BY RON RICHARDS
SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico - Tens of thousands of people marched here October 29 to protest a proposal of the U.S. navy to build an enormous radar in Puerto Rico. While most of the marchers were supporters of independence for this U.S. colony, the demonstration also included many people who support the status quo or statehood for Puerto Rico.
The march took place only eight days after some 80,000 marched against the U.S. military in the Japanese colony of Okinawa. Puerto Rico and Okinawa are two of the biggest concentrations of U.S. military bases outside the United States.
The Roosevelt Roads Naval Station in Ceiba, Puerto Rico, is the most important training site for the U.S. navy in the world. The base includes parts of several islands and covers more square kilometers of land than any other U.S. navy base worldwide. Two-thirds of the island of Vieques, with some 7,000 inhabitants, is part of the base. Puerto Ricans have organized protests against the U.S. naval facility for decades.
The navy plans to build a Relocatable-Over-The-Horizon Radar with the transmitter on its property in Vieques. The receiver would be 200 kilometers (120 miles) west in the town of Lajas, which is on the main island of Puerto Rico. The site in Lajas is currently privately-owned farm land. A similar radar is operating in Virginia and a unit in Texas is soon to be operational.
The original stated purpose for the radars was to monitor the movement of Soviet aircraft. The radars were never installed before the Soviet Union shattered in 1990.
The navy is now trying to justify its budget by saying that its resources must be put into the fight against the movement of illegal drugs. The area covered by the radar would extend as far south as Bolivia. The navy claims that the mission of the radar is solely to spy on aircraft carrying drugs and that there is no military objective.
Opponents of the radar are raising several concerns. The Yabucoa Committee for Quality of Life marched behind a banner that read "No to electromagnetic radiation." Farmers and others oppose taking land away from agriculture and making the island even more dependent on imported foods. There is also opposition to the expansion of the U.S. navy presence in Puerto Rico.
The October 29 march was endorsed by more than 80 groups including political, environmental, labor, religious, student, and professional groups. Twenty eight labor organizations endorsed the action including the AFL-CIO and independent federations in Puerto Rico. Two groups that endorsed the march were Vietnam Veterans and Families and Vieques en Santa Cruz contra el radar (Vieques in St. Croix against the radar). Several Vietnam veterans marched wearing their military medals.
In the 1950s, when the Navy was evicting people from their land in Vieques, many people moved to St. Croix in the U.S. Virgin Islands to find work. Puerto Ricans make up a significant layer of the working class of St. Croix.
The mayor of Ponce, Rafael Cordero Santiago of the Popular Democratic Party, which favors the status quo for Puerto Rico's relationship with the United States, attended the march as did a number of legislators. Prominent statehood activist Myriam Ramíerez de Ferrer has opposed the radar but did not attend the march, stating that the Puerto Rican Independence Party was using the protest for its own purposes.
The march began at the Sixto Escobar Park and proceeded past the Capitol into Old San Juan, where a rally was held in the Plaza de Colón. Of the marchers who had identifiable opinions on the status of Puerto Rico on their banners or T-shirts, virtually all were in favor of independence.
Many marchers wore environmental or labor movement slogans. On the eve of the referendum vote in Quebec, one supporter of independence in Puerto Rico had a Quebec T- shirt in solidarity with the pro-sovereignty forces there.