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"The Americans have not been shy in establishing a clear economic link alongside their military cooperation. Ghana is one of the few African nations, mainly those with oil, selected for the State Partnership Program to promote greater economic ties with U.S. institutions, including the National Guard. Expanding this to deepen our cooperation with the Drugs Enforcement Agency is one other area that President Mills should focus attention on.

"A good deal depends on both an understanding of the cards in your hands and your opponent's, and the skilful and strategic play of these cards. The first of these cards that the Ghanaian government must not fail to appreciate is the fact that Superpower America now sees West Africa as a zone of strategic importance – it's no longer a question of just us needing them, but they now also need us.

"Our trump card is of course oil. But if we are to prevent ourselves being played by the U.S., we must deploy this to maximum benefit: ultimately it is up to Africans to selfishly see our oil as means to provide energy security to others in exchange for support for more rapid African economic development."

As the visit of US President Barak Obama approaches, the pro-AFRICOM lobby in Ghana are strident in their claims of the economic benefits of the US military bases to the local economy. It looks as though, they want to tell us that in addition to the revenue to be accrued from the oil industry, we are also to benefit from the installation of US military bases. I wish to God that this article could help put to rest such type of nonsense as we clear our heads to deal with real and present dangers. So far as I am concerned, this national call for discussions over the economic benefits of a foreign military occupation is no different from a discussion about the economic benefits of slavery to the slave. Yet this is exactly what the US military industrial complex and their local agents are obliging us to engage in, without any shame.

There is no doubt in my mind that this whole vague idea that somehow the establishment of military base would have any economic benefits must really be based simply on the silly suspicions of a few ill-informed individuals. In the first place, the deployment of US forces across the globe is not done in a homogeneous manner. So it does not even make any sense to talk about the economic benefits when you do not know what type of base it is going to be. There are remarkable differences and practices of the US military around the world. It has been noted for example that marine bases are relatively less likely to create more criminal behaviour than Air Force bases, whilst naval bases are notorious for the regular visitations by rude, arrogant, and sexually aroused young men and women often in their thousands, looking for sex and alcohol. With this business profile the only sections of the economy that stands to benefit from this would be the drinking bars and the prostitution and beer industries.

Before we get carried away, it is important to know what we are talking about. Watching the behaviour of Mr. George Bush after the eleventh September, one gets the impression of observing a dog eager to run just at the moment the master's goat gives that pretext by breaking loose! I would not go as far as to speculate whether or not it was staged to justify a certain course of action, but I can go as far as to say that the weapons of mass destruction charges against Saddam Husein were fabricated to justify an unjustifiable invasion. All these are a part of a pattern of increasing militarisation of international diplomacy made worse by the right to preemptive war, all in a grand design of obvious global domination. The real question ought to be "What are the benefits of imperialist global domination to your local economy?"

Military bases are “installations routinely used by military forces.” If they are soldiers from one's own country, the chances are that in a democracy the citizens can control their excesses through their governments. However, the confluence of labor (soldiers, paramilitary workers, and civilians), land, and capital in the form of static facilities, supplies, and equipment belonging to a foreign army is a different matter. "Bases are just the most visible part of the larger picture of U.S. military presence overseas. This picture of military access includes U.S. military training of foreign forces, often in conjunction with the provision of U.S. weaponry, joint exercises meant to enhance U.S. soldiers' exposure to a variety of operating environments from jungle to desert to urban terrain and interoperability across national militaries, and legal arrangements made to gain overflight rights and other forms of ad hoc use of others' territory as well as to preposition military equipment there."

Our best place in this scenario is that of glorified pawns, or a story of a rich and powerful people who accepted a Greek gift and became slaves in their onw very rich country. No transportation needed, no need to feed them, and all the other inconveniences of the trans-Atlantic slave trade.

The reason why I decided to answer this question is to put this question to sleep so that we can find the space to raise the debate to where it belongs: an act of a greedy invader through lies and deceit, and a call to apprehend and deal with the local collaborators, President J. A. Kufour, Lt. Gen. J. B. Danquah, and Dr. Addo Kufour and other leading members of the NPP who were privy to the conspiracy to sell us to the Americans through the secret preparations for the establishment of foreign military bases within the territories of the Republic of Ghana without informing anyone!

