Army Special Forces soldiers will not “infiltrate” Utah communities this summer — a plan that had riled residents suspicious of the government’s motives.
Green Berets had planned to parachute into several central Utah counties, cross mountains and work with Utahns who would be playing roles as resisters to an enemy regime.
The Defense Department wants the soldiers to have fresh training in skills at the heart of Special Forces’ mission, such as covertly cultivating relationships with regular citizens and training resistance forces trying to liberate themselves from oppressive governments, said Col. Robert Dunton, a special projects officer for the Utah National Guard who was helping organize the exercise.
The Special Operations Command has designated Utah, with its desert and mountain geography as well as a culture dominated by a religious faith, as a good place for such training.
Sounds reasonable right? After all the military has been conducting special forces training in Alaska, due to its harsh weather conditions, for years. However that training started before Barack Obama became our President.
But budget tightening and other factors have put the kibosh on the training. Paul Weddle, a retired Green Beret contracted to help the Army set up the exercise in Sanpete, Sevier, Emery and Carbon counties, said he got news late Thursday it has been canceled.
The news was welcomed by some who had resisted the exercise.
“I’m relieved,” said Alan Braithwaite of Manti. “I like to see them get trained; I just didn’t want them coming here and scaring people and that’s what it was doing.”
Braithwaite was the leader of a sizable group that protested Manti’s welcoming of the Special Forces exercise last fall. Fifteen people spoke at a Manti City Council meeting the day after President Obama was re-elected, urging the council to rescind the welcome.
They said they feared the exercise was part of a government plan to impose martial law, that military spies were already in the community and that mentally unstable soldiers would hurt residents.
You know these types of exercises have gone on for years, and accelerated quite significantly after 9-11. I don't remember ANYBODY expressing concern that the military was about to impose martial law on them during these kinds of exercises while George W. Bush was still president. Anybody else have a different memory?
However THAT is the kind of paranoia that Right Wing news outlets and Fox News have managed to create with their constant attacks on the President. So now the purchase of ammunition for training purposes by the government has become "stockpiling bullets for potential civil unrest in case the country defaults on its loans." and training exercises are feared to be attempts to surreptitiously implement martial law on our citizens.
But that is how you keep people voting Republican. You keep them scared to death.
Before, it was fear of terrorists attacking us on our soil, and now it has been replaced by fear of our government attacking us on our soil.
Great job!
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