Pete Litster
Executive Director of Shundahai Network
On October 16, 2002, over a year after 9-11, Western Shoshone Grandmother Carrie Dann issued the following statement in response to armed US government raids against Western Shoshone land and livelihood: “ It's disgraceful,” she said, “how the United States makes international statements about human rights and then commits this kind of assault in our own backyard. It destroys their credibility and moral authority".
Days later, she stated that “I was indigenous and in one single evening they made me indigent. If you think the Indian wars are over, then think again.”"
While George W. Bush and US Government claim that it is their duty as leaders of a “civilized nation” to protect human rights, eliminate weapons of mass destruction, and to promote and secure freedom, three primary issues expose these claims as blatant hypocrisy… wrapped, according to many, in outright lies.
First, the US Government has been found to commit human rights violations within its own borders...
Second, these alleged violations are linked to America’s unrivaled weapons of mass destruction programs- all the way to nuclear.
And Third, the same corporations that have received the scandalous sweetheart contracts in Afghanistan and Iraq also benefit tremendously from these crimes that have been alleged within the borders of the United States...
First: It is alleged that the US gov’t has, and continues to commit human rights violations within it’s own borders.
We remember the doctrine of “manifest destiny”- the belief that European-American culture has a duty, under god, to settle, civilize, and develop North America “from sea to shining sea”. Today, we see that this doctrine has gone… well…global. And it’s gone crazy.
This doctrine has, for the past 500 plus years, motivated the attempted genocide against the Indigenous people of this land. It now continues to motivate the greatest empirial adventure the world has ever known.
The burning tragedy that we… today… are all left to confront is that Manifest Destiny is not some vague memory from a shameful past. It continues, to this day, as official policy of the US and allied governments, corporate culture, and the so-called “free market” they serve.
Every day we see the devastating, living, suffering, and dying reality of it played out in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere.
But how many of us are aware of the continuing violations of the lives and Human Rights of people in this country, of this land’s Indigenous People, and of the many other vulnerable communities within these borders?
How many of us are aware of the tragic link between these crimes against humanity and America’s own… unrivaled… Weapons of Mass Destruction program?
How many are even aware that this continues as an existing extension of American foreign policy, which requires our attention?
And, ultimately, how many of us realize that this is happening RIGHT HERE, and there IS something we can do about it?
We point to the ongoing struggle of the Newe or Western Shoshone Indians. According to the 1863 Treaty of Ruby Valley, Western Shoshone territory covers a portion of Northwestern Utah, and approximately 70% of the state of Nevada. It carries north into Central ID, and south into the Death Valley and Mojave Desert regions of Southern California.
In 2003 Amnesty International issued a report regarding a petition filed before the Inter-American commission on Human Rights, a body of the Organization of American States, which was formed to enforce treaties signed by the US and other nations of the Western Hemisphere- sort of the UN for the Western Hemisphere. This petition was filed by members of the Western Shoshone Nation, which, in short, urged that the US Government has illegally taken and attempted to settle claims to massive areas of land, to the devastating detriment of the Western Shoshone.
On January 9, 2003, this Human Rights Commission issued a final report concluding that the United States claims to Western Shoshone land are illegal and contrary to international human rights law. The Commission also found the U.S. Government to be in violation of it’s own Constitution through denying The Western Shoshone due process and equal protection under the law, as required by the 5th and 14th amendments to the US constitution.
Since this decision was issued, Amnesty International has taken on the Western Shoshone struggle as one of four indigenous campaigns world-wide as part of it’s International “Just Earth” Campaign.
The Bottom line is- THIS IS AN INTERNATIONALLY RECOGNIZED STRUGGLE. IT DESERVES AN EQUAL MEASURE OF OUR ATTENTION HERE.
Throughout this process, the Western Shoshone have been subject to official government harassment and surveillance. And, surprise!… under the latest Bush regime this has escalated to full-blown armed engagements- involving scores of federal agents. and occurrences which are no less than historic in their magnitude.
The links between US Gov’t policy overseas AND here in American Indian Country are clear.
On November 29, 2004, Western Shoshone Grandmother Carrie Dann urged American Indians not to be a part of the slaughter of women and children in Iraq. She also called on Native youth to defend their own nations here at home, as the Bush administration “steamrolls” both the people of Iraq AND America for corporate gain.
