Minute Musings: On Why the United States Should Launch a Tomahawk Strike on Puerto Rico

Before you send your hate mail my way, hold on and take the time to read my (un)reasoning for the States to go all Trump-and-Hillary-happy and launch a barrage of cruise missiles at Puerto Rico.

Why would I say such a horrible thing, you may ask? Well, consider the following:

That cruise missile attack against Syria kind of stuck in your memory, didn’t it, dear reader? It was all the rage, all the news, before it was superseded by mommy MOAB and the tale of the ridiculous overkill. But before that ballistic belch consumed its news cycles it was all Tomahawks, all the time.  There was much rejoicing from liberals and conservatives, and endless orgiastic dancing from Raytheon investors. But the most important thing is that you heard about it. We were all practically bombarded by news about the missile strikes from news outlets from sea to shining sea and beyond. We were even told by Brian Williams, on MSNBC of course, that the attack was “beautiful”.

But you know what you didn’t hear about? The fact that Puerto Rico, that tiny and unimportant laboratory of two empires for the past five centuries, is being slowly and inexorably throttled to death to the beat of Lin Manuel Miranda’s “Hamilton”. That being the case, then, I’ve decided not to throw away my shot.

You see, Puerto Rico, technically a self-governing (in name only) territory of the United States, that I’ve written about before, has for the past two days accelerated its free fall into complete economic ruination. The colonial quislings of the ruling New Progressive Party and the ever-spineless Popular Democratic Party minority have been very busy running the island deep into the ground. They have been tirelessly collaborating with PROMESA’s dictatorial fiscal control board to defund the University of Puerto Rico to the tune of $450 million dollars, essentially killing it and, therefore, silencing the biggest locus of outspoken resistance against Wall Street’s carrion birds. And like all ruling cowards they hid behind thick walls and closed doors, guarded by columns of police officers and, in a new development lifted from the mainland’s penchant for thuggish behavior, private security contractors armed with assault rifles.

Just in case the message wasn’t obvious enough. Kind of like Ferguson’s state of siege by what passes for police in the States now, what would be better described as standing mercenary armies on the employ of racist local governments, except with more palm trees and gorgeous beeches.

Local police seemed to be enjoying themselves on Tuesday, as well. Why, they were having a ball. In one instance a local officer, a Captain Cordero, gleefully told the press and protesters that the police would be “as fascist as you make us”. Then they joyfully pepper-sprayed protestors in front of the Capitol building in San Juan while the island’s treasonous political class, safely barricaded and isolated from the outside world in the island’s capitol building, voted to abolish the commission tasked with auditing the island’s public debt. And just what is the reasoning behind this idiocy? That regardless of any possible outcome of an audit the debt must be paid, so auditing is a wasted effort and therefore it is inconsequential finding out where the debt came from or who’s responsible for it.

In point of fact the reason that an audit is being resisted tooth and nail by both the Puerto Rican government and the fiscal control board is because a proper audit would arrive at the obvious conclusion that decades of mishandling of public funds by both majority parties on the island led to disaster. It would underscore the fact that the Puerto Rican political class operated in open collusion with Wall Street, and with the White House’s blessing, while engaging in the high-risk and irresponsible practice of issuing toxic bonds, while Wall Street speculators knowingly approved unpayable loans to the Puerto Rican government that inevitably caused the crisis in the first place. But with no commission there is no danger of an audit. With one stroke the wolves not only keep the chicken coup but also get to burn it to the ground. It is without a doubt the perfect crime.

The response from the United States has been, as always, absolute silence. As has become the rule when dealing with all sorts of spineless pundits and media outlets there exists a veritable gag rule over any and all coverage of what’s going on in Puerto Rico. The liberal media is too busy feeding its masturbatory obsession with Russian electoral intervention, while the conservative outlets are deliriously caught up in their own heavy breathing with every word that comes out of the White House or similar white supremacist outlets.

The fact is that, for better or worse, there are over three million American citizens being driven into poverty for decades to come in an American territory, yet the silence from its politicians and corporate media has been overwhelming. Even the anemic coverage that the PROMESA bill received seems in hindsight like a deluge of information compared to the complete silence that’s been imposed on the island and its problems.

Things are bad in Puerto Rico. That isn’t exactly breaking news to those that call the island home, but it is certainly unknown to the majority of people in the United States. Then again, considering the fact that most Americans do not even know that Puerto Ricans are fellow citizens, and are currently consumed by their Maddow-esque Russian obsession and pedantic liberal appeasement of homegrown fascists, would they even give a damn?

And this is where my (un)reasoning comes into play. I say bring on the missile strike! Why? Because perhaps at this point the only thing that would cast any sort of a mediatic spotlight on what’s going on in Puerto Rico would be the liberating afterglow of a Tomahawk strike. Maybe that would finally make the news, since you can’t build a wall on water to keep the thousands that will be forced to leave the island once survival becomes nearly impossible.

So, there you have it. Just bomb the island, Uncle Sam, just like you did for decades with the smaller island of Vieques. Then maybe, just maybe, people will give a damn about Puerto Rico. But let’s stick to the Tomahawks, since dropping fifty-nine MOABs on Puerto Rico might be just a bit much. After all, Americans don’t know of any aphrodisiac more potent than a good bombing of brown people. Even Brian Williams might notice. Do it for Freedom®, and for higher stock prices. Make Raytheon’s stock prices great again. What could possibly be more American than that?

Miguel A. Cruz-Díaz is a fifth-year graduate student and doctoral candidate in British and world history at Indiana University, Bloomington, where he specializes in anarchist history. A native son of Arecibo, Puerto Rico, he currently resides in Bloomington. He has published in CounterPunch and in the Spanish-language publication Revista Cruce.