U.S. puts machine-guns on Great Lakes coast guard vessels

[CHIMO]

U.S. puts machine-guns on Great Lakes coast guard vessels
Last Updated Wed, 15 Mar 2006 16:00:53 EST
CBC News

For the first time since 1817, U.S. Coast Guard vessels on the Great Lakes are being outfitted with weapons – machine-guns capable of firing 600 bullets a minute.

The War of 1812 saw violent battles on Lake Erie and Lake Huron between U.S. troops and British forces, which were largely composed of militias from Britain's colonies in what is now Canada. After the war, the United States and Britain – and later Canada – agreed to demilitarize the Great Lakes waters.

The Rush-Bagot Treaty of 1817 allowed each country to station four vessels, each equipped with an 18-pound cannon, to safeguard the Great Lakes.

The antiquated treaty has recently been reinterpreted because of U.S. concerns about customs violations, human smuggling and international terrorism.

http://www.cbc.ca/story/canada/national/2006/03/15/coastguard-060315.html

[49jim]

1. I live just off the shore

of Lake Ontario.....I feel safer now!

[liberal N proud]

4. We live on Lake Erie

I can see them shooting the beach goers this summer.

[Twist_U_Up]

20. Hi neighbor

Fulton here. Theres a Coast Guard Unit stationed there too.

I have a friend that works security at 9 mile, he says FEMA has been there for a few weeks running training exercises that doesn't include any of the current security teams.His scheduled hours are very weird. 3 days on 3 days off all hours he has never been scheduled.

I bet you feel even safer now.

[Canuckistanian]

46. And I live right across the lake from you

And I'm stayin' the hell away from the beach in Kingston.

[screembloodymurder]

2. They need the guns to keep Americans from sneaking

into Canada.

[wakeme2008]

3. To get those illegal Rx Drugs

:grr:

[PATRICK]

52. Well it's a long cold swim

and the gene splicing for fresh water sharks is still a decade away.

[TankLV]

56. Yes - but it can be done. My father & uncle used to do it when they were

kids.

Start off at the mouth of the Niagara River - swim UPSTREAM - and end up just past Grand Island by the time they crossed.

Not for the physically weak, tho.

[Kagemusha]

5. Come on, I've been hearing for years about armed smugglers

When I heard about it there wasn't much hope of doing anything about the problem. If it wasn't the Bush Administration doing this, the only people who'd complain are right wing militias.

[High Plains]

18. From Canada?

[Pavulon]

6. Blah

Coast guard boats usually carry the M-60.

[saigon68]

7. They are putting M-2 , 50 cals and above on their cutters

I hear 20mm and maybe bigger

That should kick some ass on a few demonstrators who use boats.

[pinniped]

45. I saw a Coast Guard vessel equipped with a Phalanx system docked....

in San Diego a few years ago.

[Sgent]

8. Let's not overstate this either

The guns we are talking about are 7.62mm machine guns -- the same round that's found in a .308 hunting rifle.

This is being done with the consent and agreement of Canada according to TFA.

Both sides reserve the right to use up to 50-cal machine guns.

I don't think the UK has explicitly signed off on this (like Canada has). That being said, the UK isn't really that important in this since they no longer have colonies in the area.

[IA_Seth]

49. Yeah...

I am surprised they don't already carry somethign similar to the 7.62

I mean, they ARE a military branch. Calling them a 'machine-gun' makes them sound like war machines, but a 7.62 isn't much really.

[corporatemedia]

9. We must fight the bacon there, or we'll have to eat the bacon here. n/t

[TreasonousBastard]

10. Do we invade Canada before or after Iran? n/t

[DeltaLady]

15. Thanks for the best laugh

I've had in too long.

Delta

[devinsgram]

54. That will depend on how much oil they've got.

[LeftHander]

11. Waste of Money...wtf...

What the fuck are they going to shoot?

I;ve spent countless hours sailing on Lake Michigan and first...there is zero reason for weapons on Lake Michigan.

2nd tell me terrorists are going to navigate across Lake Superior....and land in Wisconsin....rrrrrriiiiight......like people cross lake superior everyday in small pleasure craft....(not)

It takes serious seamanship with a serious boat either power or sail to spend any considerable amount of time on the great lakes. Particulalry any passage that takes you beyond five miles from safe harbor.


That is a bunch of shit.

Some jackass will get trigger happy and fill some party barge full of holes.

[Blaze Diem]

12. ya, Canada's next..right after Iran..

Ah excuse me George..your patrolling the wrong effing border..

[daleo]

13. Canada geese have been shitting all over American lawns

The way Bush has been shitting all over American laws. It has to stop.

[DeltaLady]

17. Either I've finally lost my mind

or y'all are getting high marks in the dry wit and humor category tonight. I really needed it. Rough night on the delta.

[TrogL]

50. from a recent IRC session

"Canada, please come get your geese. They're shitting all over the parking lot."

