Homeland Security Contracts for Vast New Detention Camps For American Citizens?

Pacific News Service > News > Homeland Security Contracts for Vast New Detention Camps:

"For those who follow covert government operations abroad and at home, the contract evoked ominous memories of Oliver North's controversial Rex-84 'readiness exercise' in 1984. This called for the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to round up and detain 400,000 imaginary 'refugees,' in the context of 'uncontrolled population movements' over the Mexican border into the United States. North's activities raised civil liberties concerns in both Congress and the Justice Department. The concerns persist.

'Almost certainly this is preparation for a roundup after the next 9/11 for Mid-Easterners, Muslims and possibly dissenters,' says Daniel Ellsberg, a former military analyst who in 1971 released the Pentagon Papers, the U.S. military's account of its activities in Vietnam. 'They've already done this on a smaller scale, with the 'special registration' detentions of immigrant men from Muslim countries, and with Guantanamo.'

Plans for detention facilities or camps have a long history, going back to fears in the 1970s of a national uprising by black militants. As Alonzo Chardy reported in the Miami Herald on July 5, 1987, an executive order for continuity of government (COG) had been drafted in 1982 by FEMA head Louis Giuffrida. The order called for 'suspension of the Constitution' and 'declaration of martial law.' The martial law portions of the plan were outlined in a memo by Giuffrida's deputy, John Brinkerhoff."