It is obvious as we pass through South-Central Arizona that the practice of providing the elite of the Nation’s youth with Protestant Ethics and a classical education has had an impact.
Once past the beauty and rich if prickly verdure of Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument, past tiny Why and Ajo, one enters a vast desert wasteland. This empty quarter has been an irritant in the psychic consciousness of classically educated Americans for more than a century. The idea that this arid zone can lay unproductive and economically passive has brought many of our ethic-filled leaders to a point of frustration and anger.
Our carefully prepared and brainwarped leaders know that America is great because everyone – every region – pulls its own weight. To stand in the midst of this wasteland and see that it provides nothing of worth, so irritated these channeled minds that they, almost collectively, decided to punish the land until it brought itself it into productivity. From the treasures of their classical educations they found a way.
In Classical History, they learned of Xerxes the Persian, a model leader who claimed control of his environment. When the sea turned against him, he ordered his legions to punish the sea with whips. This model of man-against-nature makes a great deal of sense to the progeny of our times. Why not, they decided among themselves, force this non-productive area to change its ways and become productive?
The opportunity to do this came with WWII. By directing the substantial National resources which they controlled, they were able to begin a campaign of land punishment of such magnitude that they felt it was certain to make the land change and the region prosper. This, they agreed, would become the model for all man-verses-nature endeavors. With the mighty power and resources of the Nation, they would bring this worthless region into prosperity as God obviously intended that it be.
At first selected areas of the wasteland were graded flat, hangers were built, and small bi-planes were brought in. Train tracks and highways were built via which munitions – primarily bombs and bullets – were brought to stockpiles near the airstrips. In time, what were considered by these elite to be the most sensitive areas of the desert – navels, if you will – were selected for punishment. Soon these areas were targeted and planes loaded with bombs and shells took to the air, circled the targets, and let go America’s fire and fury and contempt for this land and its bad attitude.
After months of man-made hell directed at limited targets, the sensitive areas were expanded and others were selected and added to the hit lists. More planes, bombs and bullets were laid into the land. Smoke and dust rose from the agonized brush and sandstone. The land was made to suffer vibration, heat and the scattering of its basic materials. The leaders observed and made excuses for the destruction, “We must destroy it in order to save it!” they agonized. Then, when the punishment had been going on for years, they decided to do an assessment to determine if the land was yielding to man’s superior powers over nature.
The first signs of man’s power to awake the land and make it productive were evident. The men shook hands, pounded each other on the backs, and celebrated. Changes were evident at the fringes of the region. Places like Gila Bend were showing growth and prosperity. There was more activity at Ajo and the pits of the copper mines were expanding, with great mountains of mine waste and processed rock building towards the skies. Everywhere, there were more people and new roads and buildings. The land was slow to change, but it was responding to the powers of American leadership and the American work ethic.
Over time, the bi-planes were replaced with single winged aluminum ships that carried more bombs, more bullets and destructive forces in the shapes of rockets. Soon the chugging of radial engines was replaced with the swoosh and scream of powerful jets. Fire power increased and more areas of the land were targeted. Day after day the land was punished for its errant ways.
Large areas were now pockmarked and scarred. The silence of a land asleep and at peace under the blazing sun was broken by the screams of planes, the explosions of bombs, and the roar of ground vehicles sent out to peruse the damages. The Nation moved through more wars and increased its destructive capabilities. The leaders directed this awsome power at the land, and smiled at each other as they, not nature, brought the land into compliance with their values. They thought of themselves as gods, and at the wave of a hand they sent hell-fire and damnation at the place they wished to change.
Few endeavors have persisted over fifty years with almost no letup. In Arizona, down on what are now called the Barry M. Goldwater Bombing Ranges, man has continued without letup a campaign to punish the land and force it into productivity. Those of us who pass though this battered landscape note little change. Those in control still think they can see changes in the region, although the mines at Ajo are closed and the town of Gila Bend is blowing away in the wind. There are better airstrips, better highways, more secret hangers and military hideaways. They project that although there have been minor setbacks with the program, in another fifty years or so of sustained punishment the desert will quit its resistance and become a productive garden. “In fact,” they observe, “if just the bomb craters were filled with water there would be an oasis every few feet.”