When Mass Murder Starts in Your Own Backyard:
Wescam, L-3 Communications Canada, and The Blood on Canada's Corporate Doorstep

It appears that Canadian technology built in Burlington, Ontario,
contributed to another cowardly act of mass murder from the skies last
month. Some 80 Pakistani school kids, most under the age of 15, were
murdered October 30 when, according to numerous on-the-ground reports, an
unmanned U.S. Predator drone, employing a targetting device designed and
manufactured at Burlington's L-3 Wescam, shot a Hellfire missile into the
students' school.

The destructive power of a Hellfire hitting your local school is
best illustrated by the fact that Hellfires are meant to slice through
heavily armoured tanks. The rationale used for the attack was that a "bad
guy," a "legitimate target," was in the area, and that if civilians don't
want to get hurt, they should just stay away from bad guys. It is no small
irony that Wescam, which might be considered a legitimate military target
or bad guy by any country at war with Canada, is located right next door to
an elementary school.

The October 30 missile strike was another illegal act in the
endless wars (the Hague Convention's Article 25 states: "The attack or
bombardment of towns, villages, habitations or buildings which are not
defended, is prohibited."). Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Iraq, to name a
few, are simply, like Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, and so many others before
them, testing labs for warfare, and all the new hi-tech gimmickry coming
out of the "aerospace" market is being honed and refined "in theatre," as
the generals like to say.

"WE ARE GOING TO KILL THE WRONG PEOPLE SOMETIMES."
And what of those murdered kids? As then White House deputy
counter-terrorism director Roger Cressey told UPI in 2001: "We are going to
make mistakes. We are even going to kill the wrong people sometimes. That's
the inherent risk of an aggressive counter-terrorism program."

This latest atrocity, a mere blip on the radar screen of the
so-called "western" media, provides one more compelling reason for folks in
Ontario to attend the November 20 rally, street theatre, and nonviolent
civil disobedience at the entrance to L-3 Wescam. Like previous rallies
over the past four years, demonstrators wish to share evidence of what
Wescam technology does when it's put to its intended use.

Burlington police recently told Homes not Bombs organizers that
Wescam executives have been ordered by their corporate masters at L-3
Communications in New York to refuse our request for dialogue. A refusal to
speak with us, however, will not deter us from trying to bring evidence of
war crimes complicity to the front door of Burlington's biggest war
manufacturer.

Evidence of the October 30 attack would not represent the first
time that the blood of Afghanis or Iraqis could be laid at Wescam's
doorstep. On February 4, 2002, a Predator drone fired a Hellfire missile at
"three tall men" believed to be Al Qaeda members because they were wearing
long robes. Despite Pentagon insistence that the men were "suspected
militants," they were in fact poor folks scavenging for metal. The Afghan
Islamic Press identified the three dead men as Munir Ahmad, Jehangir Khan
and Daraz Khan. "They were standing and chatting when hit by the missile,"
said village elders.

Pentagon spokeswoman Victoria Clark, when confronted with that
reality, stated: "We're convinced that it was an appropriate
target...[although] we do not yet know exactly who it was."

According to Professor Marc Herold -- who has diligently documented
the kinds of atrocities the Pentagon would just as soon forget -- on May 6,
2002, a Predator fired a Lockheed missile at a convoy of cars in Kunar
province, seeking to assassinate an Afghan "warlord," but succeeded only in
destroying a school and killing at least 10 nearby civilians.

EXTRAJUDICIAL EXECUTIONS WITH WESCAM TECHNOLOGY
Perhaps most famously, the U.S. carried out an extrajudicial
execution using Wescam technology when six "suspected extremists" were
blown to bits while driving in Yemen in November, 2002. There were no
arrests, no charges, no trial, no appeal. Just silence, then death. U.S.,
officials have admitted that on other occasions the Predator has been used
to attack people mistakenly thought to be Osama bin Laden.

In an age when concepts like international law are viewed as an
antiquated nuisance for those who would wage war, such incidents are
becoming quite common.

On January 31, 2006, Amnesty International wrote a letter of
protest to George W. Bush "to express its concern that between 13 and 18
people were killed on 13 January 2006," when Hellfire missiles were fired
into three houses in Damadola in Bajaur Agency from an unmanned Predator
drone probably operated by the CIA. As per usual, the excuse for the
terrorist bombing was that a high-ranking Al-Qaeda official was "in the
area."

