This week, Nato, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, is holding the largest meeting in its 63-year history there. Protests and rallies will confront the two-day summit, facing off against a massive armed police and military presence. The Nato gathering has been designated a "national special security event" by the Department of Homeland Security, empowering the US secret service to control much of central Chicago, and to employ unprecedented authority to suppress the public's first amendment right to dissent.
The focus of the summit will be Afghanistan. "Operation Enduring Freedom", as the Afghanistan war was named by the Bush administration and continues to be called by the Obama administration, is officially a Nato operation. As the generals and government bureaucrats from around the world prepare to meet in Chicago, the number of Nato soldiers killed in Afghanistan since 2001 topped 3,000. First Lt Alejo R Thompson of Yuma, Arizona was killed on 11 May this year, at the age of 30. He joined the military in 2000, and served in both Iraq and Afghanistan. Shortly after his death, the Associated Press reported that Thompson would be receiving the Purple Heart medal posthumously and is "in line for a Bronze Star". On Wednesday, President Barack Obama awarded, also posthumously, the Medal of Honor to Leslie H Sabo Jr, killed in action in Cambodia in 1970. More Read
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