F-35 training in cities is criminal. The perpetrators go unpunished. Yet local news media is silent

Jan 10, 2023

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To their credit, certain journalists did report the pain, injury, and suffering that the F-35 inflicts on thousands of Vermont families. But they did not reveal that the government was stepping outside the law by hurting Vermonters, day after day, nonstop. The government does not have authority to hurt civilians. News media has a job of holding politicians and commanders to account. Otherwise those politicians and commanders have impunity, and things will keep getting worse.

Right now it’s the 115-decibel noise of the F-35 jets that is hurting civilians hundreds of times a month. If that is accepted, why not 120 decibels? or 130? What if they start using the afterburner in a city location? Can the military hurt civilians with other weapons besides the F-35? Is there any limit at all?

Well, the FAA does set limits on aircraft noise in a populated area but only for civilian aircraft. The F-35 noise is far far beyond those limits. Vermont law itself sets limits on noise. And the military has rules, and all those rules are blatantly ignored and violated.

Local news media has not even asked the question about laws, regulations, and limits. Sure, to their credit, they did a bit of hurt-and-injury reporting. But then they stopped. They never reported that the 115-decibel F-35 training in a city is illegal under Vermont law, it’s illegal under federal law and it’s illegal under the military’s own regulations. They never reported that those responsible for giving the orders, including the governor and the commanders of the Vermont Air National Guard, are criminal perpetrators.

Nor have local news media alerted their readers, listeners, and viewers that Vermont and its local governments have both the power and the responsibility under the law to put a stop to the abuse. And to enforce the law by prosecuting those responsible. Nobody is above the law, and that means that if you are the governor or the commander you must obey the law or face investigation, prosecution, conviction, and incarceration just like anybody else if you violate the law.

No legacy news reporter ever once asked a commander about the military rule called “distinction.” Distinction is the fundamental Department of Defense (DoD) regulation that requires military forces to locate their dangerous training operations away from populated areas. It also has many other requirements. But that is one of them. Keep away from populated areas with military forces.

Nor has any legacy news reporter ever once asked a commander about enforcing the Air Force regulation that prohibits using a weapon in a manner for which it was not designed that causes “unnecessary suffering.” (page 67). Such as by training hundreds of times a month with the 115-decibel F-35 in a location where 1,300 children are growing up in the oval-shaped noise-terror zone that the Air-Force itself said was “unsuitable for residential use.”

The F-35 is being used in a way for which it was not designed. It was designed for delivering nuclear bombs. Stealth. Supersonic flight. It was not designed for training in a city. If it was designed for training in a city it would be quiet. It’s not.

Nor did local news ever report that military regulations require military forces to take “feasible precautions” to protect civilians before conducting a military operation. Such as, in this case, by relocating the F-35 training to a runway remote from any populated area. Or at least a few miles away. Or at least by installing the sound insulation on the homes, the 3000 homes, that they have been talking about for years but never did install. Schools, workplaces, and homes should have had their protection installed before initiating the training with the F-35 in a populated area if the rule about feasible precautions was enforced and complied with. But it wasn’t. The military just ignored its own regulations.

Local news media never reported that the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) shows the Burlington area is targeted with Russian and Chinese nuclear bombs, and that FEMA has to prepare for it. No reporter ever mentioned that Burlington is on the front lines of nuclear war because of the presence of these fighter jets that can drop nuclear bombs on targets in Russia and China.

And no local news reporter ever reported that it’s a war crime to use Vermonters as “human shields” for F-35 nuclear bomb delivery vehicles. Tens of thousands of Vermonters are being used as human shields.

Even after Vermont’s F-35s were sent over for “air-policing” around Russia’s borders in Eastern Europe last spring and summer not one legacy news media mentioned that the air policing solidified the Burlington International Airport, where they are based, as a legitimate military target for Russian nuclear-tipped missiles and put the 127,000 Vermonters who live within 5 miles of the runway in the cross hairs of the nuclear targeting from Russia or China. Just like the US targets their military bases from which they can launch nuclear bomb delivery vehicles.

No reporter ever mentioned the fact that the Air Force says in its Environmenal Impact Statement that repeated exposure to military aircraft noise at even less than the level of the F-35 can cause permanent hearing loss. Who needs hearing loss? Who needs to grow up from zero to 18 years old in a neighborhood where the noise is so much that thousands of exposures each year is causing you hearing loss? What does that do for your academic performance and your future? Why should our own military be hurting our own children?

