SECOND IN A SET OF FIVE POSTINGS re LOCKHEED MARTIN AT THE UNIVERSITIES:

(I am most familiar with the U of Saskatchewan, hence its use.  Lockheed Martin is also at (Canadian) Dalousie Univ, Univ New Brunswick, Royal Military College, of which I am aware.  At American universities, goes without saying.)

1. 2014-08-19 Request to Board of Governors, University of Saskatchewan: END the relationship with Lockheed Martin Corporation

2. (This posting, scroll down)   2014-12-11 U.S. Torture: ADDENDUM, Letter to University, end relationship with Lockheed Martin, ‘contract interrogators’

3. 2015-01-02 Reply from Board of Governors, request to disassociate from Lockheed Martin,

4. The Minerva Initiative. from Bill C-51, Elephant in the Room, the U.S.A.

The goal of the Minerva Initiative is to improve DoD’s (U.S. Dept of Defence’s) basic understanding of the social, cultural, behavioral, and political forces that shape regions of the world of strategic importance to the U.S.The research program will:

• Leverage and focus the resources of the Nation’s top universities. … see The Minerva Initiative

5. The very successful Disinvest – Invest Student movement (University Endowment funds): http://sojo.net/blogs/2014/11/17/why-movement-disinvest-fossil-fuels

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In the wake of U.S. Senate Committee Report on Torture (Senator Dianne Feinstein Chair),

I sent following ADDENDUM  to  the August 19th  request Board of Gorvernors to end the collaboration with Lockheed Martin .

The August 19th submission and this Addendem together document why the collaboration with Lockheed Martin needs to end.

 

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December 11, 2014

To the Board of Governors, University of Saskatchewan

The release on Tuesday, December 9th of the Report on Torture from the U.S. Senate Committee is critical to a decision about collaboration with Lockheed Martin.

Please find below documentation of Lockheed Martin’s role – – “contract interrogators”.

Thank-you.

Sandra Finley

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ADDENDUM, December 11, 2014

 

(SUBMISSION TO THE U OF S BOARD OF GOVERNORS (August 19)

 

REQUEST TO END THE RELATIONSHIP WITH LOCKHEED MARTIN CORP)

 

1.   The Board of Governors may not know the connection between the December 9th  U.S. Senate intelligence committee’s report on CIA torture  and Lockheed Martin. 

Dianne Feinstein on Tuesday released her committee’s findings on CIA torture, which found the agency’s post-9/11 embrace of torture to be brutal and ineffective.  

http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2014/dec/09/cia-torture-report-worst-findings-waterboard-rectal   Rectal rehydration and standing on broken limbs: the CIA torture report’s grisliest findings . . .

Parts of the CIA interrogation programme were known, but the catalogue of abuse is nightmarish, especially knowing much more will never be revealed . . .

So, the whole world now knows about the illegal and depraved torture done in the name of American citizens.

There is long-standing documentation of Lockheed Martin’s role.  A couple examples:

• 2011-01-11 (U.S. Torture) Lockheed Martin’s role, supplying Contract Interrogators through subsidiary Sytex
• 2005-11-04 (U.S. Torture)  Meet the New Interrogators: Lockheed Martin

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2.   UPDATE  

Lockheed Martin has launched a green-washing campaign since I wrote to you on August 19th:

• 2014-10-20  Lockheed Martin Participation in Solar Energy Project in Swift Current, SK
• 2014-09-01  Lockheed Martin green-washing. Platinum sponsor of NYC Climate Week

 

3.   BRAVE SOULS

• 2012-06-22 God bless Senator Romeo Dallaire – his speech against Bill S-10, cluster bombs

Not only Romeo Dallaire.  Just a small sampling of some others:

• 2011-02-10 Respected Canadian negotiator removed from disarmament talks, resigns. Canada can’t serve two masters at the same time, Lockheed Martin manufacturer of cluster munitions and International Humanitarian Law.

 

• 2011-01-20 Amy Goodman (“Democracy Now”), Footage of President Dwight Eisenhower on the dangers of the military-industrial complex, followed by an interview with William Hartung.  (Hartung is the author of Prophets of War,  Lockheed Martin and the Making of the Military-Industrial Complex)

 

• 2011-02-08 Lockheed Martin in Schools AND The Twisted Path From Cairo to Burlington by Laurie Essig. We are all fighting the same battle.

