Headlines, North America

IRAQ: U.S. Soldiers and Families Oppose War Aims, Preparations

Haider Rizvi

NEW YORK, Mar 11 2003 (IPS) - While military preparations continue, signs of doubt and mistrust about the legitimacy of a looming war against Iraq are becoming increasingly visible among U.S. soldiers, their families and some lawmakers in Congress.

Worried about the fate of their loved ones, some families are turning to courts in an attempt to stop President George W. Bush from giving orders for military action against Iraq. Others are lobbying with members of Congress for a presidential guarantee that U.S. soldiers would be fully protected from the possible use of biological or chemical weapons during the war.

”If President Bush wants to launch a military invasion against Iraq, he must first seek a declaration of war from the U.S. Congress,” argues Charles Richardson, who filed a law suit against Bush and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld in a Boston Court recently along with many others. ”Our constitution demands nothing less.”

Richardson, whose son is a Marine stationed in the Persian Gulf, believes that an attack on Iraq would be ”unjust and unnecessary”. ”The hardest thing that can possibly happen to me is if someone comes and tells me that my son has died fighting an unnecessary and unjust war.”

Filed by a number of military families and U.S. legislators, the lawsuit accuses Bush of ”acting as the king of a monarchy, not as the leader of a democracy where power is shared by the executive, legislative and judicial branches”.

The plaintiffs’ lawyers contend that waging war against Iraq without a congressional declaration would be ”illegal and unconstitutional”, arguing that as commander in chief the U.S. president is empowered to decide how to fight a war, but not to decide whether to fight one.

Dismissed by a lower court earlier, the case is now being heard by a three-judge panel of a federal appeal court.

Despite odds, the lawyers fighting this case are optimistic about the outcome.

”We are pleased that the federal appeal court recognises that this case deserves immediate review,” John Bonifaz, the plaintiffs’ leading lawyer told IPS. ”It was taken up within 24 hours after dismissal from the lower court. We are hopeful this court will rule in our favour.”

U.S. soldiers and their families did take the government to court during the Vietnam War, but that happened only after the fighting had already started.

Aside from legal and constitutional concerns, many families, and in some cases soldiers too, are refusing to accept Washington’s argument that attacking Iraq to end a dictatorship and establish democracy would be a ”moral” war.

”This is my son Jessy,” says Shirley Young, showing a photo of her 20-year-old son, tears welling up in her eyes. ”He volunteered to protect his country. He was prepared to do what he had to do. But now he tells me that President Bush is making a decision for the wrong reasons.”

The anti-war GI Rights Hotline, a non-profit group that provides confidential help to soldiers, says it has recently received more than 3,500 phone calls from military personnel and families seeking advice on ”conscientious objector” status and other forms of military discharge.

During the 1991 Gulf War, about 500 enlisted men and women filed for conscientious objector status. The government approved about 60 percent of the cases, but several soldiers were jailed for refusing to fight, according to a General Accounting Office report.

Anti-war groups say many working class young people are lured by the U.S. military’s advertising campaigns that promise everything they long for. ”Where else can you get paid to train with the best, travel around the world, make lifelong friends, and get an education?” asks an Armed Forces website.

In addition to the moral and legal concerns about the war, many U.S. lawmakers, former military leaders, Gulf War veterans and others are raising serious questions about the safety of hundreds of thousands of troops who are already, or will soon be, stationed in the Persian Gulf region.

In a letter sent to Rumsfeld on Thursday, eight legislators said they had strong concerns about the possible use of chemical and biological weapons against U.S. soldiers in the event of war with Iraq.

”Our military personnel do not have adequate training or equipment to respond to a biological and chemical attack,” they said.

More than one-third of the 778,000 ”defective” protective suits that the defense department ordered removed from its inventory in May 2000 are unaccounted for, according to the legislators.

The Defense Logistics Agency, according to the letter, confirmed that 80,000 gas masks with the ”wrong filters” had been issued to the armed forces, and that 19,000 of these remain in circulation.

”No family will be eager to hear that their loved ones were killed because he or she had been given a mask with the wrong filter,” the legislators said in the letter, adding, ”More than 10 years after the end of Persian Gulf War, we still don’t know why so many veterans are still experiencing medical problems.”

It is believed that more than 100,000 U.S. soldiers suffered from various diseases as a result of exposure to pharmaceuticals, chemical toxins, smoke from oil well fires, and petroleum fuels. The lawmakers expressed their fears that soldiers may face similar conditions.

In Britain, the U.S. ally most supportive of an Iraq attack, the military establishment itself seems to be uneasy about a war that many believe is devoid of clear objectives and moral clarity.

”There’s general disquiet not just about the issue of U.N. resolutions but about the ethical dimension,” the Guardian newspaper quoted a source close to the defense ministry as saying. ”There is a feeling that in order to attack there has to be some kind of aggression in the opposite direction. This would be a first.”

British troops are also complaining about their equipment.

One Royal Marine commando claimed in the ‘London Evening Standard’ newspaper last week that food supplies for soldiers in the Gulf region were short and that other key equipment, from desert boots to camouflage for vehicles, had not arrived. "As it stands, people here will die," he said.

Another paper, the ‘Daily Mail’, has been offering 10 pounds for all published letters from troops who have "experienced problems". On Saturday, it printed a selection, including one from a soldier who said, "Kuwait is a circus. If it wasn’t for the Americans, we would have starved."

Shirley Young fears Jessy will be sent to the Gulf region within a few days. ”He’ll be gone very soon,” she says. ”As a mother of a soldier, I can’t stand in silence. I have decided to do something.”