Army loopholes vs. tough ranchers
Posted: Wednesday, Aug 20th, 2008
BY: Michelle LeBlanc

For the past several years I've been following the Army's proposal to expand their maneuver site at the historic Pinon Canyon in southeastern Colorado from 236,000 acres to more than 418,000 acres.

The more I read and the more I drive through the southern part of this stunning landscape, the more dismayed I am about the state of our nation and the values that govern it.

The Army is working every loophole and coming up short of an adequate justification for their need to expand their training grounds.

First, willing sellers - there are no willing sellers stepping forward publicly. The six property owners at the southern border of the existing site are a collective committed not to sell to the Army or anyone else. They and their families are staying ­- period.

Second, preservation of families - the Army says that it wants to keep soldiers from Fort Carson closer to their families. Well, if the Army's intent is to send them off to war, bring them back in a coffin or irreparably injured, and homeless and without care, which has been proven time and again in the past few years, they are starting in the wrong place. Try being better stewards of your people, better humanitarians, and citizens, do what you say you're doing or going to do, make people accountable. Don't tell us that keeping our men and women closer to home to make them better soldiers when they are sent overseas only to return to neglect is going to help preserve families.

Third, saving costs by limiting travel from Fort Carson to other training sites - the war for oil is backfiring if even the Army is trying to limit their consumption. If it is the United States' intent to leave Iraq eventually, why is there an operation called "Grow the Forces" and why is there more land needed for training? If they say they need more training space, the Army is strategically planning to remain in combat in perpetuity.

Fourth, legislative support of the people - Marilyn Musgrave, Ken Salazar, John Salazar and Wayne Allard, although to a limited extent, and their colleagues voted 409 to 4 - almost unanimously - to enact a moratorium on military spending for infrastructure through 2009. The Army is not allowed to spend federal money to promote the expansion of Pinon Canyon, yet they are still actively pursuing the issue. They say they are using 2007 budget monies for this work. Isn't 2007 almost 2 years gone? Isn't there a deficit in this country? They must be using that deceiving accrual system of accounting to their advantage - act now, apologize later, when you rob Peter to pay Paul.

This also puts the Army in possible contempt of Congress as the Not 1 More Acre ranchers pointed out as they walked out of the meeting in Trinidad earlier this month. So, Musgrave, Allard, John and Ken, what are the consequences for that? Think fast because the Army is still rolling into Pinon Canyon despite the moratorium.

The Army's underlying fallback position for acquiring the space they say they need is condemnation of the land and enacting the principal of eminent domain, which is tantamount to the communist system of ownership, a monarchy ruling over the serfs, reminiscent of homes overtaken by the military in any number of wars in our nation's history and that of the rest of the world. It's primitive and destructive to our national honor and trust. They should be ashamed for tampering with the spirit of this country.

What makes all of this even more frustrating is that the Assistant Secretary of the Army Keith Eastin is making promises that he won't be around to keep after a new president is elected. Clearly, he thinks little of the people he's talking to, because it was a rancher that pointed this out to him and the crowd earlier this month in Trinidad and he had to concede his promises to some degree.

The Army has a war on their hands they can't easily win, because unlike Iraq, Afghanistan, Vietnam, Granada, Panama, and other small, poor countries of disempowered citizenry, the ranchers in Pinon Canyon are empowered by the fact that they are the bona fide, working, struggling, and tenacious Americans who survived the Dust Bowl, the Depression, blizzards, droughts, starving and dead livestock, rocking and rolling markets, and the first round of land grab when the first site was established.