SUPPORT PABLO, KEVIN & GI RESISTANCE;STOP THE WAR

SUPPORT PABLO, KEVIN & GI RESISTANCE;

THE WAY OUT OF IRAQ

On May 11 Navy Petty Officer Pablo Paredes and US Army Sergeant Kevin Benderman will stand before military court martial tribunals for refusing to participate in the Iraq war. These men were wrongly denied conscientious objector status because of their public statement and now face military jail time and forfeiture of pay and benefits for their stand of conscience against war and occupation.

A letter was sent out May 2 calling for a "May 10 National Day of Action in Support of GI Resistance" signed by Pablo's brother Victor Paredes, Kevin’s wife Monica, anti-war, veteran and military family organizers from across the country (see CourageToResist.org).

In just one week support actions are being organized in 20 cities, including San Diego, Baltimore, Buffalo, Burlington, Charlotte, Deerfield, Helena, Honolulu, Los Angeles, New Haven, New York City, Orlando, Ventura, Providence, Rochester, San Francisco, Springfield, and other cities across the country. Supporters will attend the court martials. Folks from across California will caravan to San Diego to be present at Pablo Paredes court-martial, where Paredes says he intends to "put the war on trial. After all, it’s the real crime here."

People are supporting Kevin and Pablo and the thousands of other public and (mostly) private resisters because of their courageous stand against the war--- actually upholding international law-- deserves our support. They also deserve our support because the military is an anti-democratic institution in which denies basic democratic rights and punishes them for engaging in free speech, for example in every case rejecting conscientious objector status for soldiers who take a public stand.

The other reason to support them is that GI resistance has the power to stop the war and occupation in Iraq and check the reckless policies of empire behind it. Young people in the military and on college campuses and in the streets are taking the lead in this unstated, but potentially successful "people power" strategy.

The Bush Administration can't fight war or maintain an occupation without troops--or without obedient troops. Nor can they begin new wars without enough compliant soldiers. Courage to Resist with Kevin and Pablo’s families initiated the May 10 Call to Action. The new group of concerned community members, vets and military families says that it is "organizing support for military objectors to illegal war and occupation and the underlying policies of empire. We have adopted a people power strategy to weaken the pillars that support the Iraq war and occupation by supporting GI resistance, which together with counter-recruitment and draft resistance work can remove the supply of obedient troops."

People Power is the simple and essential concept that the obedience and cooperation of the people is what allows any government to rule. People around the world from the Philippines to Ecuador (two weeks ago) have used people power strategies to overthrow authoritarian rulers. We have also seen people power at work in the US, from the civil rights movement to the immigrant farm worker led Taco Bell Boycott that on march 8, 2005 won all their against the biggest fast food corporation on planet earth.

The term people power was popularized by the 1986 Philippine uprising against US-backed dictator Marcos, in which like the US antiwar movement military resistance was central. A key moment in the people power overthrow of Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos came on February 22, 1986. Two high ranking officers and a group of troops defected and barricaded them selves in the Defense Ministry. Hundreds of thousands of people responded to calls from the Catholic Church-run independent radio and surrounded the Defense Ministry to block the any troops Marcos might send. They chopped down trees and parked buses in intersections to blockade streets. For the next four days, entire families camped out on the streets of Manila, using their bodies to protect the rebel troops from attack. Marcos sent Marines, tanks and armored personnel carriers which were met in the streets by tens of thousands of ordinary Filipinos. Finally the tanks turned around and withdrew as the crowd cheered. Troops begin to defect in increasing numbers.

Seven helicopter gunships landed to join the rebels. A small group of rebel soldiers in Manila took over channel four, a government-run TV station, cutting off a Marcos speech in mid-sentence. Tens of thousands gathered outside to defend the station while the opposition began broadcasting news updates and appeals for assistance. Marcos, who ruled for twenty years, was astonished to see his power, which seemed so absolute only a few weeks ago, evaporate so quickly and completely. At about nine o'clock the night of February 25, 1986 Marcos and his family snuck out the back door of Malaca–ang Palace and took a U.S. Air Force plane to Guam. When Marcos' departure was announced jubilant Filipinos celebrated in the streets and flooded into the Palace.

Former career military vet Stan Goff said recently, "Every successful revolution requires either the neutralization or active participation of military people. It's really time we factor that into our thinking."

The idea of a people power strategy to end the war and occupation of Iraq is that we the people can organize effective campaigns to directly challenge the pillars that maintain the U.S. occupation of Iraq. This strategy is different than lobbying Congress or just engaging in general public education. Rather, people power is a strategy to help the people of the United States learn what we have forgotten: the coercive power of government is fragile and when we organize to remove popular support from the pillars that hold up the system, then things can change fast.

