Lockheed Martin's plan to tax and track all modes of transportation in North America.

Nathan M. Hansen / JonesReport | April 19, 2007

Despite persistent claims to the contrary and nearly limitless nauseating marketing and public relations platitudes, evidence of the steady progression of North American economic integration is available to anyone with a little knowledge of state open records laws, persistence, and a desire for a future bereft of oppression. Further, NASCO’s cooperation with the Security and Prosperity Partnership is admitted and boasted of in their promotional materials supplied to their members. The reach of this tracking is continent-wide.

A recent request under the Minnesota Data Practices Act yielded a treasure trove of damning information. Foremost among these documents was a Letter of Intent between North America’s Supercorridor Coalition, Inc. and Savi Networks, LLC, a wholly own subsidiary of Lockheed Martin. Along with the Letter of Intent were hundreds of pages of documents detailing how NASCO plans to implement the infrastucture of the NAFTA Superhighway.

This document details Lockheed Martin's plan to utilize NASCO to track, control, and tax “all modes of transportation.” NASCO has insisted again and again that it does not promote a “NAFTA Superhighway.” Upon review of these documents, it’s clear that NASCO and Lockheed Martin have a “better” idea: attach a tracking device to all modes of transportation and, as a “long-term objective,” “design, fund, implement, operate and maintain a self-sustaining business that facilitates surface transportation.”

Maybe NASCO wasn’t lying when it said it doesn’t support a new “NAFTA Superhighway.” Why would anyone want to improve any infrastructure when Lockheed Martin and NASCO can simply attach a tracking device to all modes of transportation and have “revenue sharing” with the government? This sounds like a pretty profitable endeavor for a self-described “non-profit organization.”

The interplay of Lockheed Martin (a for profit company), NASCO (a “non-profit” organization), and various governmental entities in this whole scheme is disturbing to say the least. However, they are not surprising to those who pay close attention. One wonders how the revenue made off of the populace is to be parceled out between these various interests. Oh wait, NASCO and Lockheed Martin are going to work that out in their “definitive agreement”. It’s about time Lockheed Martin got a cut out of my trip to the grocery store.

The “centerpiece” of this plan is the concept of Total Domain Awareness. What is “Total Domain Awareness?” It is an Orwellian nightmare involving: the ability to “[a]utomatically gather, correlate, and interpret fragments of multi-source (Radar, AIS, & GPS tracks, Open Source, Intelligence, Watch list & Law Enforcement Report, CCTV, Bioterrorism sensors) data together into one collaborative portal-based environment [sic].” This sounds even worse than a huge superhighway, no wonder why NASCO never mentions any of these details on its website.

All of this information is going to be fed into one central location that NASCO has shamelessly named the "Center of Excellence." At least Orwell's tyrants had the dignity to be creative with the names of their various maniacal bureaucracies. So, who or what will administer the “Center of Excellence?” Well, what better place to house this Orwellian nightmare than: “Lockheed Martin’s militarized GTN (Global Transportation Network) Command and Control System? The Total Domain Awareness system has already “been installed and is operating and is operating in Washington, DC & Lockheed Martin’s Center for Innovation (The “Lighthouse”) in Chesapeake, VA [sic].”

We will all be much safer with Lockheed Martin tracking our movements from Washington, DC.

This troubling plan is laid bare in a series of email exchanges detailing the courting and recruitment of a few Minnesota Bureaucrats by a few persistent NASCO lobbyists. Under the provisions of the Minnesota Data Practices Act, the state was required to release all of its information relating to Minnesota’s membership in NASCO. Just beneath the surface of all on these documents is the undisputable hand of military industrial complex giant Lockheed Martin. President Dwight D. Eisenhower was not kidding when he said in 1961: “In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes.”

Truly, a major defense contractor tracking our every move here in our own country is undoubtedly a threat to our liberties. If President Eisenhower were alive today, he might say: “See, I told you so.”

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