Army Recruiters Open War 'Experience' Arcade to Attract Youngsters/Army-Navy game

Army Recruiters Open War 'Experience' Arcade to Attract Youngsters

By Jim Hightower, JimHightower.com
Posted on December 5, 2008, Printed on December 6, 2008
http://www.alternet.org/bloggers/http://jimhightower.com//110495/

From football to beach volleyball, competitive games can get your juices going.

But the ultimate game, the one that'll give you the greatest rush, is ... what? Why, it's war, of course. Yeah, man, you literally get to kill the other team! How great is that?

Such thinking (if it can be called thinking) is behind the latest leap in marketing by the U.S. Army. In its constant effort to lure young people into the killing business, the office of military recruitment has come up with a whiz bang showcase to appeal to a generation that's been raised on computer games and that hangs out at the mall a lot. It's called the "Army Experience Center," and the first one has opened right across from the Dave & Busters food and fun outlet in a mall in northeast Philadelphia.

With more than 14,000 square feet of prime mall space, the experience center is bigger than three basketball courts and is filled with lots of dazzle. There are nearly 80 video gaming stations, all sorts of interactive exhibits, a replica command-and-control center, and -- best of all -- a bunch of high-tech simulators that let the kids get a feel for the military action of, say, a Black Hawk helicopter.

The simulators are way cool. For example, youngsters can sit in a model chopper with a simulator that makes it seem as though they're ripping right over a mountain village, and – get this – they get the thrill of shooting at enemies in the village! Yes, the virtural thrill of the kill coming to a mall near you. And, indeed, the army says it hopes to replicate the experience all across the country.

One enthusiastic Army general says that the center is "a learning laboratory." Yeah, but... do we really want youngsters learning that stuff? Not to worry, say the recruiters, for the Army does have rules – for example, while the "laboratory" is open to all ages, kids can't play the video games until they're 13. No toddlers allowed.

Jim Hightower is a national radio commentator, writer, public speaker, and author of "Thieves In High Places: They've Stolen Our Country And It's Time to Take It Back." He publishes the monthly "Hightower Lowdown," co-edited by Phillip Frazer.

© 2008 JimHightower.com All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/bloggers/http://jimhightower.com//110495/

Jim Hightower is a national radio commentator, writer, public speaker, and author of "Thieves In High Places: They've Stolen Our Country And It's Time to Take It Back." He publishes the monthly "Hightower Lowdown," co-edited by Phillip Frazer.

Bob Smith also reports from Philadelphia:

 

The Army - Navy game will be played in Philadelphia on the first Saturday after Thanksgiving, as it has for most of its 104-year history.  With all the events and festivities going on all around the city this weekend,  its as if Philadelphia has been handed over to the "game" and to its sponsors, and hardly anything has been said about it.  And there's a lot of weaponry on display, the biggest of these being the Aegis cruiser and destroyer now docked for public visit down at Penns Landing. 

 

Aegis cruisers and destroyers, built around the Aegis battle command system and automated radar and launch system, are equipped with cruise missiles and a host of weapons, like the Vulcan Gatling gun autocannon that can fire up to 4500 rounds (many with depleted uranium projectiles) per minute. Aegis warships are the most used weapons systems in the U.S. arsenal since the Vietnam War. Aegis has been called by the Navy "the most powerful war-fighting system in the Navy arsenal today".  One Aegis cruiser, operating within a naval group of aircraft carrier, multiple destroyers, and attack submarines, can "detect, track, and attack" more than 100 targets in the air, on or below the sea simultaneously earning it the label: "the Star Wars of the Sea". Quickly becoming the next mission of Aegis is "Star Wars": ballistic missile defense [BMD], Aegis BMD, that is, the adaptation of Aegis cruisers and missiles for use against ballistic missile placements in China or North Korea, for example.  

 

This year's Army-Navy game and surrounding festivities has a number of corporate sponsors and at the top of the list is (wouldn't you know it!) the world's top weapons manufacturer, Lockheed Martin.The chief contractor for Aegis warships and Aegis BMD as well as many of the other weapons on display during the Army - Navy festivities, both on the field and around Philadelphia, is Lockheed Martin.

 

War is and has long been the predominate factor in our culture, creating our games, our toys, our markets, making of violence and empire an economy and a way of life, a living death.  Peace certainly begins with acting nonviolently for justice in our communities, with people being lifted from poverty and out of injustice and violence, with children being taught life and truth matter most of all, and that war is never, ever, a game.

 

Join us in the coming weeks for peace and in nonviolence at Lockheed Martin, www.brandywinepeace.com.

Brandywine Peace Community, P.O. Box 81, Swarthmore, PA 19081 - (610) 544-1818

 

Donations can be sent to the Baltimore Nonviolence Center, 325 E. 25th St., Baltimore, MD 21218.  Ph: 410-366-1637; Email: mobuszewski [at] verizon.net

 

"The master class has always declared the wars; the subject class has always fought the battles. The master class has had all to gain and nothing to lose, while the subject class has had nothing to gain and everything to lose--especially their lives." Eugene Victor Debs