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The fifth anniversary of the war and
occupation of Iraq came and went in the US with only a tiny percentage of
those opposed to the war mobilized in the streets. Yet in the hundreds
of cities and towns where events occurred it was clear from the mood of
protesters that much more could have been done to organize antiwar
sentiment.
In London, 50,000 participated in a rally on
March 15th called by the Stop the War Coalition, which had
issued an appeal for mass protests around the world – an appeal ignored
in the U.S. Having decided against a mass national demonstration,
United For Peace & Justice focused on a March 19th
midweek civil disobedience action in Washington, D.C., combined with
local protests around the country.
The day after, UFPJ announced that "It
is clear that March 19th and this whole week of anti-war action was
historic. On Wednesday, the atmosphere in the streets of our nation's
capital was exhilarating. More than 1,000 people engaged in more than a
dozen bold, creative, inspiring actions that disrupted business as
usual. The protests made those who profit from war, and those who
enable it, stop and take notice."
It's more likely that to the extent the
ruling class paid much attention, they could only have noted how few
people there were and how little business was interfered with.
Among the CD actions in D.C. were one at the
IRS building, in which a third of the 100 protesters were arrested.
Another action, whose lead organizer was the No War, No Warming
network, occurred at the American Petroleum Institute. Some protesters
wore green hard hats with stickers saying "Green Jobs Now."
Later a march of several hundred students led
by SDS joined this action. This march stopped traffic briefly by
sitting down at various points.
Meanwhile handfuls of anarchists hurled paint
bombs at military recruiting and war profiteer offices.
A leader of No War, No Warming described this
as "a very important day for the peace/justice/climate movement.
Although numbers were not what they should have been, we sent an
important message that people are stepping up their tactics, that
militant, nonviolent, disruptive action has become a top priority
tactic that we must keep using and keep escalating."
Similarly some students in Portland said in a
statement: "We believe that anti-war efforts have been too
moderate and passive to make a difference."
Protests elsewhere were generally small in
size. Among the bigger were those in Chicago of 3,000, including many
students; a thousand in Austin, Texas; and a mostly young crowd of 800
in Albany, New York.
In San Francisco about 5,000 turned out – more
than on October 27, 2007, the last date for nationally-coordinated
actions. Earlier in the day 150 protesters were arrested for blocking
traffic and chaining themselves to public buildings.
There was a higher percentage of new, young
people – perhaps even the majority – than at previous rallies.
Among the speakers was Cindy Sheehan, who
talked about the social needs ignored in favor of war spending – a
theme expressed around the country from platforms and in the crowds. In
Kauai, Hawaii, demonstrators at the Army Recruiting office held signs
listing projects and services that could have been funded by the money
spent on the war. (See article on "The War and the Economy"
in this issue.)
The San Francisco rally, like the one in Los
Angeles, was cosponsored by ANSWER, one of whose speakers was an
Egyptian student who tied the war to the decades of repression in his
country. Filipin@ and Palestinian students also turned out, as well as
some union members.
In Cleveland, one of the country's biggest
chapters of the new Students for a Democratic Society, made up of both
high school and college students, held a rally.
A leader of a Boston antiwar group notes that
while UFPJ wanted originally to have small pickets at congressional
offices, in some cities when the rank and file of broader coalitions
which included UFPJ affiliates pushed for bigger actions, they often
carried the day, leading to somewhat larger turnouts. Nonetheless they
were fighting not only against caution on UFPJ's part, but also against
the sentiments expressed above that "new," supposedly more
radical actions, even if smaller, were better than mass marches.
Actions in other areas on March 19th
ranged in size from dozens to a hundred or two hundred. Many reported arrests
at recruiting stations and other military facilities.
Participants in several cities said they were
pleasantly surprised at the turnouts, modest though they were, given
the inadequate organizing that had gone into them.
In New Jersey, 250 students walked out of
Princeton High School for an hour long rally, and are now fighting two
days of detention.
Some major cities had several small events.
In the Philadelphia/New Jersey area there was a demonstration on the
Trenton bridge, another at the New Jersey statehouse, a teach-in at a
Bucks County college and a picket at Lockheed Martin in Newtown in a
heavy rainstorm. All were small but spirited.
Similarly in New York there were several
demos in each of the five boroughs, all small but enthusiastic, totaling
no more than one or two thousand. The following Sunday about 3,000,
generally middle-aged or older, including several trade union
contingents, turned out at Union Square in Manhattan. And the following
week 300 came to a vigil marking the 4,000th U.S. death in
Iraq.
In Minneapolis on March 19, over 850 people
participated in the weekly vigil. The Saturday before, a coalition of
groups organized a march of about 2,000, twice the number expected.
Here as in many places around the country speakers included veterans
and family members of active duty and returned troops. A clear "U.S. Out of Iraq
Now" message was put forward. The event was endorsed by the St.
Paul Trades and Labor Assembly. Here too – and in dozens of other
cities -- a vigil to mark 4,000 U.S. deaths was held the following
week.