TROOPS; PILLAR OF WAR

There are several clear pillars that the war and occupation are supported by, but the clearest one that brad sectors of the antiwar movement have taken on is the pillar of obedient troops. This pillar be weakened by focussed campaigns in three key areas:

Supporting troops (or private or government employees) who refuse deployment or otherwise resist the war and occupation.
Counter-Recruitment; Reduce the military's ability to recruit young people, disproportionately low income and of color.


Resisting the Draft and Draft Registration; Support young men to refuse to register for the selective service and prepare for mass resistance to a possible draft, particularly if counter recruitment is effective.
GI resistance within the military, together with massive desertion and draft resistance, is widely credited with being a key element in forcing the US out of Viet Nam. Steve Morse, a former US Army soldier who was active in the antiwar GI movement during Viet Nam and today coordinates the GI Rights Program of the Central Committee of Conscientious Objectors explains, "This was an unprecedented event in US history. Underground newspapers, GI coffeehouses, petitions, demonstrations, black armbands, stockade revolts, the FTA (Fuck The Army Show), leaflets, discussion groups, civilian/veteran support and counseling, combat refusals of riot control training and duty, revolts on ships; these all occurred many times." By 1970, the Army had 65,643 deserters.

GI RESISTANCE

Much of the last year's resistance to the war has come from within troops themselves and their families: blowing the whistle on Abu Graihb; the entire 17 member Army Reserve platoon-the 343rd Quartermaster Company -- refusing an order to go on a "suicide" supply mission in Iraq; troops cheering as one of them confronted Rumsfeld at his photo op speech to the troops in Iraq; thousands of former soldiers are fighting the "backdoor draft" -last November 1,800 of 4,000 people notified (of 110,000 former "individual" ready reserves) are requesting exemption or appealing deployment and of 2,500 ordered to report to military bases 733 never showed up; hundreds have applied for conscientious objector status and the military has admitted that over 5,500 have gone AWOL sine the Iraq invasion. Many will go to Canada, where one Canadian recently wrote in a letter to US troops, "We are just beginning to prepare for deserters/draft dodgers who will head North to avoid dying for Halliburton. Be assured there are thousands of Canadians willing to help you, no matter what our Government rules." In addition to this resistance within the ranks, military families have become public anti-war spokespeople and frontline activists.

On December 6, 2004, Pablo Paredes refused to board his Navy ship. Paredes explained, "Like all members of the military, I have been trained to recognize my personal responsibility for participating in war crimes. Since the war is itself illegal and has been characterized by repeated and consistent violations of international laws and treaties, of the Geneva Convention rules of war, and of generally accepted standards of human rights, I have a reasonable belief that my training required me to avoid participating in these crimes."

The invasion and occupation of Iraq has included War Crimes, Crimes Against Humanity and Acts of Torture in violation the Geneva Conventions, the Nuremberg Conventions and the UN Charter. The War Crimes Tribunals held after World War II declared, "anyone with knowledge of illegal activity and an opportunity to do something is a potential criminal under international law unless the person takes affirmative measures to prevent the commission of crimes." Additionally, the U.S. Military Code of Justice states that military personnel have a right and a duty to disobey illegal orders.

On January 7, Sergeant Kevin Benderman refused to re-deploy out to Iraq, saying " since the governments want the wars then why don't we let the government fight the war? All of the politicians that want to fight a war are free to trade places with me at any time." Benderman is a 40-year old veteran from a military family who has received many awards, including four Good Conduct Medals; Benderman was deployed in Iraq from March to September of 2003 with the 4th Infantry Division. Twenty-two other soldiers in his unit also refused less publicly-- seventeen have gone AWOL (Absent Without Official Leave) and two attempted suicide. "U.S. military personnel," Benderman said, "are increasingly killing non-combatants. On my last deployment in Iraq, elements of my unit were instructed by a Captain to fire on children throwing rocks at us."

Pablo and Kevin were wrongly denied conscientious objector status by the U.S. military and now face jail time and forfeiture of pay and benefits for their public stand of conscience against war and occupation. Military personnel have a legal right to Conscientious Objector status based on their opposition to war, yet objectors who have made their views public have had their claims rejected and been punished for speaking out.

Objection and resistance by military servicepersons is a healthy and important assertion of Democracy in a country where the decisions to invade Iraq, to maintain an occupation, and engage in widespread human right violations and torture were made undemocratically in violation of international law and based on continuing lies and disinformation.

We can also do the less visible and equally important behind-the-scenes work of long-term political, economic and personal support for military refusers and their families. Groups can start with anyone in the military they are connected to or help public refusers or GI rights groups- and let them know there is help for them if they choose to refuse or go to Canada or go underground.

