PR is divided on reopening of shuttered military bases, militarization

U.S. War Secretary Pete Hegseth is greeted by Puerto Rico government and military officials at Muñiz Air National Guard Base in Carolina on Monday. Not everyone on the island welcomes the recent buildup in the U.S. military presence. (Facebook via Jenniffer González Colón)

By THE STAR STAFF

There is division in Puerto Rico over the increase in the U.S. military presence on the island due to tensions with Venezuela.

While pro-statehood interests support the military presence because it shows the United States needs Puerto Rico for security reasons and have called for a reopening of military bases, opponents fear the U.S. Navy will reactivate bases and contaminate their beaches with weapons residue.

“It gives anxiety, nerves, discomfort, knowing well how our community has been directly affected by the militarization of the archipelago,” said Ilandra Guadalupe Maldonado, who was born in the offshore municipality of Vieques, in a report from EFE. “I would not like to think of a repetition of history.”

The U.S. Navy used part of the offshore islands -- the municipalities of Vieques and Culebra -- as a firing range, and rented those areas to other nations to test their weapons. To date, the cleanup of the remnants of unexploded ordnance has not yet been completed.

“Six decades of militarization have left us with contaminated land, a contaminated population, [and] fractured education, culture, identity -- the list is long,” emphasized Maldonado, 27, a member of the Vieques Women’s Alliance, an organization that was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 2005, and which sued the U.S. for human rights violations associated with military maneuvers.

The young woman from “La Isla Nena,” as Vieques is known, which has the highest prevalence of cancer in Puerto Rico, says her relatives remember with euphoria when popular demonstrations in 2003 managed to expel the U.S. military from Vieques. A few years later, the U.S. Naval Base at Roosevelt Roads in Ceiba shut down.

Maldonado views Gov. Jenniffer González Colón as promoting the militarization of Puerto Rico. The governor has welcomed the practices and appears to be in favor of the United States’ attempts to topple Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, who has been charged with heading a drug cartel. Maduro this week warned Puerto Rico against supporting President Donald Trump’s intentions against Venezuela.

“The threats from drug trafficker and dictator Nicolás Maduro portray the gang-like nature of his regime,” González Colón said Wednesday. “As governor of Puerto Rico, I will continue to defend the security of our island and the Caribbean against drug trafficking and its cartels. The drugs and violence that spill into our streets as a result of their operations rob our people of peace and life every day.”

“During the campaign, we made it clear that sectors of the left in Puerto Rico and now the Popular [Democratic] Party, instead of condemning Maduro and standing in solidarity with the suffering Venezuelan people, prefer to defend a criminal by repeating his narratives and even justifying his attacks,” the governor said. “Today, we see that script in action, when instead of defending our American nation, they side with a dictator who threatens our people.”

While the United States has issued a $50 million reward for the arrest of Maduro on charges of drug trafficking, the United Nations has found no evidence supporting that Venezuela is responsible for the drugs going to the United States.

A UN report says only 5% of the drugs reaching the United States is from Venezuela, while 87% is from Colombia and Ecuador.

The organization SOLi – International Solidarity of Puerto Rico, a member of the World Peace Council -- issued a strong statement, repudiating the growing U.S. military presence in the territory and the recent statements of González Colón, who described Puerto Rico as “the border of the United States in the Caribbean.”

According to the entity, the governor’s official position “contributes to fueling tensions that threaten regional peace” by supporting the use of the island as a strategic military platform under the pretext of the fight against drug trafficking, and aligning itself with Washington’s verbal and diplomatic aggressions against sister countries in Latin America and the Caribbean.