalent for Christians, Aila said, would be ”somebody reaching their hand up into heaven and pulling your spirit down from heaven.”

Aila said the Army should rebury the bones, or iwi, screen the disturbed dirt for additional remains and stop digging in the area. After the remains are reinterred, the Army should hold a ceremony to apologize to the individual whose bones were dug up, he said.

The Army has fenced off about 500 square feet around the spot where the bones were found and has halted all further construction at the site.

”It’s all about the investigation – not about the work – and doing the right thing, handling the remains with respect and dignity,” said Loran Doane, a spokesman for Army Garrison-Hawaii. ”That’s what our focus is on.”

David Henkin, an Earthjustice lawyer who has repeatedly sued the Army over protection of Hawaiian cultural sites, said the case was an example of threats faced by such resources.

”It certainly illustrates the risk of harm to cultural remains when the Army goes forward with activities in the very sensitive areas that it controls,” Henkin said.

May 12, 2010May 12, 2010

Dugong Sighted – What is Sacred?

A dugong, the endangered sea manatee of Okinawa, a sacred animal deity that is recounted in ancient Okinawan songs, was recently seen in Henoko, proposed site of the military base relocation from Futenma. A ho’ailona (sign)?

Meanwhile, Carolyn Raffensperger, Executive Director of the Science and Environmental Health Network., asks “what is sacred?” She reflects on the new science that is showing how environmental contamination can be linked to many diseases formerly blamed on “lifestyle choices”. She also refers the recent adoption of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and the protections it enshrines for indigenous peoples of the world. Not mentioned in Raffensperger’s article is another clause referring to militarization:

Article 30
1. Military activities shall not take place in the lands or territories of indigenous peoples, unless justified by a relevant public interest or otherwise freely agreed with or requested by the indigenous peoples concerned.
2. States shall undertake effective consultations with the indigenous peoples concerned, through appropriate procedures and in particular through their representative institutions, prior to using their lands or territories for military activities.

In Hawai’i, the military destruction of sacred places like Lihu’e, Mauna Kea, Makua and Mokapu continues despite protests. Clearly in the case of Okinawa, Guahan/Guam, Hawai’i, these conditions were not met.

>><<

http://okinawa-dugong.blogspot.com/2010/05/dugong-was-seen-in-henoko-bay.html

Tuesday, May 11, 2010

Dugong was seen in Henoko Bay!

See the following link from Ryukyu Asahi Broadcasting news report!

http://www.qab.co.jp/news/2010051217881.html

Ryukyu Asahi Broadcasting (QAB) captured a Dugong, swimming in the Eastern Coast of Nago City.

Both Environmental Ministry and Defense Ministry have admitted that the ocean area from Henoko Bay to Kayo Bay is “the important sea area for the inhabitant of Dugong.”

The Nature Conservation Society of Japan is warning that, “seagrass beds, which feed dugong, are distributed in the shallows in front of the Camp Schweb. Therefore, even the pier plan proposed by the government, surely vanish the seagrass beds. Moreover, change of sea current would possibly vanish the distribution of the seagrass.”

+++

http://womensearthalliance.blogspot.com/2010/05/following-article-has-been-written-by.html

Thursday, May 6, 2010

What is Sacred?

The following article has been written by Carolyn Raffensperger, Executive Director of the Science and Environmental Health Network.

What is sacred? What does the law recognize as sacred? These were the questions that haunted me yesterday, the third full day of the delegation’s trip to Nevada and Arizona to join with indigenous people to protect sacred sites from defilement and desecration.

Our first stop was at a uranium mine owned by Dennison Mines Corp.

The mine is one of the stand-by projects of Dennison. The corporation is awaiting the price of uranium to go up and the boom of nuclear power to resume. Dennison, according to its website, “enjoys a global portfolio of world-class exploration projects…” The problem is that the neighbors of the mine, in this case Navajo and Havasupai do not enjoy the exploration or the mining. The legacy of uranium mining in the Southwest is grievous. Cancer, contaminated land, and water are the consequences of six decades of a nuclear weapons program and nuclear power. Indigenous people bear the brunt of the environmental problems associated with uranium mining.

