Hosting base helicopters makes locals feel complicit in distant wars

Evidence

In Ansbach, Klose and others told me, some of their discomfort comes not so much from the noise itself as from what it represents. The whoomp-whoomp of the whirling blades symbolizes the wars that those helicopters have helped wage, and hosting the helicopters in their city makes the locals feel complicit. For some, there is a painful irony in the garrison’s motto, “We are all part of the fight.” — David Vine, Base Nation_ How U.S. Military Bases…, 896

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the book’s core thesis about how bases enmesh host populations in U.S. warfare.