In Duluth, Minnesota, 50 people participated
in a vigil/press conference on the 19th. That Friday a march
led to an indoor rally of 150. These smaller actions however were
preceded by monthly community forums and teach-ins since last September
each drawing 50 people, with over 200 participating in IVAW teach-ins
held last month.
About 200 religious activists and others in
Hartford marked the anniversary with prayer and song.
On March 15th, the Saturday
before, there were marches of 2,000 in Minneapolis, several hundred in
Akron, 200 in Southern Oregon, and 1,000 in Portland.
The same day, activists and community members
protested the war, environmental racism and global warming by
attempting to blockade the Chevron oil refinery in Richmond, CA.
Community members are trying to stop expansion of the refinery, which
already causes asthma, cancer and higher death rates in surrounding
neighborhoods.
About 400 turned out, and the company shut
down for the day in anticipation. Organizers pointed out that Chevron
refines over a million barrels of Iraqi oil each month at Richmond, and
is lobbying for the privatization of Iraq's oil fields. Chevron has
teamed-up with Total to bid on Iraq’s fourth largest oil field as Washington
pressures the Iraqis to allow US companies to own and control Iraqi
oil. (This attempted resource grab is a big factor behind recent
fighting in Basra and Baghdad. Iraqi unions have been protesting and
striking since the occupation began to stop this theft.)
An episode at the March 19th rally
of 250 in Ashland, Oregon speaks to one task facing revolutionaries in
coming months. Here, as in other cities, many participants wore Obama
buttons. A Socialist Action speaker drew cheers for his denunciations
of war makers. But when he exposed the responsibility of both parties
for the war, a hush went over the crowd. An SA member active in Ashland
says this stemmed from a recognition of the contradiction between their
hopes in Obama and the realities of his support for the war. This
episode presages the hard but crucial discussions needed between now
and November with fellow movement activists.
Winter Soldier
Hearings
From March 13 to 16, Iraq Veterans Against
the War held its Winter Soldier hearings at the AFL-CIO's National
Labor College outside D.C. to document the brutality, massacres,
degradation and humiliation imposed by U.S. troops on Iraqis. The
hearings also described the toll violence takes on soldiers themselves
and the inadequate care they receive upon returning home.
IVAW Chair Camilo Mejia said the group is
demanding "immediate and unconditional withdrawal of all troops,
care and benefits for all veterans, and reparations for the Iraqi
people.”
The hearings were designed to show that U.S.
war crimes are not the doings of a few bad apples among the grunts, but
are rather encouraged by officers' and politicians' orders and
instructions, and are part of a pattern of "an increasingly bloody
occupation."
By such exposures IVAW hopes to encourage
ever more troops to "throw down their weapons and refuse to
fight."
One witness pointed to the weekly meetings in
his unit to educate and organize GIs. This is the kind of one-on-one
agitation that needs to be extended on a mass scale, not only within the
military and among vets, but also with soldiers talking to union
members, immigrant workers, women's groups, and all other opponents of
the war, on how our efforts can be united to end the war and
occupation. Mass, national demonstrations are one essential venue for
such discussions, and to see in action our strength and diversity. And
such demonstrations reinspire activists to go back home and have these
discussions with yet unmobilized soldiers, vets, workers, and others.
The testimony of the hundreds of vets at the
hearings were largely blacked out by the mainstream media.
Support for
National Assembly Continues to Build
The continued desire by war opponents to
mobilize – and to decide for themselves how and when to do so – is
helping to build support for the June 28-29 National Assembly to End
the Iraq War and Occupation in Cleveland, Ohio. Among the newest of
over 400 endorsers are Fred Mason, national Co-Convenor, U.S. Labor
Against the War and President, Maryland AFL-CIO and D.C. Labor Council;
Malik Rahim, co-founder, Common Ground Fund, New Orleans, and Ramsey
Clark. ANSWER has endorsed, and while UFPJ has not yet, leaders of both
of these major national antiwar organizations, Brian Becker of ANSWER
and Leslie Cagan of UFPJ, will speak at the public Saturday evening
panel at the Assembly on the theme “Building the Movement to End the
War and Bring the Troops Home Now."
USLAW has sent two emails to affiliates
informing them of its endorsement and encouraging participation.
Assembly workshops are being organized around
a wide range of issues, including the war and the economy; the war and
racism and anti-immigrant attacks; the war and the climate crisis; the
role of vets, active duty soldiers and military families;
counterrecruitment; making connections to Palestine, Iran and other
countries; intervention in Africa and Latin America; and building the
antiwar movement in unions.
The attractiveness of a conference which, for
the first time since the war started, will allow participants to
democratically decide the next steps for the movement, is shown in
exchanges at the 5th Year march in San Francisco. An
Assembly supporter found little initial interest for making the trip to
Ohio. But when he said "Were you ever asked to be part of the
process of building the antiwar movement?", the response,
especially from young people, was an eagerness to talk about how they
could do so.
The Minneapolis Star Tribune quoted Tyrus
Thompson, 18, a member of Youth Against Racism and War, as saying at a
March 19th rally: "I wish more were here. I wish they
knew how much power we actually have." If the Assembly has the
kind of success it seems headed toward, the antiwar movement can resume
calling the kind of actions which let us feel once again just how much
power we have.
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