This is personal for me. One of my dearest friends, an indigenous woman, grew up playing in the mine tailings near Tuba City AZ. Monday she had surgery for her third cancer. She is in her 30s. The mining official we met with yesterday argued that the uranium miners’ high cancer rate was caused by their smoking rather than the radioactivity associated with the radon in the mines or the uranium itself.

The old argument that most cancers are a result of lifestyle “choices” is increasingly discredited by science. Just today the President’s Cancer Panel, a distinguished group of scientists issued a new report on environmental causes of cancer. Radon is fingered as one of the culprit carcinogens.

Northern Arizona is full of places sacred to the Hopi, Navajo, Havasupai and other tribes that have called this place home for millennia. But it is also pock marked by uranium mines and old mine tailings. Over 10,000 new uranium mine claims were staked between 2005 and 2009.

U.S. law, particularly the antiquated General Mining Act of 1872 treats all mines and potential mines as part of the wild frontier, the cowboy west. There are few barriers to mines except some procedural hoops that might delay a mine from opening for a few months or years.

The tribes consider this land to be sacred. There are springs and mountains, canyons and buttes that hold the religion, the stories and the histories of these people. It is the relationship of a community of humans to a place that makes that place sacred. Yet U.S. law only recognizes religion, which amounts to beliefs held by individuals. Indigenous spirituality is made up of the web of exquisitely-tended relationships that manifest and express beliefs.

We are only beginning to shape laws to reflect the sacred. The U.N. Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous People includes this statement:

“Article 25: Indigenous peoples have the right to maintain and strengthen their distinctive spiritual relationship with their traditionally owned or otherwise occupied and used lands, territories, waters and coastal seas and other resources and to uphold their responsibilities to future generations in this regard.”

While not law in the United States, the Declaration sets the standard for how the law should treat the sacred places and relationships of indigenous people. The Declaration was not signed by the United States because it clashes with the U.S. private property regime. Private property trumps the sacred. Uranium mining trumps the rights of indigenous people to care for their springs and their holy sites.

The question of what is sacred sometimes only surfaces when we see what has been defiled–the rage we feel when we think a cancer might have been prevented, or an ocean might not have been polluted. How could we contaminate the very land from which we live? How can we contaminate the bodies of our children? How can we defile the places where we bury the dead? How can we destroy the places of great beauty and much history? All of these are sacred. We know this in our hearts.

May 4, 2010May 6, 2010

Blackwater is operating in Guam and Shariki, Japan

Another blogger shared the following articles about Blackwater and their involvement in Guam and Shariki, a tiny village in Japan that hosts a missile defense radar facility. She points out:

• In 2006, Blackwater’s aviation division won a $91 million contract for air charter work in Guam, a contract the Navy had set aside for small businesses. Two losing bidders challenged the award, saying Blackwater had more than 1,500 employees, the threshold for an aviation contract. An administrative judge ruled for Blackwater, saying the company’s 1,000-plus guards working overseas did not count as employees…

• Blackwater teamed up with the Chenega, an Alaskan Native American tribe of 69 people, to guard a missile defense installation in northern Japan. As a native-owned company, Chenega can win special no-bid contracts because of rules crafted by Alaska’s powerful U.S. Sen. Ted Stevens.

• And this is from Wikipedia: In Asia, Blackwater has contracts in Japan guarding AN/TPY-2 radar systems.

More: A U.S. military mobile BMD radar (AN/TPY-2, i.e., “X-Band Radar”) was deployed in June 2006 to the. ASDF Shariki Sub-base in Aomori Prefecture, Japan. A new detachment, consisting of a small team of military service members and contractors who will operate and maintain the Forward Based X-Band Radar Transportable (FBX-T) system, was honored during an activation ceremony 26 September 2006 at Camp Shariki in Aomori Pref., hosted by Brig. Gen. John E. Seward, commanding general of 94th Army Air and Missile Defense Command of the U.S. Army Pacific Command. The FBX-T radar is designed to provide early detection and tracking of ballistic missile threats while providing a key element to the layered defense strategy. The radar is a defensive system with no offensive capability and will fall under the command and control of the 94th AAMDC, which is based at Fort Shafter, Hi. The command officially joined USARPAC in Oct. 2005.

