PUERTO RICO: THE REVOLUTION AT OUR DOORSTEP

	  In August, of	1987, the United Nations Committee on
     Decolonization voted to ask the United States to immediately remove
     itself from Puerto	Rico and to recognize the Puerto Ricans' right to
     self-determination	and independence. This was the 11th time the U.N.
     committee made this request. And, each time the request was ignored by
     the United	States government and by the U.S. press.
	  In 1898, Puerto Rico won its autonomy	from Spain and was well	on
     its way to	becoming an independent	nation.	That is	until July 25,
     1898, when	the United States invaded the island. After three years	of
     resistance	by the Puerto Rican people, the	U.S. military might
     prevailed and Puerto Rico became a	U.S. colony. In	1952, it became	a
     "commonwealth," but the colonlial pattern,	with 90	percent	of the
     country's industry in U.S. hands, continues to this day.
	  Puerto Rico is rife with social and environmental problems, many
     of	them stemming from its status as an American colony. One
     independence group	claims that "forty percent of Puerto Rican woman
     have been sterilized as part of a deliberate U.S. strategy	to
     depopulate	the island."  Unemployment drives many Puerto Ricans to
     seek work in the U.S. Many	others left their homes	in order to
     accommodate the seven military bases there. Military recruiters prey
     on	desperate youth	experiencing 75	percent	unemployment. Bombing
     practice on the island of Vieques destroyed the local fishing industry
     there. And	while Puerto Rico has eight federal "emergency list" toxic
     dump sites, no U.S. environmental laws apply there. The U.S. is in
     violation of the Treaty of	Tlateloco, which prohibits the storage of
     nuclear arms in Latin America, by storing nuclear weapons in Puerto
     Rico.
	  Unfortunately	for Puerto Rico, its importance	to the U.S. is not
     limited to	its industrial development but rather to its critical
     position as a U.S.	military base. Currently 13% of	Puerto Rico is
     controlled	by the U.S. military. Roosevelt	Roads, the largest U.S.
     naval base	outside	the continentnal U.S., is located in Puerto Rico.
     And, when the U.S.	military is forced to leave Guantanamo,	Cuba, and
     Panama, in	the 1990's, the military importance of Puerto Rico will
     increase significantly.
	  The Puerto Rican people are resisting	by every means they can
     from demonstrations protesting U.S. war games, to protests	over plans
     to	strip-mine mineral-rich	Puerto Rico, to	militant occupations of
     U.S. military controlled-land, to armed actions.
	  As a result of the growing independencestruggle, the U.S. has
     intensified its repression.  FBI surveillance, the	use of grand juries
     to	imprison activists, and	a deliberate media portrayal of	Puerto
     Rican independistas as terrorists are all designed	to destroy the
     movement for self-determination. It was recently revealed that the
     Puerto Rican Intelligence Division, a unit	known for its closeness	to
     the FBI, maintains	a 74,000-person	"subversives list" which includes
     not just those affiliated with armed actions but lawyers, writers,	and
     others who	engage in serious dissent.
	  Given	the ongoing repression and the increasing dissension, it
     may well be that our next Vietnam is not Nicaragua, but our very own
     "Commonwealth" -- Puerto Rico.

	   SOURCES: NORTHERN SUN NEWS, October 1987,  "Puerto Rico: A long
     freedom struggle,"	by Melinda Power, p 5; UTNE READER, Jan/Feb 1988,
     "Puerto Rico: Revolution at doorstep?," by	Chris Gunderson, pp 13-14.