A recent report by Dahr Jamail on the excellent liberal blog TomDispatch uncovers the devastating environment potential of an upcoming US Naval exercise to be held in the fishing lanes off the Alaskan coast. This month, the Navy will be conducting war games in the Gulf of Alaska involving the use of live munitions and active sonar.
The exercises will be conducted at the height of fishing season and risk destruction not only to marine life in the area, but also to the livelihoods of thousands of Alaskans, many of them American Indians, who depend on the Gulf for their livings. Among the marine species potentially endangered will be the critically endangered North Pacific right whale, of which there are estimated to be thirty left in the Bering Sea. The Navy itself admits there will be 182,000 "takes," deaths or detrimental effects on the Gulf's marine mammals.
My Gut Reaction: FTN
Analysis below the fold....
