NATO Maintains Control of Situation

In classic Yes Men style, NATO arrived in full force at an otherwise peaceful separatist rally in Gent. The preparation was minimal: copying 1,000 fliers the day before, and the morning of putting together the

amazing NATO banner, turning the van into a Police paddy wagon, and getting into the camo. But the effect was massively uncomfortable and awkward to the max. We rolled up on the steps of city hall, dropped the banner, and The General gave his speech.

A little back story.

The Flemish (north) region of Belgium has been on a conservative nationalistic streak. Politicians have been pushing an anti-immigrant platform and non-dutch speakers have felt an increase in racist sentiments. The more liberal Gent sits smack dab in the middle of all

this,and decided to secede from the rest of Belgium and become its own city state. Of course this was all in jest: Somebody's bright idea that the media jumped on and turned into a citywide joke. A big rally was planned downtown with a all day concert featuring Belgian bands. In the spirit of things NATO decided to step in to ensure the safety of everyone and the continuation of the ethnically diverse union that is Belgium. The url www.nato-press.com was purchased and set up to look just like NATO's official site (www.nato.int). Our NATO spokesman contacted lots of local media about our planned presence, and told them to contact us threw the website.

The guy who set the site up still has charges against him for doing a similar stunt last year. He set up a Belgian government website and issued a bunch of fake press releases to the effect that the Belgium was withdrawing from NATO. That got a lot of publicity and people were calling NATO and Belgian politicians for weeks. There is actually a long and proud history of these types of hijinks. The Yes Men (www.theyesmen.org) have a fake WTO website and they receive invitations to speak as representatives of the WTO at conferences all around the world.