Army Experience Center shut down

Around 70 protesters from dozens of groups on the East Coast took on the Army Experience Center at the Franklin Mills Mall on Sept. 12, with determination to shut it down. For a few hours, at least, they did. The center closed during the action and several arrests were made.

Sept. 12 protest at the Franklin Mills Mall. Photo: Kelly Valdez

Some of the signs and banners read: “War is not a game!” “Stop teaching children to kill!” and “More U.S. soldiers committed suicide than were killed in combat January-July 2009.” This was the second significant protest against the Army’s latest recruitment scheme aimed at youth. Local media were made aware of the actions, but no coverage was forthcoming.

In August 2008 the Army went retail at the giant Franklin Mills Outlet Mall in northeast Philadelphia. The $12 million, 14,500-square-foot Army Experience Center is a pilot program to test a new marketing strategy targeting children as young as 13. The AEC is nestled across from an indoor skateboard park and next to a music store.

The AEC houses a tactical operations center and is equipped with interactive displays, including a real “Apache” helicopter, M-16 rifles, automatic machine guns, an armored Humvee and a tank used to train soldiers. In the back room of the AEC, children touch and feel weapons created for killing.

While the games of violence and combat draw in the young public, a staff of more than 20 soldiers—active military recruiters—looking like friendly, civilian salespeople dressed not in uniforms but in khaki pants and white polo shirts, pitch military career specialties and perks.

It comes as no surprise that the U.S. government fails to protect youth from these aggressive and abusive military recruiting practices. A provision of the “No Child Left Behind” Act forces schools to allow military recruitment without parental consent. The personal information of hundreds of thousands of youth is stored in databases allowing the military to profile and cherry-pick future soldiers, while the Pentagon produces video games to attract young teens.

The expanding military budget, which grows at the expense of social programs, along with the lack of jobs and inability to afford college produces a wider audience of young people vulnerable to military recruitment. Jobs with living wages, decent, affordable homes, quality education and comprehensive health care are basic human rights and nobody should have to join the military to have them. Children should have the right to be protected from harm.

There is a private criminal complaint pending against the AEC, Franklin Mills Mall and its owner, Simon Properties Inc. Among the charges are operating a storefront inducing minors to witness and participate in acts of violence, through simulators constructed with actual weapons and armored vehicles initially built and meant for combat in a war zone; endangering the welfare of a child; criminal solicitation of a minor; and corruption of minors.

The demonstration was endorsed by the Northwest Greens; World Can’t Wait; Code Pink; American Friends Service Committee, Youth and Militarism Program; Gray Panthers NYC Network; Granny Peace Brigade, New York City and Philadelphia; Brandywine Peace Community; Philadelphia International Action Center; War Resisters League, Delaware and Philadelphia; After Downing Street.org; Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, Philadelphia; Delaware Valley Veterans for America; Lehigh-Pocono Committee of Concern; Chester County Peace Movement; Veterans for Peace chapters 31 and 96; and other organizations.