I found the information fascinating that Blackwater was teaming with Chenega, an Alaska Native Corporation that has “Special 8A” status to get no-bid, unlimited contracts from the federal government. This arrangement is ripe for corruption. The federal government has issued scathing reports on the abuses of the Special 8A status whereby, native corporations get the sole source contract as a front for a larger military contractor.

Native Hawaiian Organizations also get special 8A status for military contracts thanks to Senator Inouye. However, since Native Hawaiians are not listed as a federally recognized tribe, every year Senator Inouye must add Native Hawaiians into the existing statutes via provisions of defense spending bills. The so-called Akaka Bill to list Native Hawaiians as a native tribe under the U.S. government would solidify Native Hawaiian access to these special 8A contracts. Some of the leading proponents of the Akaka Bill are already getting the no-bid contracts for defense projects. The passage of the Akaka Bill will further militarize Hawai’i by co-opting Native Hawaiians into the military industrial complex.

>><<

http://www.tradingmarkets.com/.site/news/Stock%20News/1575255/

Blackwater’s Aggressive, Entrepreneurial Culture Keeps its Business Growing

By McClatchy-Tribune News Service

May 17, 2008

Blackwater was all over the news last fall, and the news wasn’t good. The North Carolina company created a diplomatic crisis when its guards killed 17 Iraqi civilians in a Baghdad square.

The Iraqi government promised to evict the company from Iraq. Blackwater’s reclusive owner, Erik Prince, was called to Congress to testify; and afterward, he began a PR blitz of the national media. He even appeared on “60 Minutes.”

Today, however, the trouble has subsided. Last month, the State Department renewed its contract with Blackwater to provide security in Iraq. It’s still in Afghanistan for the military. In the fall, Blackwater won a new contract, for $92 million, to fly soldiers and cargo around Pakistan and Afghanistan for the Army. And the company was one of five picked to support the Pentagon’s Counter Narcoterrorism Technology Program, a five-year contract worth up to $15 billion.

As the company grows, so do its headaches: a persistent congressional investigation, several high-profile lawsuits and a federal weapons investigation. Still, Blackwater is thriving because of its aggressive and entrepreneurial business culture and a strong network of Republican connections. The company has hired extensively from the top levels of the CIA, Defense Department and State Department, and named the former No. 2 official at the CIA to its Board of Advisors.

“Their connections certainly help a lot,” said Peter Singer, an expert on military contractors at the Brookings Institution. “But they may be a vulnerability in the future, if the regime changes in Washington.”

This is a company that barely existed at the start of the decade; Blackwater grew from $204,000 in federal contracts in 2000 to almost $600 million in 2006. Its rise is a case study in business timing and the power of financial and political capital to take advantage of a new market.

Blackwater Lodge and Training Center was the brainchild of Al Clark, a Navy SEAL and instructor. Dissatisfied with the Navy’s rented training grounds, Clark told colleagues he would open his own when he left the service. Clark hooked up with Erik Prince, a young Navy SEAL who shared his interest in training. Clark didn’t know it at the time, but Prince was an heir to a billion-dollar auto-parts fortune.

When the two broke ground on Blackwater Lodge and Training Center in Currituck and Camden counties in northeast North Carolina in 1997, the timing was good. The military had closed and consolidated bases after the Cold War and neglected training facilities. Blackwater built the largest shooting facility in the country, with indoor ranges, mock urban landscapes, a 1,200-yard firing range, driving tracks and a lake for naval training. Blackwater boasted it could design any sort of training a client might want.