No reporter ever discussed the crash danger from the F-35 and disclosed that it’s unacceptably high. Not just because the F-35 is so new and has such high crash risk but also because the F-35 crash consequences are so much higher than those of the old F-16s. After all the F-16 was made of aluminum and it didn’t burn. The F-35 burns. The whole plane burns. It is made of a carbon composite material that burns. It emits an enormous amount of toxic chemicals and particulates that get into your lungs and won’t come out.

At a time of intense housing crisis, isn’t it a wonder that no legacy news media ever looked at the 44 acres of land in the Chamberlin School neighborhood of South Burlington forced under FAA regulations to remain vacant of housing because of the noise. Because of the 115-decibel noise of the F-35. That’s the only reason this land is vacant.

And that no news media ever disclosed the full facts about the FAA grants that were provided to the airport so they could buy up the 200 houses that used to be on that land and demolish them. Well those FAA grants came with grant assurances that require the airport to sell the land for housing as soon as the F-35 noise goes away. So if the F-35 departs those 44 acres are available for housing. And, what’s more, it can be affordable housing because the land is owned by the City of Burlington. It’s not privately owned land. It’s owned by the City. It’s already publicly owned land. Why couldn’t hundreds or up to 1000 affordable units or more be put on those 44 acres?

And housing is desperately needed in Chittenden County. What’s holding up economic development is the lack of housing for employees. Companies cannot expand because they can’t bring in new workers because there is no housing nearby. This is the F-35: not an economic driver but an economic retarder.

But there is even a more important reason. The F-35 is climate catastrophe on steroids. The F-35 is such an enormous gas-guzzler that its training flights emit as much CO2 as all of Burlington airport’s civilian airliner flights put together.

And it’s training for war. And the US has initiated wars of choice not just in the middle east but in many other places, in South America and Africa. They are doing these wars that are not just causing devastation but climate catastrophe, too.

Nor has any reporter asked what is the “military necessity” for the training with the F-35 to be conducted in densely populated cities? Couldn’t the pilots just as easily train from a runway remote from any populated area? No local news media reported that former Wing Commander David Shevchik, who commanded the training until very recently, told an open house sponsored by the national guard that the Burlington location is better for attracting and retaining pilots. Well, that’s a terrific reason that an employer would want to be located near Burlington. That is a good reason. But it is not a military necessity. It’s mere convenience. Not military necessity. It cannot be used as a reason to hurt civilians with 115-decibel noise or make them a target for nuclear tipped missiles. If you want to be in the military you serve the people. You don’t abuse the people for your own convenience.

Vermonters cannot be proud of news media for never reporting that the US Constitution and federal law make the states the level of government in control of the training of their own state national guard. It’s not the federal government that is responsible for these training activities in a city.

Nor can Vermonters be proud of a news organization that failed to investigate why the state is not using its power over training to order a halt to F-35 training flights in a populated area where there is no argument that they are hurting civilians, including children. There is something deeply wrong with our political and military leaders that they allow this to happen and our news media is not doing its job.

Nor can Vermonters be proud that our local news media did not just fail to cover the story of ongoing law breaking at the highest level of state government. News media kept silent that the governor has the authority to order a halt to F-35 training in cities. It covered up for the vicious crimes the governor commits each day against thousands of families in Winooski, Burlington, South Burlington, Williston, Colchester, Richmond, and other nearby towns and villages.

News media also covered up for the abuse the governor commits against the men and women who are members of the Vermont National Guard by foisting training that violates state and federal law and the military’s own regulations. F-35 training in a city location that dishonors the commanders and the units themselves. Nothing is worse for our state national guard than abusing them by forcing them to violate their own regulations and corrupting them.

By failing to report and by maintaining its silence, the local news media is responsible for high-level perpetrators getting away with ongoing criminal activity. The local news media silence legitimizes and gives a stamp of approval to these crimes. It’s not just hurting working class and minority people in Winooski and in the Chamberlin School neighborhood, and in Burlington and Williston. It vividly demonstrates that the news media cannot be trusted to do its job to fearlessly hold truth to power. To hold government officials to account. “To comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable.”

Cancel the F-35

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