In the related press release, Amnesty International said it was
concerned that a pattern of killings carried out with these weapons
appeared "to reflect a US government policy condoning extrajudicial
executions. Amnesty International reiterated to the US President that
extrajudicial executions are strictly prohibited under international human
rights law. Anyone accused of an offence, however serious, has the right to
be presumed innocent unless proven guilty and to have their guilt or
innocence established in a regular court of law in a fair trial."

Amnesty also pointed out that "the fact that air surveillance,
witnessed by local people, took place for several days before the attack
indicates that those ordering the attack on the basis of this information
were very likely to have been aware of the presence of women and children
and others unconnected with political violence in the area of the attack."

L-3 NOW CANADA'S #1 WARMAKER
While hundreds upon hundreds of Canadian companies are reaping huge
profits by enabling the murder of human beings in these testing grounds for
war (supplying everything from the bullets, machine guns, and grenade
launchers to the base material for depleted uranium bullets and
light-armoured vehicles), L-3 Communications Canada (Wescam's parent) was
recently named the #1 military firm by the Canadian Defence Review.

L-3, which has grown into one of the largest weapons firms in the
world, plays a major role in all parts of the so-called war on terror:
interdiction of refugees seeking safety, supply of interrogation teams
implicated in torture of Iraqi detainees, provision of the tools of
repression utilized by police to smash demonstrations, and key components
for major weapons systems.

Here in Canada, two of those major systems rely on L-3 Canada
technology: the unmanned aerial vehicle Predator, and the Stryker Light
Armoured Vehicle.

According to the U.S. Air Force's strategic vision planning
document, the future of warfare is the use of unmanned aerial vehicles,
naming the Predator as a system that "evolved into a formidable combat
support and was involved in every major military operation" between 1996
and 2004. Armed with Hellfire missiles, the Predator is described as "one
of the military's most requested systems, assisting in the execution of the
global war on terror by finding, fixing, tracking, targeting, engaging, and
assessing suspected terrorist locations."

The UAV is viewed as "a major component of the Army Future Combat
System," especially since unmanned vehicles mean increased air time,
hovering time, and an ability to operate in "environments contaminated by
chemical, biological, or radioactive agents." The Pentagon admits that
politically, using UAV's piloted with video screens based on the US cuts
the domestic cost created by bodies coming home.

"Arming the RQ-1 Predator with Hellfire missiles can be compared
to the mounting of guns on biplanes early in the last century," gushes the
Air Force document.

PROVIDING U.S. ARMY WITH INCREASED LETHALITY
L-3 Canada has also taken over the old Rexdale, Ontario, Litton
plant, infamous for 1980s cruise missile production. Now called L-3
Electronic Systems, the division is currently manufacturing for General
Dynamics Land Systems multiple assemblies for the Stryker Brigade Combat
Team (BCT)."

General Dynamics describes the Stryker as "the Army's highest-
priority production combat vehicle program and the centerpiece of the
ongoing Army Transformation.... Stryker is an eight-wheel armored vehicle
that is changing the way warfare is conducted on the battlefield....Stryker
is an essential element of the Army's effort to transform itself into a
more agile, deployable, survivable and lethal force....Stryker fulfills an
immediate requirement to equip a strategically deployable and operationally
deployable brigade capable of rapid movement anywhere on the globe in a
combat-ready configuration."

So while a majority of Canadians oppose the wars in Afghanistan and
Iraq, there is little doubt that they will continue until we confront the
economic engine that is driving these wars, the corporations that make a
living from killing (along with the many other tentacles of the war
complex, from recruiting in schools to the investment of public pension
funds in war profiteers).

The workers at these factories need not lose their jobs. War must
become as socially unacceptable as smoking. Both are profitable, and both
kill. But now that smoking has been recognized for the grave health hazard
it poses (along with huge health care bills), governments now subsidize
farmers who used to grow tobacco to plant something else. And so it can be
in the hi-tech sector --instead of pumping billions into bombs, why not
provide funding to transform their operations, so that the warlords of the
world, from General Hillier on down, are forced to disarm and seek
nonviolent means of conflict resolution?

One step in that process is continued pressure on corporations like
L-3. Please consider joining us for the demonstration November 20. If you
cannot make it, drop a line to Wescam President John Dehne, urging that he
meet with Homes not Bombs representatives to transform his business. His
fax is (905) 633-4100, or send an email from the following site:
http://www.wescam.com/contacts_1_sales.asp

(report from Matthew Behrens of Homes not Bombs)
www.homesnotbombs.ca