[Rich Hunt]

25. well, actually

The ports of Chicago and Indiana have a little drug smuggling problem.....could get nasty if the 'drug war' escalates any further.

I'm all for it. I'd like for Chicago and Indiana to not be a courier for a bunch of drug addicts in the far suburbs and out east.

[LeftHander]

31. What kind of drug smuggling problem....

Any recent seizures....?

Are they in fast cigarette racing boats running cocaine from Toronto?


99.9% of the Drug ploblems in the midwest come from local Meth labs.

Not for militarization of the Great Lakes....

[Rich Hunt]

43. uh no...

Chicago is the transportation nerve center for the United States, and the drug lords would dearly like to control it and use the infrastructure to do their dirty business - by rail, by boat, by truck. If things got out of hand, there could be violence, because Chicago doesn't want the drug trade in their backyard and the feds have set up shop here.

Chicago has more heroin addicts than any city in the country - ever wonder why? It's obvious why.

[LeftHander]

51. I don't see how machine guns on Coast Guard

Vessels is going to do anyhing.....

Waht are they going to do drive up the river and spray bullets into "smuggler" vessels...or wage a gun battle on the docks?

[TankLV]

57. Think Niagara River or Detroit River - much shorter easier to do.

I'm only commenting on the distance/ease part - not the continuing example of REPUKE idiocy in the plan.

[doc03]

14. If you have ever been attacked by those Canadian

Black-flies, a Nuke would be justified.

[KansDem]

30. Yeah, I've noticed they send their geese down here once a year.

Probably for reconnaissance purposes.

[ConcernedCanuk]

16. Are they going to be using DU (Depleted Uranium) rounds?

.
.
.

Start their own little genocide of us Canuks with every shot fired?

They gotta "practice" ya know - so they'll be firing (hopefully) into the water

But wherever the USA uses them they will kill for millenniums . . . .

"DU has been used as a field weapon by NATO since the beginning of the 1990s. During Operation Desert Storm, American M1A1, M1, and M60 tanks and British Challenger tanks fired thousands of large calibre DU missiles. American A-10 and AV-8B aircraft shot hundreds of thousands of small calibre DU rounds. American snipers shot 7.62mm and .50 calibre DU bullets. "

/snip/

30 metric tonnes of DU ammunition (300,000 rounds in all) were used on the Kuwait / Iraq border as part of "Operation Desert Storm"…. And it was to here that British low-level radiation expert Dr Chris Busby travelled … what Busby discovered surprised him. Soil samples showed lower levels of contamination than he expected. But his air samples revealed levels of ionising radiation in the atmosphere around the battlefield 10 times higher than in the nearby city of Basra and 20 times higher than in Baghdad. (Observer, 07/01/01)

There has been a fourfold increase in cancers in those areas of southern Iraq where fighting took place, says Dr Jawad Khadim Al-Ali, a member of the UK Royal College of Physicians. The Independent's Robert Frisk talks of "old men, young women with terrible tumours, whole families suffering from unexplained leukaemias..., children with internal bleeding.... Ahmed Fleah had already died in the children's ward, bleeding from his mouth, ears, nose and rectum. He took two weeks to bleed to death."

http://www.futuretrust.org/essay3a.html

Genocide, one round at a time

[benEzra]

23. There are tungsten-core bullets in 7.62x51mm and .50 caliber,

but not depleted uranium bullets. The smallest caliber I'm aware of that has ever fired DU cored rounds is the 20mm Phalanx CIWS system that used to be the mainstay of ship defense. Small-arms armor-piercing rounds have always been either hardened steel or tungsten core.

If DU ammunition for the 7.62x51 and .50 BMG existed, then it would be a simple matter to find the military M-number for that load. I googled high and low, and there's apparently no such thing.

If you google "depleted uranium sniper", you get a bunch of sci-fi game forums.

[ConcernedCanuk]

44. The article I quoted specifically says "7.62mm and .50 calibre DU bullets"

.
.
.


"American snipers shot 7.62mm and .50 calibre DU bullets."

I even posted the link to that article

Another article states:

In addition, the Army has tested limited quantities of small caliber DU ammunition (5.56mm, 7.62mm and 50 caliber).<213> However, the Army produced these rounds in limited quantities for developmental testing only and evaluation and never type-classified them for standard use. Some veterans claim to have fired 50-caliber DU sniper rounds during the Gulf War, but this claim could not be supported after numerous interviews with the manufacturer of the 50 caliber sniper rifle, with ammunition suppliers, and with the DoD logisticians responsible for small caliber ammunition

http://www.deploymentlink.osd.mil/du_library/du_ii/du_ii_tabe.htm

Last Update: December 13, 2000 -

http://www.deploymentlink.osd.mil/du_library/du_ii/index.htm

If the US were testing them over 6 years ago,

well before Afghanistan and Iraq

I bet my butt they used, and are using them.

That's just my Canuk Opinion tho . . .

