http://www.the-times.co.uk/news/pages/tim/99/09/06/timfgnfar01004.html?1124027

Saw this today and it occurs to me that if the military takes this kind of tactic (terror and shooting) then you could move a large number of people out of a city and into a refugee camp in a hurry.

Of course we're doing it for their own good

-- LM (latemarch@usa.net), September 06, 1999

Answers

the 'camps' are to protect 'them' from 'us'.

-- Dan G (thepcguru@hotmail.com), September 06, 1999.

What a convenient way to vilify the citizens' militias at the same time.Hope the militias are thoroughly vetting recent "eager" volunteers.

-- Sam (Gunmkr52@aol.com), September 06, 1999.

In an already unstable world... what will Y2K repurcussions do in various global and domestic loacations? What will the restless people do? And how fast can the outside mobilize... or not?

Lessons to learn.

Truly sad.

Diane

Article...

 Anti-independence militiamen kill 20
 Australian Navy to evacuate UN staff

150,000 flee East Timor terror

FROM DAVID WATTS IN DILI
AND JAMES BONE IN NEW YORK

http://www.the-times.co.uk/news/pages/ tim/99/09/06/timfgnfar01004.html?1124027

[Fair Use: For Educational/Research Purposes Only]

MILITIA gunmen rampaged through the capital of East Timor last night killing more than 20 people as violence throughout the territory forced up to 150,000  a quarter of the population  to become refugees.

The well co-ordinated attacks appeared designed to drive out United Nations officials, aid workers and foreign media after the historic vote for independence from Indonesia. The militiamen surrounded the UN compound and overran hotels used by foreigners.

Today Australia will launch an evacuation of non-essential United Nations staff and Australians, a defence official said. Lieutenant- Colonel David Tyler said that the Australian Defence Force would make several sorties into Dili using five C-130 Hercules transport aircraft flying out of the Tyndall air force base at Darwin in Northern Territory.

The UN Security Council decided yesterday to send a mission to Jakarta to put pressure on the Indonesian government to halt the violence.

Reports from Dili said that pro-Indonesian militias had attacked the home in the capital of the Nobel Peace Prize winner Bishop Carlos Belo, torching the Roman Catholic diocese office and burning houses.

Bishop Belos fellow prize winner, the independence leader Jose Ramos- Horta, called for international military intervention, saying that the credibility of the United Nations was at stake. "People must be protected by an independent, neutral armed force in the territory," he said.

Pro-independence sources said at least 100 East Timorese had been killed in two days of bloody unrest since Saturdays announcement that a UN-organised ballot on August 30 had recorded a 78.5 per cent vote in favour of the territorys independence from Indonesia.

Indonesia came under blistering international criticism for failing to control the proJakarta militias, as its ministers of defence, foreign affairs, police and justice flew to Dili to discuss the crisis with UN officials. Last night the UN convened an emergency session and Australia made a proposal to send in a UN-authorised peacekeeping force. Indonesia is resisting the suggestion.

Only hours after the referendum result was announced militiamen began rampaging through areas known to support independence. The militias appeared determined to carry out their threat of civil war if Jakartas offer of autonomy without independence was turned down.

Shortly after nightfall, in a well-organised exercise in terror clearly intended to look like civil war and to paralyse UN operations, gunmen started firing streams of tracer fire over a crowded camp in a school area next to the UN compound. It had the desired effect. Men, women and children threw themselves at the razor wire that surrounds the compound in a frantic attempt to escape what they had been warned would happen to them.

The women had been told to dance and enjoy the day because it would be their last.

Shredding themselves on the wire, they ran screaming into the UN base; 1,400 men, women and children crammed into the hall. They were already hungry and tired from days in the camp.

"Ive never seen a controlled situation so out of control," an official said.

James Dunn, a leading foreign expert on the territory, said: "Its a thoroughly planned campaign from over the border in West Timor which has exposed the Indonesian lie that they are loved here in East Timor.

"The vote is an utter humiliation for the army and they are venting their frustration on the people."

The UN pulled all its staff in the capital back to its main compound and suffered its first serious Western casualty when a young American doctor was ambushed east of Dili by a dark-clad gunman carrying an automatic weapon and wearing a flak jacket similar to those used by Indonesias mobile brigade. The representatives of CARE International, Mhdecins sans Frontiires and World Vision International were all threatened or attacked.

The offices of the principal human rights association were raided, the attackers smashing in the windows and climbing in. Eight people were killed in a diocesan house in the centre of Dili, and about 20 elsewhere in the town. In the past 24 hours, 25,000 people in the capital have become refugees. The total number of refugees was reported to be more than 100,000 and up to 150,000.

-- Diane J. Squire (sacredspaces@yahoo.com), September 06, 1999.

I should clarify,

I always assumed that NG or Army would go door to door and relocate people in the extremis of a completely screwed up city.

I figured that most would have a choice of whether to go or not.

It never occured to me that there are other ways to "herd" people. Would the Army or NG use such methods?

Could they use such methods or would there be sufficient armed people in the US to thwart such a method?

Just asking, I have no clue.

-- LM (latemarch@usa.net), September 06, 1999.

Why would they "herd" people anywhere? Wouldn't it be easier to fence them in?

-- Mabel Dodge (cynical@me.net), September 06, 1999.

I certainly don't know. But there sure seem to be alot of just that going on in other places in the world.

Sometimes it's obvious as in Kosovo (ethnic cleansing) Sometimes its because someone else wants all the land. Sometimes it's just about control (Indonesia and East Timor). Here in the US (Sorry for being USCentric) I'm not sure if anyone would even want to or "need" to or even could.

-- LM (latemarch@usa.net), September 06, 1999.

Go to the archives and see numerous threads addressing the Executive Orders and the broad scope of FEMA's powers in a declared national emergency, and you will have the rude awakening I did about how we can be forced to evacuate our homes! Very frightening.

-- Elaine Seavey (Gods1sheep@aol.com), September 07, 1999.

Notice how pro-government forces are called "militia" in all the establishment press stories? An attempt to denigrate (foul) the word militia?

East Timor is another potential breakup of a nation-state (albeit a small one) as outlined by James Dale Davidson and Sir Wm. Rees-Mogg in their book "The Sovereign Individual" (see amazon.com for description and reviews).

ref also: http://www.sovereignsociety.com

-- A (A@AisA.com), September 07, 1999.