For decades, the military fired explosives on Vieques. The US citizens who live there still face the consequences
Wilfred Chan in ViequesMon 1 May 2023 06.00 BST
When Carmen Valencia was five years old, troops came banging on her door. Her mother grabbed a long machete. “I had no idea what was going on, but I thought, if they come in here, they’re going to kill us.”
Now 78, Valencia has lived most of her life on Vieques, one of the Caribbean’s most picturesque islands, under the thunder of bombs. They roared from navy planes just over the hill by her mother’s house, leaving the smell of smoke hanging thick in the air.
She was even more frightened of the troops, who would stalk her neighborhood looking for women to harass.
But Valencia and her whole family are US citizens. Vieques is part of Puerto Rico, a US territory. She wasn’t living in an enemy country – just a 52-square-mile island of farms and cattle ranches, ringed by pristine gold beaches and crystal waters.
Read article here…
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/apr/30/vieques-puerto-rico-us-navy-base-trainin