ustxtxb_obs_1981_04_17_50_00001-00000_000.pdf

TEXAS 13 SERVER April 17, 1981 A Journal .of Free Voices 750 Border Star ’81 War in Texas-New Mexico Desert Fort Bliss, White Sands Missile Range The press shack near McGregor Range headquarters was crowded GIs in combat greens and sidearms jostling pencil reporters and television camera crews and the portly Air Force public affairs buck colonel led the Observer team to his quieter office. “Ask me anything, anything,” he said, picking up, packing and lighting a Black Forest meerschaum with a bowl as big as a tangerine. “There’s this obvious question,” said the Observer reporter; “Is there any significance in this choice of terrain? Secretary Haig lands in Egypt this afternoon, tonight, and he’s stopping in Israel, Jordan and Saudi Arabia. He’s talking about a ‘strategic consensus’ in an arc from Egypt on the west to Pakistan in the east . . .?” “Oh, no, no, no,” said the colonel. “These things are four or five years in the planning. We started planning this one in early 1974. “I won’t deny the coincidence with General Haig’s trip,” he said, “and I Games of Readiness for ‘Afghanistan, Eyeran, or Anywhereistan’ guess it’s fortunate that if we have to go we’ll have had this exercise here in this . . .” His voice trailed off and he stood and turned to a wall map behind his desk. By Lyman Jones “The invasion’s from the north \(his headed down toward Bliss and El Paso. The invader force is stronger, as an invader would be. Their momentum will push back the defenders for a couple of days and then we’ll reverse the exercise and beef up the defense but, no, this exercise was planned beginning in early 1974.” [INTERVAL: In late 1973, reacting to massive United States arms shipments to Israel, then under attack by Egyptians, Syrians and Russians, the petroleum exporters of the Middle East embargoed crude oil shipments to the West. The effects of the embargo peaked, for the United States, in December of 1973 and in early 1974. And in Washington about that time, wrote Richard Rovere in the New Yorker, “Whirl is king.” All was crumpling for Richard Nixon. He was seven or eight months from resignation.] The Observer team was issued press passes Numbers 29 and 30 yellow, plastic-enclosed, reading in bold black at top: “USREDCOM.” USREDCOM, translated, means the United States Readiness Command, a U.S. Army planning entity commanded by a four-star general, headquartered at MacDill Air Force Base, Tampa, Florida. It has immediate operational control of about 220,000 Army and Air Force “general purpose -forces,” nine di visions and four separate brigades in cluding Army airborne, air assault, mechanized, armored, infantry and spe cial forces, and 46 Air Force tactical fighter, tactical reconnaissance, and special operations squadrons. Some of the USREDCOM units are Texas-based: The 12th Air Force, controller of all tactical air units west of the Mississippi River, headquartered at Bergstrom Air Force Base, Austin; and armored cavalry units from Forts Bliss and Hood, El Paso and Killeen. USREDCOM operates directly under the Joint Chiefs of Staff and is empowered to fold into its standing forces National Guard and reserve air and ground elements. When the Joint Chiefs order it, Navy and Marine surface, ground and air units may also be assigned. USREDCOM missions include the providing of .a general pool of “combat ready” forces, the conducting of “con tingency planning as directed by the Joint Chiefs of Staff for areas of the world not assigned to other unified IN THIS ISSUE . Page Abandon Nuclear Power 2 On Being a Farmworker 3 The Texas Farmworkers’ Split 4 Speaker Clayton Speaks 8 Cisneros, and in Austin STNP 14 A Nuclear Dump for Texas? 19 The Coming Showdown on STNP 22 The MX Threatens the Panhandle 27 /