How can we create a climate of massive visible support for GI resistance and spread the risks to civilian society, so we create a serious political and social consequence for cracking down on those who refuse orders/obey international law or assert their rights? GI resistance is becoming the flashpoint for the rest of the antiwar movement. How can we organize to protect soldiers of conscience from crackdowns for their standing up for international law or asserting their rights? This can become a wider catalyst to end the occupation and war and the project Courage to Resist was formed to find creative ways to "have the backs" of GO resisters.

COUNTER RECRUITMENT

Barring recruiters from high schools and educating youth about the lies and manipulation of increasingly desperate military recruiters (many of whom have gone AWOL themselves) is another key effort to weaken the pillar of troops. Students across the US have taken spirited action and waged legal and political challenges that have driven military and CIA recruiters from their campuses including the University of California, Santa Cruz, San Francisco State University, University of Wisconsin-Madison, New York University, University of Illinois, Chicago, and Southern Connecticut State University. Massive counter education of students and youth, increasing protests and direct action at recruiting centers have contributed (along with the losing war in Iraq) to the record low for military recruitment. Many recruiters under intense pressure to produce bodies, have gone AWOL themselves.

In every branch of the military recruiting is has collapsed and the military is getting desperate. Morale is so low that, Lt. Gen. James R. Helmly wrote that "stop loss" orders involuntarily extending reservists' tours in war zones, and calling reservists to active duty after they had returned to civilian life have pushed the Army Reserve to the point that it is "in grave danger of being unable to meet other operational requirements" and is "rapidly degenerating into a 'broken' force."

DRAFT/REGISTRATION RESISTANCE

Cutting into the military recruiters' numbers could mean the government will bring back a military draft, "national service," or a special medical worker draft which all offer an opportunity for massive public resistance. According to 1980 draft registration resister and current anti-draft organizer Ed Hasbrouck, massive selective service non-cooperation may have been key in preventing a draft over the last the 25 years. He said the last General Accounting Office audit of the Selective Service found that they did not have current information on the whereabouts of as many as 75% of potential draftees. We can begin educating medical professionals, who may be the most likely to be drafted, and young draft age and younger men about the possibility of a draft and how to resist it. Instead of waiting until draft induction begins, peace and justice groups and individuals can begin now to help make a draft unworkable later. Young men can refuse to register, refuse to tell the selective service their whereabouts when they move, urge their parents or those at the registration address at (if you did register) not to accept or sign for an induction or any other Selective Service notice or give out any information about current whereabouts. People who did register can actively publicize their commitment to refuse a military draft.

OTHER PILLARS

Another of the most obvious other pillars of the Iraq war and occupation are the corporations that play an essential role in the occupation and in the motive for it. In the San Francisco Bay Area a new antiwar group has begun a campaign against Bay Area-based Chevron Texaco’s war profiteering, recently joining with Amazon Watch and other human and indigenous rights and environmental groups to demonstrate outside their April 27 annual shareholders meeting. In their call to antiwar activists to join they articulate their people power approach, "Eliminate the profitability of war. Expose the lack of rebuilding taking place in Iraq. Expose corporate war criminals. Expose the crony capitalism fueling the war. Cut the fuel by cutting the profits.

In Houston Texas activists are preparing for a major May 18th nonviolent direct action and festival of resistance at Halliburton’s headquarters during their annual shareholder meeting. The lead organizing group, Houston Global Awareness says in it’s call to action, "Halliburton is essential to continuing the war and occupation in Iraq and forcing them to withdraw their participation would shut down essential parts and motives for the war and occupation. Not only are their operations in Iraq depriving the children and people of Iraq of any sort of future, but also the billions upon billions in no-bid contracts heaped upon them by George Bush and Dick Cheney results in the further weakening of social services here at home."

COURAGE AND HEART

It’s clear that the anti-war movement needs a strategy and as usual it is the courage of young people in the military, on the campuses and in the streets who, by example, show us how to assert our people power. A people power strategy can stop the war and occupation if we clearly articulate it and organize and organize relentless innovative campaigns against the pillars the war. We need to find the courage and the heart that is in root of the word courage, le coeur, to assert our power as communities, as movements and as people to reverse the policies of empire behind both the war in Iraq and the war at home. It’s clear that Pablo Paredes, Kevin Benderman and other GI resisters have the courage to resist. Do we?

David Solnit is an organizer with Courage to Resist

More info about:

Pablo Paredes:

http://www.SwiftSmartVeterans.com

Kevin Benderman:

http://www.BendermanDefense.org

May 10 Day of Action:

http://www.CourageToResist.org

Counter Recruitment:

http://www.objector.org/recruiting.html

Youth/Student Organizing:

http://www.nyspc.net/

Draft resistance:

http://www.Resisters.info

May 18 Halliburton Action:

http://www.HoustonGlobalAwareness.org