F.A.Q.s (Frequently Asked Questions)
Q. What does the Coast Guard want to do?
A. The Coast Guard wants to use sites on all five of the Great Lakes (Lakes Erie, Huron, Michigan, Ontario, Superior) as target ranges
Q. Why does the Coast Guard want to use the Great Lakes for target practice?
A. Probably because it is an easy and cheap place for them to do target practice, at least in the short term.
Q. Why does the Coast Guard want to do target practice anywhere?
A. Historically, the Coast Guard's main mission on the Great Lakes was to rescue people who had boating accidents, to encourage the use of life preservers and other safe boating practices, and to otherwise help keep the lakes a safe place for the people who use them. In 2004, the Bush Administration made the Coast Guard part of the new Department of Homeland Security, and the Coast Guard started talking about putting guns on its Great Lakes boats and acting more like a part of the military.
Q. Why does the Coast Guard need guns on the Great Lakes?
A. They have carried handguns for some time, just like the police on land do, and for the same reasons. They are the police on the Great Lakes. The guns the Coast Guard now wants to practice with, though, are large machine guns that are mounted on stands that are bolted to the deck of their boats.
Q. What are the big guns for?
A. Hard to say. In addition to their duties on the Great Lakes, our Coast Guard also guards our ocean frontage. But the guns on the Great Lakes are probably not to keep Cuban emigrants from landing on our shores, or to stop Colombian drug smugglers, or to protect us from a Russian invasion. Some people say the machine guns are to protect us from terrorists.
Q. Have terrorists been cruising the Great Lakes?
A. There haven't been any reports of terrorists on the Great Lakes. But there are some alleged "potential terrorist targets" on the Great Lakes, such as chemical plants and nuclear power plants.
Q. Will the Coast Guard be using their machine guns to protect these targets?
A. That might work if the Coast guard had enough boats to park one on the lake just offshore from each potential target. But they don't, and there are so many of these alleged potential targets that the Coast Guard will almost certainly never have enough boats to protect them this way.
Q. Won't the Coast Guard be able to do anything with their machine guns to protect us from terrorists?
A. It's hard to see how they could, unless the Coast Guard knows ahead of time that the terrorists are coming. Boats move pretty slowly compared to cars or planes or helicopters. The Great Lakes are huge. Coast Guard stations are miles and miles apart. If someone wanted to steer a boatload of explosives into a target on the Great Lakes, the likelihood is that the nearest Coast Guard boat will be too far away to get there in time to do anything about it.
Q. Is there a better way to protect these alleged potential terrorist targets?
A. Yes. There are lots of things that could be done on land, not on the lakes, to make these sites more secure. Fences. Walls. Security guards stationed on land. Security cameras.
Q. Have all these steps to improve security been taken?
A. Most reports conclude that since 9/11, very little has been done to make most of these sites more secure.
Q. Isn't it better to give the Coast Guard machine guns to protect these sites than to do nothing?
A. Isn't it better to do something that will work than to do something that won't? And even if the Coast Guard keeps its machine guns, they don't have to practice shooting them on the Great Lakes.
Q. Does the Coast Guard own the Great Lakes?
A. No. No agency of our government owns the lakes. The lakes are shared by the United States and Canada. They are an international resource that contains one-fifth of all of the fresh water on Earth.
Q. What are the Great Lakes used for?
A. They provide drinking water for millions of people; recreational areas for swimmers, divers, boaters, and fishers; transportation for people and goods including crops, manufactured goods, and ore; habitat for diverse animals and plants; and they influence our climate.
Q. Why shouldn't the Coast Guard use the Great Lakes for target practice?
A. Several reasons. For one thing, when the Coast Guard is shooting, everyone else has to get away from that part of the lake or risk getting killed by a stray bullet. For another thing, the bullets are made mostly of lead. Lead is toxic to people, plants, and animals, and it dissolves in water. So the bullets will be polluting the lake, which is the source of drinking water for millions of people and the habitat for millions of animals. Finally, the Great Lakes are a natural wonder, which should not be despoiled.
Q. Isn't there somewhere else the Coast Guard could practice shooting?
A. Of course. They could practice on land, like the Army, Navy, Marines, Air Force, FBI, police, and everyone else does.
Q. But don't they have to practice shooting from boats?
A. Not necessarily. The military uses simulators for a great deal of its target practice. The Navy has built an entire simulated destroyer in a big tank of water inside a building for training sailors. Most missile launching practice is simulated. There are lots of alternatives the Coast Guard could use that wouldn't endanger the lakes and the people who use and enjoy them.
Q. Doesn’t target practice on land cause problems, too?
A. Yes, unless it is done properly. The military has already closed down hundreds of poorly designed open-air firing ranges because they were allowing lead to get into the groundwater. In properly designed firing ranges, the bullets fall into traps and can be recycled without doing any environmental damage.
Q. Will the number of bullets the Coast Guard will be firing really hurt the lake?
A. Almost certainly. The only real question is how much harm they will do. Each machine gun the Coast Guard wants to use shoots 600 bullets a minute. The Coast Guard wants to use 34 sites within the lakes as target ranges. They estimate that they will shoot 43,000 bullets into the lakes each year, but there is no limit on how much they could shoot. Add it up and the Coast Guard will be shooting tons of lead into the lakes.
