Planning exercise shows Army's true intent

Planning 'exercise' is NOT a diversion

by Doug Holdred

     In her article titled, "Army brainstorm document causes panic among PCEOC," Lisa Gossman Steeves assures us that it's no big deal that the Pentagon has been planning a 7-million-acre land-grab in Southeastern Colorado since at least 2004. She claims to have inside information, an unnamed source at the Pentagon who has told her that the Army's Analysis of Alternatives document, which outlines the plan to seize the land and to displace over 17,000 people is just an innocent "brainstorming" exercise by military planners with too much time on their hands.

     Far from being an innocuous brainstorming session, the Analysis of Alternatives is a requirement of Army Regulation 210-21. It is one of three steps in the process of acquiring land, along with the Land Use Requirement Study, (LURS) and the Environmental Impact Statement,
(EIS.)

The attitude of Ms. Steeves is astounding. She views the fact that the largest, most powerful agency of the Federal Government is in the midst of an official process which involves seizure of our homes, the destruction of our livelihoods, the desecration of our family burial plots, the pollution of our rivers and air, the decimation our wildlife and the ruin our historical and archeological sites, as an innocent little diversion by a few playful planners in Washington D.C.

     This attitude is beyond naïve. It is irresponsible and dangerous.

     Ms. Steeves seems to think that we ought to wait until the Army's proposal is congressionally approved and funded before we sound the alarm.  I'm sure that she, and her unnamed source at the Pentagon would be happy to let us know when it's appropriate for us, as American Citizens to voice our concerns about the implications of the U.S. military scheming to take our private property.

     I'm sure it's true that the Army writes," tons of plans" but very few of those plans get to the point of an Analysis of Alternatives document. And the public outrage about this particular plan is far from "silly."

     Ms. Steeves is not only bothered by citizens raising concerns about the Pentagon's plan; she is also wrangled that a journalist would be so bold as to disclose the contents of an Army document to the public. She sites a Pueblo Chieftain article which does so as proof that the reporter is acting as a mouthpiece for the Pinon Canyon Expansion Opposition Coalition. Not so. He's doing what good journalists do.

     He's making sure that the public is in possession of the facts;including facts that the Pentagon would prefer to keep hidden.

     How does Ms. Steeves know that the content of the Analysis of Alternatives document is "not news?"  She has a source; an unnamed "source" in the Pentagon; a source which she mentions nine times in her article without revealing his or her identity. Why does she feel the need to protect the identity of her source?  Was it not simply someone in the Pentagon's Public Information Office?  Maybe Ms. Steeves simply forget the person's name.

     The Analysis of Alternatives document can hardly be regarded as a meaningless piece of paper.  It is an official document and a required part of the land-acquisition process.  According to Army Regulation 210-21 this document, along with the LURS and the EIS constitute the Army's land acquisitions process.

     The Analysis of Alternatives document is not the only piece of evidence that the Pentagon wants to grab millions of acres of land in Southeastern Colorado, but it is the most weighty and official. The amount of land that it proposes taking away from the people of Southeastern Colorado corresponds to acreages shown on a leaked Fort Carson map and mentioned in other Army documents such as TC 25-1, their Training Lands Manual and their 2002 Fort Carson Sustainability Plan. In a 2003 article in the Federal Facilities Journal, Robert Stack, Fort Carson Range Officer is quoted as saying that the Army was, at that time looking at expanding Pinon Canyon to 150-kilometers, over 5 million acres.

     Documentary sources such as these are ignored and discounted at our own peril. And a journalist who fails to report on them or who ridicules the public's concern on the basis of her conversations with unnamed Pentagon sources is failing in her duty.