U.S. Anti-War Movement – PRESENT!

By Sanjay Suri

More Americans became casualties in the Gulf War than in the Vietnam War or in World War II. True or False?

True, says Kevin Danaher from the Global Exchange, an organisation building people-to-people exchanges in the face of opposition from the U.S. government.

"Not during the war but because of what happened later," he said, explaining his somewhat daring assertion, during the meeting Americans Against War and Imperialism.

Use of depleted uranium and other such weapons has left "more than 150,000 soldiers certified by the U.S. military authorities as disabled." The reason people do not know this is because of "systematic deception of the U.S. people by the U.S. government."

But it is not only for the sake of those soldiers that the Global Exchange is opposing a war on Iraq. The organisation and a growing number of other NGOs and individual citizens are mobilising against war to save civilians in Iraq, and to bust what they see as lies from the administration of U.S. President George W. Bush.

Also, Danaher says, Washington is waging war to divert attention from "the crisis of corporate capitalism" which saw a loss of seven trillion dollars on Wall Street last year.

Activists gathered for Sunday's meeting at PUC mentioned the flood of anti-war activity they say the mainstream American media has barely reported.

Every single day a group of women wearing pink demonstrate outside the White House, and give their message to every tourist who comes along, says Medea Benjamin, of United for Peace and Global Exchange. "We are seeing an outpouring of support," she said.
A group of volunteers is preparing to head to Iraq on Feb 1 to form the first human chain of women. "They are mothers, grandmothers," she said. And there are more already working to set up another group, and then another.

Much of this was news to the audience. And some were caught off guard by the emotion and passion with which so many Americans are opposing war.

Benjamin was among the group that took relatives of the Sep 11, 2001 attacks to Afghanistan to express peace and solidarity with those who suffered and died there. "How can we expect people around the world to love us if we do not express love toward them? How can we let our leader call a nation evil? We must show others the love and compassion we showed to those who died in the attacks of September 11."

She has no illusions about the power of this movement, however strongly she believes in it. "We do not know if we can move fast enough or effectively enough," she said. "But sure as hell we will give it our best try."

At the end of the gathering, Danaher issued an appeal: "When people opposed the dictatorship of Gen. Pinochet in Chile, we struggled by your side. We struggled by your side in East Timor against the ways of the Indonesian government. Now we have our own liberation struggle. We ask you, humbly, for your support in helping us fight this government that has taken over our country."