Estimated reading time: 8 minutes
It is a forgotten chapter of American history to the settler population that did not have to live through it: the so-called “Indian Wars,” an active struggle of resistance to colonialism by the remaining Indigenous nations which were subject to the United States’ expansion. The Navajo Nation, which stood strong in resistance against U.S. imperialism, and even now cultivates an active resistance movement, was forced into submission by the U.S. in 1868, in the treaty of Bosque-Redondo. Like prior treaties, the Navajo signatories of Bosque-Redondo were not given a full picture of what U.S. occupation would entail. The treaty was presented as a pact of mutual assistance where in exchange for some minor land rights the U.S. would provide top-notch care and security to the Navajo Nation, while allowing for its sovereignty to be respected. Instead, the treaty dictated an occupation of oppression, domination, and extraction. The Navajo Nation was confined to an arid, non-sowable, and barren tract of land by the United States government.
It comes as no surprise, then, that uranium shipments in and through Navajo Nation territory have resumed. Energy Fuels, Inc. and the Navajo Nation (represented by President Buu Nygren) reached an agreement in January which allowed for the transport of uranium over Navajo land. The uranium has been and will be transported to a facility in Utah by the Energy Fuels company, a U.S. energy company.
The historical problem of uranium and the Navajo Nation is not lost on the Navajo people. During World War 2 and the Cold War, the United States government illegally violated treaties with the Navajo to mine and transport uranium on their land, resulting in outbreaks of radiation sickness and cancer, and later deaths. The generational impacts of this mining continue to this day.
The United States, in its ongoing dream of expanding its empire, seeks to procure uranium for energy, military, and economic purposes. Navajo protest is not congruent with this dream, and so businesses and the federal government have tirelessly worked to undermine Navajo sovereignty and steal the coveted uranium ore from the land which the Navajo call home, and transport said uranium over that land.
What results is the following.
- A demonstration of U.S. colonialism in action. The 1868 Bosque-Redondo treaty established the Navajo reservation (the largest U.S. reservation), and Article IX of said treaty established the United States’ authority to build railroads and other infrastructure over the Navajo lands. What is at issue here is a corporation, on behalf of the United States, violating the land of the Navajo, which is in accordance with the wording of the 1868 treaty and the actions which surrounded it (including the termination of U.S. treaties with Indigenous nations in 1871).
- A demonstration of the necessity for common action and solidarity efforts. In the summer of 2024, the same company had illegally transported uranium. Upon discovering this gross violation of what little sovereignty they were supposedly allowed, the tribal authorities attempted a roadblock, though were too late in doing so, as the uranium trucks had already passed through the Navajo lands. The subsequent resistance eventually resulted in the settlement that is now allowing uranium transport over Navajo Nation lands. This response was drafted and supported by the comprador Buu Nygren, who notably is married to Arizona State Representative and former Prosecutor Jasmine Blackwater-Nygren, and has expressly acted against the wishes of a large number of members within the Navajo Nation, who called for negotiations to be halted.
The perspective of one member of the Navajo Nation who wishes to remain anonymous is that the actions of current President Buu Nygren, and more importantly the colonial overlord government, only serve to hinder the well-being of the citizens of the Navajo Nation.
The respondent made clear that “Nygren was looked at with hope because he was from a younger generation,” and that “many of the younger voters in the Navajo Nation felt betrayed and lied to.” Nygren has worked with the company Energy Fuels, Inc. and was instrumental in signing the January deal to allow the shipment of uranium through Navajo land. Per the anonymous source, “When Navajo people want freedom over their land, it becomes frustrating that the President of the Navajo Nation agrees to allow uranium transport and mining again.”
To this day, communities across the Navajo Nation are impacted by the mining of uranium. One such community is Church Rock, which has a long history of mining the uranium the U.S. government used for its nuclear weapons. In 1979, Church Rock, a small community of about 2,950 (of which only 20 are non-Indigenous), was the subject of outrage after a uranium spill on the Rio Puerco. The disaster, which is to date the largest nuclear disaster in U.S. history, and the third largest accidental release of radiation after Chernobyl and Fukushima, is all but forgotten. Just two months prior to Church Rock, the Three Mile Island nuclear meltdown occurred, and the national response was immediate, with President Jimmy Carter visiting the site just days after. Church Rock was never visited by a U.S. President to address the disaster. The impact of the Church Rock disaster is not well researched, with a 2003-2007 study through Clark University, and an EPA profile being the only major sources of research on the matter. Nygren’s allowing the uranium operations to begin again is a disgusting insult to the survivors and victims of Church Rock, and is a clear indication of where his interests stand, that being with capital, and not his constituency.
The Bosque-Redondo treaty again demonstrates that the United States interest in the Navajo Nation is purely colonial. Wherever the U.S. stands to gain, the Navajo people will lose. According to the anonymous interviewee, “The land given to us by Bosque-Redondo is not suitable for agriculture or building a life on. The education and medical resources we receive are the absolute bare minimum. The U.S. Government took advantage of us in 1868, and now we are again seeing the effects.”
When asked about how to combat the transport of uranium and other colonial actions, the respondent said, “The younger Navajo 7th generation needs to think about the implications of what our ancestors taught us and participate in the sovereignty we have now. We need to make our government accountable for us. Protests that are happening must continue in the form of blocking highways and disrupting infrastructure. We need to take charge for what is ours, because if we don’t, we can say goodbye to our land and sovereignty. If the U.S. comes to take what little sovereignty we have, will we just let that happen?”
The respondent encourages everyone, both Navajo and not, to complain to chapter houses [Local Navajo Nation representative organizations], which are across the U.S., and make your voices loud. “This shouldn’t be pushed under the rug like everything else has with our nation.”
The continued struggle against U.S. colonialism by the Navajo people is a demonstration of the need for an internationalist struggle against U.S. colonialism and imperialism in all corners of the empire. The Navajo cannot be left to stand alone in their struggle, because their struggle is the struggle of all colonized and working peoples under the violent oppression of the imperialists. The Navajo Nation has for centuries been fighting a war that can only be won through the upending of the whole capitalist imperialist system. This war will be won by the self-conscious uniting of the Indigenous nations, New Afrika, and the conscious workers of the oppressor nation on a truly internationalist foundation built on a struggle for self-determination of all oppressed peoples.