[benEzra]

48. I saw that claim...

but considered it to be an error. It is a known fact that DU ammunition has been issued in calibers down to 20mm. Nothing smaller. If an article claims the contrary, especially as an aside, it needs specifics to have any credibility at all.

Your second link does nothing to dispute the fact that no DU ammunition has been issued for small arms; a small quantity were allegedly produced for testing, never issued, because in calibers that small, the gain over standard tungsten-core AP ammunition is negligible. The U.S. once tested nuclear-powered airplanes, too...

American snipers do not use DU small arms ammunition. If they did, it would have an M-number (even special ops stuff gets M-numbers). They use standard match ammunition (lead-core), tungsten-core AP, incendiary, and in the case of the .50 there is the special Raufoss explosive ammunition which is considered both AP and incendiary.

[ConcernedCanuk]

53. Last reply bE, it's people like you why innocent Iraqis are still dying

.
.
.

[BrightKnight]

55. Patrolling the Loop w/ depleted uranium is a bad idea.

Firing depleted uranium into the drinking water supply is also a bad idea.

They shut down the skeet ranges along the lake shore because people did not want the lead in their drinking water.

---------

Aside from the toxic rounds I don't have a problem Coast Guard machine guns.

[formercia]

19. Have there been any armed confrontations?

There must be some justification, or is this basic intimidation.

Be afraid.....

[Theres-a]

21. It's pandemic protection

When the geese try to migrate down here,they will be exterminated.By bikini girls with machine guns.:crazy:

[Giant Robot]

36. Bikini girls with machine guns

Am I the only one that wants to listen to the Cramps right now?

[Theres-a]

37. Ha!

I wondered why that phrase popped into my head!I was a big cramps fan way back when.B-)

[Giant Robot]

39. I was hoping I got that right!

The Cramps kicked ass back in the day.

[JNelson6563]

22. Those Whitefish are in for a surprise

Wait till they meet our "little friend"!

And the Zebra mussels, who boy! Do we have a surprise for them!

Ugh.

[formercia]

24. Someone trying to pump up the price of Gefilte Fish?

AIPAC is at it again....

http://www.cyber-kitchen.com/recipes/Gefilte_Fish_Story.htm

[bobthedrummer]

26. Anyone else ever spot a submarine docked at a Coast Guard station?

Just asking.

[formercia]

27. I can see the headline now.

Iranian 'Boomer' spotted in the Great Lakes.


Biggest scam since 'Nessie'.

[bobthedrummer]

28. You got it wrong, we're talking "friendlies" and "research subs" n/t

[Pharlo]

59. Well, I don't know about at a Coast Guard station,

but in Manitowoc WI, there is a submarine museum - not too far from the Two Rivers Nuclear Power Plant. I suppose it's merely a matter of time before the 'museum' is reactivated by the Dept of Homeland Security to deliver radioactive matl to Canada...

No proof, you understand - Just sayin'....

[noonwitch]

29. It seems like it could be a useful thing

But the US/Canada border is a peaceful place, for the most part. Unless Bob Probert is crossing or something.

There have been a lot of drug interdictions at the border, but it hasn't been boating traffic. They've been using garbage trucks and other land-based vehicles to smuggle it in (mostly pot, but sometimes cocaine).

It's kind of like they're giving the smugglers some ideas to use routes they weren't already using.

[area51]

32. Two reasons.

(1) Machine guns to stop Canadians from trying to smuggle medications into the U.S. Everybody knows that Canadian drugs aren't safe; that's why our govt. is trying to stop the importation of them. I mean, every day we hear of Canadians dropping dead in the streets from their unsafe drugs. :eyes:

(2) Machine guns will also stop Canadians from trying to sneak over here & use our healthcare system, which is superior to theirs, since they don't allow people to die due to lack of money to pay for medical treatment. :eyes: </sarcasm>

[Xithras]

33. So ends the "Worlds longest undefended border".

What a sad day :(

[suffragette]

34. Yes, it is a sad day n/t

[formercia]

35. Harper probably thought it a good idea.

Of all people, he knows how dangerous Canuckistanis can be.

[superconnected]

38. Somehow I think they're more worried we'd escape

than canada invade.

It would be the loss of uneducated cheap labor. It fits in with the pell grant cut and food program cuts. The nation is supposed to be dumb and hungry, and happy for the sweat shops. It explains all the education cuts.

[geniph]

40. Damn that Soviet Canuckistan plot to take over the Lakes!

Must.defend.against.invaders.from.Great.White.North.eh?

[geniph]

41. Today's GOP: Building that Bridge to 1812!

[geniph]

42. My Gawd, They're After Our Beer!

Shoot to kill, everyone!

[Bozita]

47. Is "Canadian Bacon" available at Comcast's "On Demand"?

It just seems so appropriate.

I'm gonna go look.

[MetaTrope]

58. Watch out when Chicago tries to secede from the fascist union