Column by George Sibley
Rural economics – December 2001 – Colorado Central Magazine
CARGO CULTS. At yet another early morning Economic Development Board emergency airline meeting, that’s what I found myself thinking about.
During World War II, the great American war machine dropped out of the sky onto some Pacific islands that were inhabited only by some remnant Stone Age peoples. We went in with bulldozers and carved runways out of the jungle, flying big cargo planes in and out to support the island-hopping war against Japan. Then, a few months later, as the war moved on, the runways were abandoned.