Q. The Great Lakes are big. Will that much lead hurt anything?
A. For years, polluters argued that the Great Lakes and the oceans were so big that they could dump whatever they wanted into them and it wouldn’t matter. Time after time we learned, tragically, that they were wrong. Waukegan Harbor on Lake Michigan had such a great volume of PCBs dumped in them that it became a hazardous waste site. Certain fish from the lakes are not healthy to eat because they have ingested so much mercury. Sadly, the Great Lakes are already polluted. Putting additional lead in them only adds to the problem.
Q. But doesn't the Coast Guard say the lead won't hurt anything?
A. In their environmental assessment, the Coast Guard makes a number of assumptions. The Coast Guard assumes the lead will sink to the bottom of the lakes and won't bother anything. They assume fish won't eat it as it falls. They assume the lead won't get caught in lake currents and washed into shallower waters. They assume not much of the lead will dissolve in the water. They assume fish or other animals won't eat the lead off the bottom of the lake.
Q. Is the Coast Guard right in assuming the lead will be harmless?
A. No. The lead will dissolve. It's just a question of how quickly. Once it dissolves, it will be carried wherever the currents take it. As for what amount of lead will get into your drinking water, and what quantity of lead the fish and other animals will eat, depends upon a lot of things, including how well your water is filtered. Historically, lots of chemicals have been dumped in the lakes and the oceans on the assumption that they wouldn't hurt anything. People have died and gotten sick and continue to do so, because these assumptions were wrong.
Q. Isn't there some law that keeps the Coast Guard from dumping lead in the Great Lakes?
A. There are all sorts of laws that ban putting lead into the lakes. If you go fishing, you aren’t allowed to let even one lead fishing-line weight, which is smaller than a bullet, fall into lakes. If you are a hunter, you aren’t allowed to use lead shot on or around the lakes. If you own an industrial plant, you aren’t allowed to discharge or dump lead into the lakes. But the Coast Guard wants to do it anyway.
Q. Don't these environmental protection laws apply to the Coast Guard?
A. Some day a court may decide the laws do apply, or they may decide they don't. As with lots of legal questions, it is hard to predict. But the legal process would take years, and in the meantime, the Coast Guard would be polluting. Once the lead gets into the lake, it is almost impossible to get it out.
Q. Can't someone get an injunction to stop the Coast Guard from polluting the lakes?
A. Please go ahead and try. So far no government agency, not even the Environmental Protection Agency, has stepped in to help.
Q. Who is leading the effort to protect the Great Lakes?
A. This web site was created by a group of ordinary citizens who gathered in someone's living room and named themselves Citizens for Lake Safety. We hope there are lots of other groups like us. We have been contacting established environmental groups, some of which are working on the issue, and others which haven't made it a high priority. If you contact your local environmental group or the national big-name groups, you can help convince them to join in this effort.
Q. What can I do to help protect the Great Lakes?
A. Write and call your elected representatives. Testify at one of the public hearings the Coast Guard is holding. Support the environmental organizations that are helping with this problem. More suggestions can be found at the Take Action section of this website.
Q. Are any politicians helping to protect the Great Lakes?
A. Some are. A lot more will if you ask them.
Q. Is anyone going to make any money if the Coast Guard's plan is allowed to proceed?
A. The direct beneficiaries will include the companies who make the guns and bullets and targets. The indirect beneficiaries will include all industries that want to be able to pollute our lakes and rivers and oceans, because the Coast Guard's actions will help lower government and public resistance to polluting. The Navy may also benefit if the Coast Guard's shooting on the Great Lakes makes it easier for the Navy to shoot on the lakes.
Q. Does the Navy want to shoot on the Great Lakes, too?
A. The Navy only has one “boot camp,” where every sailor goes to train. It is located on Lake Michigan. During World War II, the Navy did some target practice on the lake. It's hard to be sure what the Navy's intentions are, or whether they will change.
Q. What keeps the Navy from shooting on the Great Lakes now?
A. A treaty between the United States and Canada that was signed in 1817.
Q. Doesn't that treaty stop the Coast Guard from shooting on the Great Lakes too?
A. It did, but after September 11, 2001 the Bush administration reached an agreement with the Canadian government to reinterpret the treaty to allow shooting on the Great Lakes.
Q. So, if the Coast Guard can use the Great Lakes as a target range, the Navy can, too?
A. That’s what it looks like.
Q. What kinds of guns does the Navy have?
A. Big ones. Little ones. Guns of every kind.
Q. Have citizen initiatives like this ever succeeded?
A. They almost always succeed, if enough people work hard enough. Virtually every environmental law, every cleanup, every industrial installation of environmental safety equipment, was brought about because of citizen action.
Q. Is there enough time to stop the Coast Guard?
A. With the aid of email, telephone calls, mail, and other actions, it is possible. But we will have to act quickly. The Coast Guard tried to push their plan through with almost no chance for the public to respond. Fortunately, someone noticed, and the Coast Guard was pressured to hold more public hearings. Still, immediate action is needed.