The location was excellent, within four hours of the Pentagon in Washington, and Fort Bragg and Camp Lejeune in North Carolina. The country’s biggest naval base in Norfolk, Va., was less than an hour away. Despite the steady stream of business, Blackwater wasn’t making money. Clark recalled how Prince summoned him to his office, on Christmas Eve 1999 and said, “I want this place profitable tomorrow.”

Clark said his relations with Prince went downhill when Prince complained that he was training the students so well that no one would come back for more training.

Clark left Blackwater in the summer of 2000. Business was growing steadily, Clark said, but the company wasn’t making a profit.

“There are two people who put Blackwater on the map,” Clark said _ “Al Clark and Osama bin Laden.”

After the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, the demand for training from military and law enforcement filled Blackwater’s ranges and classrooms.

Blackwater’s most lucrative line of business wouldn’t be in the Eastern North Carolina town of Moyock, but overseas. It was the brainchild of a former CIA employee, Jamie Smith.

While working at Blackwater before Sept. 11, Smith had suggested that Blackwater go into the private security business, guarding businessmen or government officials. Prince was initially skeptical, but warmed to the idea after the attacks on New York City and the Pentagon.

Prince contacted Alvin “Buzzy” Krongard, the No. 2 official at the CIA. Krongard had known Prince since at least 1999, when Krongard’s son, a Navy SEAL, had trained at Blackwater, according to Al Clark. Krongard had visited Blackwater and shot at the firing ranges, Clark said. (In October, Krongard stepped down from Blackwater’s Board of Advisors because his brother, Howard Krongard, was the State Department inspector general responsible for investigating Blackwater. Howard Krongard later resigned.)

The CIA was stretched thin in the aftermath of Sept. 11 and the invasion of Afghanistan. Blackwater landed a sole-source, no-bid contract to provide security at CIA stations in Afghanistan.

When Blackwater won the contract, the company had no one to staff it. Smith advertised for security contractors in the Washington Post, according to author Robert Young Pelton. Smith led the security team when it arrived in the early spring of 2002.

The contract was not a big one; it called for 16 Blackwater security personnel, plus dozens of Afghan guards hired locally. But it was profitable, a Blackwater budget spreadsheet shows. Blackwater expected a 26 percent profit on the job.

Most important, the contract was a start, a foot in the door of what would expand into a billion-dollar industry once the U.S. invaded Iraq.

The invasion created a huge demand for private security in Iraq. Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld sent about half the troops recommended by his Army chief of staff. There weren’t enough soldiers to secure the country, let alone protect U.S. diplomats and civilian workers.

In August 2003, Blackwater won a $27 million sole-source contract to guard Paul Bremer, the head of the Coalition Provisional Authority and probably the top assassination target of insurgents.

The contract called for helicopters to fly Bremer around Iraq. Blackwater was well positioned for that; the company had bought a Florida aviation company four months earlier.

Peter Singer, an expert on private military contractors, said this was typical of Blackwater’s business savvy.

“They are very good and very savvy at identifying market needs and pushing hard to enter into those markets, even before clients have recognized the need,” Singer said.

The private security business turned Blackwater into a heavyweight government contractor; the company went from $204,911 in government contracts in fiscal 2000 to $593 million in 2006, an average annual growth rate of 277 percent. Blackwater went from having 16 guards in Afghanistan to more than 850 personnel in Iraq.

By the end of 2006, Blackwater had received more than $1 billion in government contracts. That doesn’t include classified contracts, including providing security at CIA sites overseas.

The CIA contracts are lucrative, according to a document Blackwater filed in a federal lawsuit.

Blackwater had a contract since 2003 to protect a CIA site in Pakistan, the document said. “The profit potential is high (25%+ margin),” because of the classified nature of the budgets, and the knowledge gained from past performance on existing contracts.

During congressional testimony in October, Erik Prince said that Blackwater made a 10 percent profit on his State Department contracts, but he declined to elaborate or discuss the company’s annual profits. He also declined to comment for this report. But there is a healthy markup for the company’s services: Blackwater bills the State Department $1,221 for a security guard earning $500 a day.

