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U.S. Veterans Stand With Dakota Pipeline Protesters

U.S. Veterans Stand With Dakota Pipeline Protesters

CANNON BALL, N.D. (Reuters) – In the back reaches of the Dakota Access Pipeline protest camp, U.S. military veterans, armed with saws, hammers and other tools, are quietly building barracks, an infirmary and a mess hall.

Despite the bitter cold and an evacuation order from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the veterans hope to erect enough space to house at least several hundred peers making their way into the Oceti Sakowin Camp here in Cannon Ball.

Veterans interviewed by Reuters gave a plethora of motives for traveling here. Some felt it was their patriotic duty to defend protesters, especially since Native Americans have historically had an active presence in the U.S. military.

For others, coming here offers a sense of purpose they have lacked since returning to civilian society. For all, the camaraderie with those who have also shared military service was important.

“Our commitment has not expired because we took off the uniform,” said Charles Vondal, 51, an Army veteran and Native American from Turtle Mountain, N.D. “We understand what it means to put our lives on the line.”

The response last month to a call for 2,000 veterans to act as a barrier between activists and law enforcement was much swifter than expected – with organizers having to stop accepting volunteers.

The veterans arriving say their presence will make it less likely that police will resort again to aggressive tactics, after water cannons and tear gas were used on a group of protesters in sub-freezing temperatures two weeks ago.

More than 500 activists have been arrested over the last several months.

“I felt it was our duty to come and stand in front of the guns and the mace and the water and the threat that they pose to these people,” said Anthony Murtha, 29, from Detroit, who served in the U.S. Navy from 2009 to 2013.

Local law enforcement said the specter of having thousands of military-trained veterans in the area was of concern, but they were not expecting any melees.

“If (veterans) come to this area and they want to protest peacefully, if that’s what they want to do and have their voice heard, then there’s absolutely no issues with that,” Kyle Kirchmeier, sheriff for Morton County, North Dakota, where the pipeline is routed, said in an interview Saturday.

Some veterans groups are unhappy with those coming to support the protesters, saying they are standing up for illegal behavior. They also note that many law enforcement officers are veterans. North Dakota’s state veterans coordinating council, in a letter last week, asked the veterans who want to stand with the protesters not to come.

“We don’t want to see veterans facing down veterans,” said Lonnie Wangen, commissioner of North Dakota’s Department of Veterans Affairs.

But veterans at the camp say pictures and video of water hoses used against Native Americans spoke to their concern of heavy-handed tactics used by law enforcement.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has yet to grant a permit for Energy Transfer Partners to drill under Lake Oahe, a reservoir that is part of the Missouri River.

This one-mile stretch represents the last unfinished portion of the line in North Dakota, which will stretch as far as Illinois.

Native Americans serve at a high rate in the armed forces, according to data from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. A 2012 report showed more than 150,000 veterans of Native American descent. U.S. Defense Department data as of 2014 put Alaskan/Native American service members at more than 24,000.

“It’s symbolic for people who stood up for this nation’s freedom to stand up for the first inhabitants of this nation,” said Dave Archambault II, chairman of the Standing Rock Sioux, on Saturday.

Veterans Stand With Standing Rock, which organized this weekend’s rally and other events, has warned veterans they could experience flashbacks to combat experience.

“We’re under constant surveillance with helicopters and planes flying over. There is a military boundary with barbed wire,” said Angie Spencer, 34, a clinical psychologist from Seattle who has worked with veterans.

The surroundings, she said, mean counselors are vigilant for signs of post-traumatic stress disorder.

On Friday, the rally organizers met with law enforcement on the Backwater Bridge, the site of two of the most heated confrontations between police and protesters in the last several weeks. They said they were there to protest peacefully.

The chances that the pipeline will be stopped at this point seem slim. President-elect Donald Trump last week voiced support for the project, which has been delayed twice since September by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

Opposing the pipeline, standing with the Standing Rock Sioux tribe, was an opportunity to again find a personal mission, some said.

“You kind of lose your purpose when you’re out (of the military),” said John Nelson, 25, from San Diego, who spent seven years in the Navy. “I think that’s why it’s so easy for so many veterans to jump on board.”

