Monday, March 16, 2020from …. http://space4peace.blogspot.com/2020/03/us-army-invades-virus-plagued-europe.html
UPDATE.. DEFENDER War Games now PARTLY CALLED OFF !!
17 March..US halts deployment & recalls troops from NATO’s biggest drill ‘Defender Europe 2020’ due to coronavirus threat
Rick Rozoff, peace activist at StopNato International, thinks it’s incredibly ironic that a virus seems to have derailed, however temporarily, NATO’s strategic priority to expand to the Russian border.“This is a tactical retreat, in the face of nature,” he told RT. “I’m going to have to assume that, if and when the coronavirus is brought under control, that we’ll see the resumption of such military provocations, large-scale military exercises on Russia’s western border.”
Totally Cancel War Games and Weapons Shows Now..by .World BEYOND War
Please sign these two urgent petitions:
1. The U.S. Military has scaled back the massive war rehearsals in Europe but not yet canceled them. Add your name now to the demand that such madness cease immediately and entirely, so that resources can be redirected to something more useful.
2. Despite the growing coronavirus pandemic, the CANSEC 2020 weapons show is still scheduled to take place in Ottawa May 27 and 28. CANSEC is billed as “North America’s largest trilateral defence event” and is expected to attract 12,000 government and military officials and weapons industry representatives from 55 countries to Ottawa. Click here to send a letter to top officials telling them: Weapons dealers should not risk the health of the people of Ottawa in order to market, buy, and sell weapons of war, endangering the lives of people around the world with violence and conflict. via. World BEYOND War
In the midst of a staggering virus epidemic that has shut much of Europe down, the insane and arrogant United States began sending 30,000 Army troops throughout Europe for war games.
As the soldiers emerged from their transport planes they shook the hands of US and European military officials welcoming them to the hot bed of corona-virus.
Exercise DEFENDER-Europe 20, now cut back but not cancelled, is the deployment of a division-size combat-credible force from the United States to Europe, the drawing of equipment and the movement of personnel and equipment across the theater to various training areas.
U.S.-based equipment was due to leave from ports in four states and arrive in six European countries. This would require the support of tens of thousands of service members and civilians in multiple nations.
U.S. service members were planned to spread out across the region to establish intermediate staging bases with multinational forces and participate in various annual exercises.
DEFENDER-Europe 20, now cut back due to the withdrawal of the German contingent, was to be the largest deployment of U.S.-based forces to Europe for an exercise in the more than 25 years.………………………….continues further down..…………
“Close contact” and COVID-19: what does it mean?, according to the US Army
By Gia Oney | Landstuhl Regional Medical Center | March 15 ………………………..With confirmed positive cases of the 2019 novel coronavirus, or COVID-19, in the Kaiserslautern and Wiesbaden Military Communities, many concerned community members may be wondering whether or not they have been exposed to the virus if they had any contact with the infected patients or their families.
In order to dispel rumors and misinformation, Landstuhl Regional Medical Center Public Health Officials want to share the process by which potentially impacted people are identified and notified.
According to U.S. Army Col. Rodney Coldren, chief of preventive medicine for Public Health Command Europe, the community is not at risk from someone who is a “close contact” of someone infected with COVID-19, as long as they are not displaying symptoms themselves.
“The people who came into contact with family members (of infected COVID-19 patients) are at absolutely no additional risk beyond that of being out in the general community,”
Ostensibly this massive war game is to ‘protect’ the people of Europe from the exaggerated ‘threat’ from an attack by Russia. Of course that is total nonsense. The US-NATO are in fact threatening Russia and when these wars games are over much of the military hardware delivered there will be left in large new ‘storage depot’ bases located in Poland and other locations near Russian borders..
Of course the US will likely be ‘leaving’ and ‘spreading’ something much more dangerous during these exercises. There is no way in hell that during this current pandemic many of these troops wouldn’t become ‘carriers’ of the virus. What message is being sent to the people of Italy, Germany or France that they should lock themselves inside their homes while US troops play war throughout Europe?
Peace groups in Europe are now demanding that these provocative war games be cancelled and finally the US military is being forced to cut back the War Games.
But what happens when likely already ‘contaminated’ troops return to the US – to be fanned out across the nation – bringing home the contagion that they carry inside their bursting patriotic chests which now are loaded with the virus?
When will the world begin to realize that the USA is not here to help you?
Update: On March 13, 2020, the German Bundeswehr command announced a decision to withdraw from the NATO anti-Russian exercises Defender Europe 20 . Due to the spread of corona-virus, German troops will not be involved in maneuvers. The main training venue is training grounds in Poland and Germany.
The departure of the Bundeswehr from the exercises of Defender Europe 20 means a stop on the entire supply line of military equipment and weapons for the exercises. According to the AFP news agency, the further transfer of American soldiers to exercises from the US through German airports has been stopped. This means the actual curtailment though not complete cancellation of the War Games.
U.S. European Command (EUCOM) announced that the number of U.S. troops participating in DEFENDER-Europe 20 was being cut back, although several U.S. units have already arrived and moved into position in NATO alliance states.
“In light of the current corona-virus outbreak, we will modify the exercise by reducing the number of U.S. participants,” the EUCOM statement said. “Activities associated with the exercise will be adjusted accordingly, and we’ll work closely with allies and partners to meet our highest priority training objectives.”
As part of a modified war exercise, they expect that an armored brigade combat team already deployed to Europe will conduct gunnery and other combined training together with Allies.
In parallel, preparations for war games called Aurora 20 is continuing according to plan. Aurora 20 – the largest military exercise in years will include a debut of the Pentagon’s Patriot missile system – is due to take place in Sweden from May 11 to June 7. Preparations already include transport of equipment and soldiers to Sweden.
Bruce
posted by Bruce K. Gagnon | 2:16 PM
4 Comments…on original site:
joystjohn said…
holy effing moley3/16/20, 3:59 PMRedwoodhippie said…
Bruce do you know what countries besides Poland United States troops are at now or likely going to soon?3/16/20, 5:06 PMBruce K. Gagnon said…
Germany, Italy, Poland, Sweden and many other NATO nations – likely Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania
3/16/20, 9:20 PMJoan said…
first part from …. http://space4peace.blogspot.com/2020/03/us-army-invades-virus-plagued-europe.html
The Free 