She questioned whether the Iraqi people would be subjected to a U.S. orchestrated government, designed to enrich oil corporations, in the same manner that American Indian tribal governments were initiated by the U.S. government for the purpose of seizing these lands and energy resources.
And during a federal operation against the Shoshone, in September, 2002, I personally witnessed one of the most eloquent declarations of non-violent civil resistance I have ever heard- on par with Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King, and others. This occurred around a campfire at 4 o’clock in the morning, as Carrie Dann and another Shoshone grandmother, Katherine Blossom, appealed to some of their white allies to leave their guns at home. Deep and urgent words were spoken as the lights of the federal vehicles and aircraft, containing scores of armed agents, were approaching in the distance…
Second: In case it’s not enough that these human rights violations are committed within these borders, they are being committed in the service of America’s weapons of mass destruction programs.
The Nevada Test Site nuclear weapons facility is locate in Southern Nevada- just southwest of us. Though many of us here in Utah have been affected… as downwinders…by the decades of atmospheric, underground, and still sub-critical nuclear weapons testing, we also need to recognize that this facility is located near the geographic center of Newe Sogobia, the Western Shoshone Nation as recognized by the standing treaty of Ruby Valley.
It’s also important to note that there are other US military reservations throughout the Western Shoshone Nation- some of which conduct the most advanced and top secret military research… ever.
In Utah, we have endured storage and disposal of the world’s largest single stockpile of chemical and biological weapons, to the detriment of our public and environmental health.
Further- U.S. Government Department of Defense and Department of Energy military and industrial sites - all the way to nuclear- tend to establish themselves in the most vulnerable communities in America- primarily Communities of Color and other disenfranchised communities. This is to the detriment of our health and safety, and in violation of principles of environmental and social justice.
And third: It is urgent that we recognize that the some of the world’s largest corporations, which have received the scandalous sweetheart contracts in Afghanistan and Iraq also benefit tremendously from the alleged crimes committed with the borders of the United States.
For our purposes today, I refer to the obvious- Bechtel Corporation.
- Bechtel was founded in Nevada in 1898. Since then, Bechtel has evolved into the world's largest engineering-construction firm. The second largest, at least this has been my understanding since 911, is Bin Laden construction out of Saudi Arabia.
- Bechtel has grown as a majority developer and operator of America’s, and the world’s, nuclear power capacity. It is involved in over 900 projects in nearly 60 countries.
- Bechtel has also been the beneficiary of very scandalous, very large… sweetheart contracts for reconstruction and development in the aftermath of the US invasions and demolition of Afghanistan and Iraq.
- Bechtel runs the Nevada Test Site- nuclear weapons facility…
- Bechtel is behind the development of the Yucca Mountain high-level nuclear waste dump, in Nevada… in Western Shoshone country… that could put so many Utahns- and everyone else- at risk.
- Bechtel is a great corporation to check out, if you’re committed to peace and justice.
In summary, claims of human rights, of freedom, made by this administration, which supposedly justify the most egregious and violent aspects of their foreign policy, are betrayed… are exposed…. by the conduct of The US Government, and the industry it serves… right here… where we live.
A statement by the Indigenous Environmental Network makes clear what we all need to understand:
“The ancestral lands of the Indigenous peoples in the United States have been used for testing nuclear weapons, experimenting with biological and chemical warfare agents, incinerating and burying hazardous wastes, and mining uranium. United States federal law and nuclear policy has not protected Indigenous peoples, and in fact has been created to allow the nuclear industry to continue operations at the expense of our land, territory, health and traditional ways of life. This system of genocide and ethnocide has brought our people to the brink of extinction.”
The bottom line is, this government is MURDERING PEOPLE, including countless civilians, referring to non-combatant., children… elders…as collateral damage. This is done, allegedly, to stop other governments from committing the same crimes that throughout this country’s history, and to this day…the US government and the industries it serves, continue to commit... here…where we try to live.
We have literature located on the back table, and we urge you to strengthen your involvement in the work with the organized efforts that are represented here.
Thank you.
(Written and delivered by Pete Litster, Shundahai Network)
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