(Reporting By Ernest Scheyder and Terray Sylvester; Additional reporting by Alicia Underlee Nelson in West Fargo, N.D.; Writing by David Gaffen and Ernest Scheyder; Editing by Chris Reese)

IMAGE: Veterans attend a Sioux tribal welcome meeting at Sitting Bull College as “water protectors” continue to demonstrate against plans to pass the Dakota Access pipeline near the Standing Rock Indian Reservation, in Fort Yates, North Dakota, U.S. December 3, 2016. REUTERS/Stephanie Keith

Standing Rock Protest Continues After Months As Tribe Fights For Ancestral Sites And Against Pipeline

Standing Rock Protest Continues After Months As Tribe Fights For Ancestral Sites And Against Pipeline

The Standing Rock Sioux tribe, together with more than a thousand indigenous activists from multiple other tribes, today continued their months-long protest of the proposed Dakota Access Pipeline, a $3.8 billion project that would transport oil across the state.

The protests began on April 1, and have shown no signs of slowing since then. The proposed pipeline would be 1,172 miles long and would run through South Dakota and Iowa, as well, to connect with an existing pipeline in Illinois. The Standing Rock Sioux tribe has sued federal regulators for approving the pipeline in the first place, challenging the U.S. Army Corps of Engineer’s decision to grant over 200 permits for water crossings. The tribe argues the pipeline could harm drinking water for the more than 8,000 tribe members who live less than a mile downstream. The tribe also says the pipeline could impact the drinking water of millions more who live further way.

The suit also invokes the National Historic Preservation Act, as the tribe argues the pipeline could disturb ancient sites outside the reservation.

The protests are located in Sacred Stone Spirit camp, and have said their protest is intended to remain peaceful.

Work on the pipeline was paused recently after Energy Transfer Partners LP claimed its workers were under threat. The construction crews are now being guarded by police and independent security contractors and have won restraining orders against the protesters. Over 20 arrests have also been made.

Dave Archambault, chair of the Standing Rock Sioux tribe told Democracy Now! host Amy Goodman that the pipeline was a threat to the health of members of his tribe.

“And we never had an opportunity to express our concerns,” Archambault continued.

“This is a corporation that is coming forward and just bulldozing through without any concern for tribes. And the things that have happened to tribal nations across this nation have been unjust and unfair, and this has come to a point where we can no longer pay the costs for this nation’s well-being. We pay for economic development, we pay for national security, and we pay for energy independence. It is at our expense that this nation reaps those benefits. And all too often we share similar concerns, similar wrongdoings to us, so we are uniting, and we’re standing up, and we’re saying, ‘No more.'”

The Standing Rock protest has recently been gaining ground and publicity: actors Susan Sarandon, Riley Keough and Shailene Woodley joined the protest, through a demonstration outside a courthouse in Washington D.C. After the restraining orders were granted to the construction company, the tribe sought a preliminary injunction to stop construction. No decision has been made yet, but one is expected by District Court Judge James Boasberg by September 9.

“I’m here as a mother and a grandmother to thank the people of the Standing Rock community for bringing our attention to this horrible thing that is happening to their land, which in turn will endanger all of us … because all of our waters are connected,” said Sarandon, according to Reuters.

The Standing Rock protest is not the first of its kind, by a long shot. Opposition to the proposed Keystone pipeline, for example, went on for years.

Protesters include young tribe members, but also those who have a history of protesting government oppression of indigenous rights, including some protesters who participated in the 1973 Wounded Knee standoff to demand treaty rights.

The protest has been compared by some to Cliven Bundy and his son Ammon’s battle with the U.S. government for years over unpaid grazing fees and control of land. Ammon Bundy, with the help of his brother Ryan, undertook occupation of a wildlife refuge in Oregon earlier this year. According to Indian Country Today Media Network, the refuge the Bundy boys were occupying was formerly the Malheur Indian Reservation.

Photo: Dakota Access Pipeline protest at the Sacred Stone Camp near Cannon Ball, North Dakota. Flickr/Tony Webster