For 60 years, Navy warships have dropped bombs, spread toxic waste, crushed coral reefs and endangered the islanders' health. And now Bush says he feels their pain?

All I can say is: Querido Puerto Rico, cuidado. My dear Puerto Rico, beware.

If you missed it, President Bush, in Europe this month for his "Blind Ambition" tour, announced he had decided to end the Navy's training exercises in Vieques by May 2003.

Pithy as always, Bush said of the people of Vieques: "These are our friends and neighbors and they don't want us there."

Actually, the people of Vieques are U.S. citizens and what they don't want are bombs exploding in their collective backyard. Some people call that un- American. I call it human nature.

So, now the plan is to find an alternate site for the U.S. Navy and the U.S.

Marine to train for the dangerous business of wartime beach assaults. The trouble is that the hunt for a suitable replacement could take two years or more, according to U.S. Navy Secretary Gordon England.

Here's where I started to get a little suspicious:

Within hours of announcing that the Navy would be closing shop in 2003, England mentioned that he'd rather that Congress cancel a citizens' referendum on the matter, which is scheduled in Vieques for November.

Military training policy, said England, shouldn't be decided by voter referendum. That would set a "bad precedent." What England does not mention is that the Navy is expected to lose at the ballot box in November, an outcome that could prove embarrassing for President Bush.

The truth is that the president's team of political advisers has decided to wage war against the Vieques activists. Not with bombs and bullets, but with the flak of politics and public pressure.

For the past few months, the White House has been losing the battle of public opinion as the arrests of protesters -- some of them with names like Kennedy and Sharpton -- continue to mount.

Am I suggesting that Bush doesn't care about the people of Vieques? Of course he cares. He cares very much that Latinos nationwide sympathize -- and empathize -- with the people of Vieques.

And he cares that in next year's congressional elections, not to mention the presidential race in 2004, Latino voters will be an increasingly important swing vote.

And because he cares, Bush has a plan. Let's call it a vast West Wing Conspiracy.

First, the White House promises to pull the Navy out of Vieques in a mere two years. That's supposed to prove he's compassionate. Then, he urges Congress to cancel the November referendum. If Congress doesn't, Bush figures he wins either way. A vote to kick the Navy out validates his decision. A vote to let the Navy stay allows him say, "How can I pull out now? The people have spoken."

In the meantime, Bush and company are banking that his announcement to have the Navy leave Vieques by 2003 will blunt the protesters' momentum and turn public opinion against them.

What the president doesn't realize is that the Vieques movement is about much more than the military destruction of the island's once pristine beaches.

The real damage done runs much deeper.

In the past, the people of Vieques have been virtually powerless to fend off the abuses of the United States. Bombing Vieques not only scarred the island's beaches, it wounded a proud people's psyche.

But times have changed.

The people of Puerto Rico are now linked politically to the growing clout of American Latinos from New York to California. And so for the first time since Puerto Rico's colonization by the United States, its citizens -- its American citizens -- have real power. And they are willing to use it.

Bush's announcement to end the Vieques operation in 2003 was not an act of compassion. It was a strategic political move designed to paralyze his opponents and curry favor with Latinos.

And to that I repeat: Querido Puerto Rico, cuidado. My dear Puerto Rico, beware.

James Garcia is editor and publisher of politicomagazine.com.

©2001 San Francisco Chronicle

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