BASES OF EMPIRE
The Global Spread Of
US Military & Spy Bases
CORA FABROS
Touring NZ July 2008
Cora Fabros, from the Philippines, has been a high
profile activist, domestically and internationally, for more than 30 years with
the anti-bases, anti-nuclear and peace movement. She has been to New Zealand
before, as a guest of the Anti-Bases Campaign. Cora will be touring New Zealand in
July 2008 as the Asia/Pacific Coordinator
of the International Network for the Abolition of Foreign Military Bases.
The US
has been on a global war footing since 2001 and sees the Asia/Pacific region, NZ’s backyard, as being of immense strategic significance. This
is the region that Cora will be speaking about. In countries such as Japan (particularly Okinawa) and South Korea the huge US presence there covers the full
range from nuclear warfighting bases to conventional
combat bases to a whole variety of spybases. Despite
having been kicked out of the Philippines
by the world’s most successful anti-bases campaign in the early 1990s, the US
military is now permanently entrenched back in that country, which it has
designated “The Second Front In The War On Terror”. Guam, which is a US
territory in the Pacific, has been turned into a major US nuclear warfighting base in recent years. Australia hosts a variety of US bases and has
given the US
permission to build its first new spybase there in 40
years. And, of course, New Zealand
hosts one medium level US
military transport base (at Christchurch
Airport) which is a cog in the chain
of regional US bases; and
two “New Zealand”
spybases, at Tangimoana and
Waihopai. The latter is NZ’s
single most important contribution to all US wars.
2008 is election year in both NZ and the US (this only happens
every 12 years). The Anti-Bases Campaign believes that it is vital that NZ’s continuing role as a small but very important
satellite of the US
military and intelligence empire be thoroughly exposed and that voters demand
that the Government finish the job begun when this country became nuclear free
and out of ANZUS in the 1980s. Cora Fabros’
tour is vital in providing an international context for how we aid and abet
that empire. US bases and the struggle against them are a huge issue for many
of our neighbours.
Donations are needed, to help with
our costs. Please make cheques payable to ABC, Box 2258, Christchurch,
with a note saying that it is for the Fabros tour. Our budget is $5,000.