 

• 2010-10-10 Stunning victory: Breaking the law to obey a higher law (Lockheed Martin’s unmanned drones, Creech Air Force Base).  and  2011-04-24  The Verdict: Guilty of Protesting the Drones

 

• 2009-01-21 Student protests and Lockheed Martin Cancels recruitment on University of New Brunswick Campus, Fredericton. Subsequently Lockheed says “No intention of hopping over NB”.

 

• 2011-09-02 UPDATE: A HUGE WIN!! Burlington, Vermont’s Lockheed Martin Showdown.

 

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4. BACKGROUND YOU MAY WANT TO SKIM

o   2007-01-16 The Iraq War, Brought to You by Your Friends at Lockheed Martin

 

o   2004-11-28 Lockheed Martin and the Future of Warfare, NY Times, “Lockheed Martin doesn’t run the United States. But it does help run a breathtakingly big part of it.”

 

o   1997-12-03 Lockheed Martin: Antipersonnel Weapons (land mines), Baltimore Chronicle

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5. LOCKHEED MARTIN, MODUS OPERANDI

a.   2006-09-13   Maclean’s Magazine interview, President of the Americas for Lockheed Martin

a Lockheed Martin president lays out part of the modus operandi.   He was speaking on behalf of the large corporations in the SPP.    They will run things from inside the Government.   They cannot get what they want through normal democratic means and so they will use the “agencies” of Government and the bureaucracy.

Stunningly brazen and stupid (arrogant) for the man, Ron Covais, to have laid it out so clearly to a journalist for a national magazine (Maclean’s).

b.   2002-05-13 Lockheed Martin, US: Wages Of Sin – Why Lawbreakers Still Win Government Contracts, US News & World Report

It is important for Canadians to remember that in Saskatchewan and most other provinces, there is no law against corporate or union contributions to political parties.

It is no surprise to see Lockheed Martin and the Government of Saskatchewan partnered on a solar project in Swift Current. (item f. below)

c.   2012-07-26 Key Senate Staffer on Military Issues Got Big Payout From Lockheed Martin

 

d.   2011-10-31 (Lockheed Martin) Arms Industry Gave $1.1 Million to Super Committee Members

 

e.   2010-06-26: Aerospace Giant Lockheed Martin Donating $3.5 Million Training Package to the Saskatchewan Indian Institute of Technology (SIIT) in Saskatoon (Drones)

 

f.   2014-10-20 Lockheed Martin Participation in Solar Energy Project in Swift Current(First Nations partnership)

 

g.   2014-09-01 Lockheed Martin green-washing. Platinum sponsor of NYC Climate Week

 

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6.   LOCKHEED MARTIN AND THE NSA (Edward Snowden leaks)

The issue of surveillance, a specialty of Lockheed Martin’s,  is of increasing worry.   We are moving toward a police state.

Documentation of Lockheed Martin’s role in the NSA is scattered in many places.   One example from Lockheed Martin’s own website:

http://www.lockheedmartin.ca/us/news/press-releases/2013/april/isgs-nsa-cdx-0415.html

Lockheed Martin Hosts Cyber Defense Exercise Supporting NSA for 11th Year

April 15, 2013 /PRNewswire/

• 2013-11-26 NSA surveillance: Europe threatens to freeze US data-sharing arrangements, The Guardian. Canadians might ask . . ?

 

• 2014-06-04 Government orders federal departments to keep tabs on all demonstrations across country

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CONCLUSION:

Lockheed Martin’s role in

• torture, illegal under International and Canadian Law,
• their production of land mines and then cluster munitions, illegal
• their production of drones for dropping bombs (Yemen, Afghanistan, a growing list)
• their use of bribery,
• their long record of court convictions for such things as breaking arms export control laws,

all point to the need to disassociate. Utilitarian arguments to support collaboration with Lockheed Martin will, in the end, torpedo the University.

Dianne Feinstein, chair of the Senate Committee (Torture), spoke of the stain on America and the consequences of the loss of moral authority.   I hate to be repetitive but the loss of moral authority leaves you with scorn and no leg to stand on.

For your consideration,

Sandra Finley