For all the controversy, Blackwater has an unblemished record on its main task in Iraq: None of the diplomats in the company’s care have been killed or wounded. Undersecretary of State Patrick Kennedy recently told The New York Times that the diplomats could not function in Iraq without Blackwater: “If the contractors were removed, we would have to leave Iraq.”

A company that has banked more than $1 billion in federal payments since Sept. 11, 2001, doesn’t sound like a small business, but Blackwater says it is.

For a company providing security services, the threshold for a small business is $17 million in annual revenue. Blackwater passed that threshold in 2003, yet continued to list itself as a small business.

In 2006, Blackwater’s aviation division won a $91 million contract for air charter work in Guam, a contract the Navy had set aside for small businesses. Two losing bidders challenged the award, saying Blackwater had more than 1,500 employees, the threshold for an aviation contract. An administrative judge ruled for Blackwater, saying the company’s 1,000-plus guards working overseas did not count as employees.

Blackwater’s contention that its guards are not employees has generated a lot of controversy.

Last year, an Internal Revenue Service hearing officer ruled that a Blackwater security guard was an employee, not an independent contractor. U.S. Rep. Henry Waxman has asked the IRS to investigate whether the company used the independent contractor designation to avoid paying federal taxes. Blackwater disputes Waxman’s complaint. If that ruling were applied to Blackwater’s entire work force, the company could be on the hook for $50 million in unpaid Medicare and Social Security taxes that companies must pay for their workers.

Prince, Blackwater’s founder, is known for his libertarian views. He touts the virtues of the free market and entrepreneurs. But the company is not averse to exploiting contracting loopholes and government giveaways.

Blackwater teamed up with the Chenega, an Alaskan Native American tribe of 69 people, to guard a missile defense installation in northern Japan. As a native-owned company, Chenega can win special no-bid contracts because of rules crafted by Alaska’s powerful U.S. Sen. Ted Stevens.

But to fulfill the terms, Chenega needed a partner to supply the guards, so it turned to Blackwater. The contract was worth $5 million for Blackwater in 2006 and $6 million for the first half of 2007.

In North Carolina, the Department of Commerce approved a $120,000 grant for Blackwater to support the company’s production of its Grizzly armored vehicle. The department projected that Blackwater would file for $637,500 in tax credits for the same project.

Despite the phenomenal growth, Prince has been quietly looking for more investors. At the end of April, the giant hedge fund Cerberus said it had decided against investing as much as $200 million in Blackwater. After news broke of Cerberus’ interest, Blackwater President Gary Jackson sent an e-mail message saying the company was anticipating even more growth, the Wall Street Journal reported.

“The company has “had two successive quarters of unprecedented growth,” Jackson wrote, and is “exploring multiple avenues to finance our continued expansion.”

External link: http://www.tradingmarkets.com/.site/news/Stock%20News/1575255/

+++

http://www.stripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=49341

Tiny base assimilates into Japanese town

To allay locals’ health fears, housing built close to radar

By Teri Weaver, Stars and Stripes
Pacific edition, Monday, October 8, 2007

SHARIKI, Japan

In Shariki, selecting the right place for American workers’ housing involved more than worrying about a daily commute.

For the 100 or so government contractors and two U.S. Army soldiers now living in and around the tiny Japanese village near the Sea of Japan, setting up a homestead also sent a message about their mission, according to the company commander at Shariki Communications Site.

“There were some people that told us, if you build that housing (elsewhere), it will be a public relations disaster,” said Capt. Will Hunter, whose unit in Shariki is attached to the 94th Army Air and Missile Defense Command in Hawaii. “It implies that you don’t think it’s safe to live around the radar.”

The radar is the AN/TPY-2, which points high-powered radio waves westward toward mainland Asia to hunt for enemy missiles headed east toward America or its allies. The system is serious — it could burn a person standing in the wrong place at the wrong time, Hunter says.

That hasn’t happened, he says, and occasional testing by the Americans and Japanese has found the radar does not interfere with local cell phones or harm local farming. Still, showing is better than telling, and that means building a housing complex for the Americans only a five-minute drive from the site.