Before we come to that, here are a few interesting cases that show the impact of the US bases on the local populations:

Case Number One: the removal of the U.S. Navy from Vieques, Puerto Rico in 2003

Since these troubling events, the number of countries into which the U.S. slowly but surely seeking to establish bases in are expanding rapidly. We see them particularly in Africa, Central Asia, and Latin America. In spite of the overwhelming sympathy that greeted the US after the attacks of the 9/11,sustained campaigns of direct action and political lobbying resulted in the removal of the U.S. Navy from Vieques, Puerto Rico in 2003. "The success of this anti-base campaign, where others had failed, was due in part to the use of arguments about the deleterious environmental and health effects of military activities on the island. This argument also remains the centerpiece of resistance to military activities on and around domestic U.S. bases." (Catherine Lutz, Bases, Empire, and Global Response. www.forusa.org)

Case Number Two: Voices from Chamoru
In the summer of 2007, Two Chamoru representatives from Guam visited Australia for a month-long international awareness campaign and accused the United States of glaring human rights violations of the indigenous Chamoru people. It is an interesting case because if there are any economic impact to be expected per ratio of local population, in Guam the ratio was one is to one. The island's entire indigenous Chomoru population stands at 55,000. The Americans are seeking to base 55.000 troops there. The military build-up now underway in Guam, which will include an influx of a military personnel population comparable in size to the entire indigenous population (55,000), is being done entirely without the input or consultation of the local people. Asking the people of Guam the benefits of a military base is like asking a rape victim the benefits of being raped!

'“The new wave of U.S. militarization of Guam means to be decisive,” said Chamoru writer Julian Aguon in Sydney today. “It is not simply more of the same. Part of the U.S. military realignment in the Asia-Pacific region includes the controversial relocation of 8,000 U.S. Marines from Okinawa, Japan to Guam. The move will have devastating consequences for the indigenous Chamoru people, who have been struggling for decolonization of their island home.

“The situation of Guam serves as one of the greatest indictments of U.S. democratic legitimacy, as Guam remains one of only 16 non-self-governing territories in the modern world. The military build-up now underway in Guam, which will include an influx of a military personnel population comparable in size to the entire indigenous population (55,000), is being done entirely without the input or consultation of the indigenous people and over their deepening dissent.”

Dr. Lisa Natividad, a professor at the University of Guam, stated that the new wave of military buildup will only worsen the well being of the Chamoru people, who already suffer from the classic symptoms of a colonial condition such as dramatic health disparities. “For example, rates of nasopharyngeal cancer among my people are 2,000% higher than in the United States, and the rate of diabetes is five times the national U.S. average,” Dr Natividad said.

“Although Guam is only 30 miles long, it contains 19 sites designated by the US Environmental Protection Agency as the most highly contaminated and toxic sites in the entire United States.” Dr. Natividad said. These toxins include radioactive and carcinogenic materials, dioxins, etc.

“We come to Australia in the hope of raising awareness about the human rights deprivations of the Chamoru people by the U.S, to build solidarity among the peace and justice groups here and throughout the Asia-Pacific region, who are all endangered by current U.S. militarization of the region,” she said.' (Source: US ACCUSED OF HUMAN RIGHTS VIOLATIONS, http://www.anti-bases.org/)

Case Number Three: The Italians have had enough

In methods of social research, I don't know what to make of it, but if I see tens of thousands of people marching as they did in the north-eastern Italian city of Vicenza against a planned extension of the US army base there, I know from this that the much vaunted economic impact has not tipped the scale. This demonstration was organised because the majority of local people are opposed to US plans for expansion. They said Prime Minister Romano Prodi had ignored strong local objections. Mr Prodi was going ahead with a plan agreed by his pro-US predecessor, Silvio Berlusconi.  Continued    Source: Nana Akyea Mensah

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