Army archaeologists discovering history at Fort Drum

AP ^ | December 10, 2005 | WILLIAM KATES

[Sentis]

I have been one of the Staff Archaeologists at Fort Stewart and a contract archeaologist at camp Lejuene. Basically the Military has to have land cleared of cultural concerns before any training or building can occur. Cemetaries also fall under the category of Cultural resources (and some can be moved if the army want them moved). Basically the legal reasoning behind preserving Historic resources is certainly not a liberal conspiracy to prevent training (I'm hoping no one thinks that). In fact most archeaologists on bases work hard to clear land for training and I know the army at least was very thankful for our support. At least i have several plaques thanking me for my work.
As a conservative I think that preserving our Nation's history and heritage is very important and most others would seem to think that also, as historic preservation activities are often spearheaded by Republican congressmen and senators. Be it a native american site or a Civil war battle field on government property, preserving certain areas is a good idea as these areas do not get preserved on private property. Unless the land owner wishes. In fact most sites are cleared to be destroyed if no unique cultural resource is discovered. For instance this area of boat building may be the only example in that area and is worth preserving but if there were another example already preserved it probably would have been bulldozed.
On Ft Stewart for instance there are probably about 10-20 acres of preserved archaeological resources not including cemetaries. The Fort itself is over a 270 thousand acres. To match that against "Natural Resources" one woodpecker preserve (There are hundreds of them) on a base probably take that many acres. Thats one species and one preserve.
So before people start and I know its coming consider what I just said.

[SunkenCiv]

Whoops! Thanks also to you for your ping.