It’s an apt example of how community relations can take on special meaning when a seaside village of 5,500 Japanese residents finds itself hosting several dozen Americans.

Hunter, the first commander of the year-old unit, has spent much of the past year making and implementing decisions like housing location. He’s also become a local ambassador of sorts at festivals, parades, Japanese military ceremonies and even afternoon cookouts.

“I think that’s my bigger job,” he said when weighing building relationships with local residents against his other tasks, working with the contractors and ensuring security of the radar site.

First Sgt. Ben Williams, the only other soldier in the unit, has picked up the role as well. Williams has been in the Army 16 years, and this is his first assignment without soldiers to lead and with a foreign language to negotiate. “I’m still feeling this out,” he says.

On one of his first days in town, he, Hunter and about 20 other workers from base helped drag a 16-ton float for a festival in Goshogawara, the biggest city about 45 minutes from base. “I was drenched,” he said of the sweaty work on the humid summer night.

For Hunter, much of the community relations means establishing safety procedures and conveniences for the Americans. He has set up phone lists and emergency procedures with local police and other officials so languages won’t be barriers to a response to Americans in need.

He’s even collected menus from local restaurants and had them translated to make it easier for the Americans to dine out and for local businesses to attract more customers.

The local community has responded as well. Lt. Col. Masaru Ohta, the Japan Air Self Defense Force’s 21st Air Defense Missile Squadron commander, ensures Americans get invited to festivals and meetings. And the city of Tsugaru, which oversees the smaller community of Shariki, has built a police koban in the village.

“I choose to say this police box was built for us, not because of us,” Hunter says.

Vehicle accidents have been the one sore spot for Hunter. There have been quite a few since the Americans came to Shariki, where an average of 12 meters of snow falls each winter.

Most of the accidents involve simple mistakes, not paying attention or slipping on ice, Hunter says. Still, a couple of Japanese people have been injured and gomen money, traditional compensation and condolence money, has been paid.

“In all honesty, I have beat up the contractors a lot about making their people drive correctly,” Hunter says while driving on a narrow two-lane road through rice paddies. The highway connects Shariki and Goshogawara, the closest place to big-city life that includes karaoke parlors, a dance club and two malls.

It’s hard to have absolute control, however, over a workforce that reports to a private company rather than a company commander, he says.

The Americans work for Raytheon and Chenega Blackwater Solutions, who, respectively, run the missile radar and provide security at the base.

In the past year, a couple of workers were sent home as punishment. But Hunter has no direct control over their privilege to hold a license, as he does over soldiers.

At the Shariki police station, inspector Yoshifumi Nakagawa warmly welcomes Hunter and gives business cards printed in English and Japanese to the two members of his staff – Williams and translator Yuko Akita.

Nakagawa was happy to learn Hunter has an interpreter, his first even though the Army unit officially stood up on Sept. 26, 2006. Previously, the captain relied on a handful of the contractors who speak Japanese, or a few of Ohta’s command staff who speak English.

The police official and the translator exchange cell phone numbers, then Nakagawa praises Hunter for participating in a recent community walk. It’s a formal thank-you for two men who see each other regularly. Both take the same language exchange course on Fridays, and the group has dinner together once a month.

Ohta credits the Americans’ involvement in the community with appeasing some of the fears first raised when the radar was built. “Because they participate in local events,” he says through a translator, “now there are no objections.”

The objections haven’t quite gone away. A Japanese Ministry of Defense office, at Shariki city hall, is where the Defense Facilities Administration Bureau works as liaison between the community and the U.S. Army base, Hunter says. It’s also where locals can go with concerns about the radar site.

In the past year, complaints have fallen off so much that the office has reduced its hours twice.

A couple of months ago, Hunter met with the bureau to hear about any recent complaints. One resident said his pacemaker had acted oddly when he drove on Shariki’s main street. Another man said his radio transmitted only static at 5 a.m. on a recent day. Both men suspected the radar.

“Things like that still come up,” Hunter said. “I think for the most part, people understand the radar is not going to hurt them.”