Clancy Sigal : Resisting War Takes Guts

"No More War!" Art by Iván Lira /MRZine.
In our war-loving society:
Conscientious resistance takes guts, bravery

By Clancy Sigal / AlterNet / May 30, 2011

War will exist until that distant day when the conscientious objector enjoys the same reputation and prestige that the warrior does today. -- John F. Kennedy

I lost a friend recently with whom I'd grown up. As adolescents, we'd shared enthusiasms, and death-defying leaps into Lake Michigan off the Adler Planetarium, and chased the same girls. He had a puckish sense of humor, sometimes ghoulish, the kind of stuff you laugh at only when you're 15.

He could crick his neck with a loud snap, as if being hanged from a gallows, a party trick that revolted grownups but we thought hilarious. He could pick out a tune on a banjo on first hearing and sing political parodies of pop songs. As we grew up, we shared a history, not only of our acne-scarred, ego-obsessed selves, but something broader and deeper I best call anti-fascism.

We ran wild in the streets of Chicago itching for showdowns with anyone who disagreed with us -- we were young Communist-fronters and couldn't wait to enlist or be drafted. In the middle of the second world war, it was patriotic to be a red -- "communism is 20th-century Americanism," went the slogan.

Passion, not cynicism or detachment, was our deal.

With his death, I've lost a big part of the thread, a connection to the original meaning of things. I'm not alone in this broken thread on Memorial Day.

If you're in the United States while reading this, try a little test: ask someone, anyone, what Memorial Day memorializes? I've queried several friends and none could tell me that Memorial Day, once called "Decoration Day," began in the aftermath of the civil war to honor the more than 600,000 dead Confederate and Union soldiers -- the deadliest war in U.S. history.

Once, Memorial Day was a fairly solemn occasion when local communities lowered the courthouse flag to half-mast in salute to the "fallen," with jamboree parades to follow. In the 1960s, Congress changed the date to the last Monday in May so that people might have an extra day off on the weekend. Hence the current barbecues and shopping mall mania -- and national amnesia.

Except for the boy and girl Scouts, who still place little American flags on grave sites in our veterans' cemeteries, like the one almost within sight of my house, and a few soldiers' and sailors' relatives who come to visit, the original meaning of it has fallen into dust.

Curious, this. Because the publishing industry continues to pump out torrents of civil war books to feed a niche audience with pop biographies of bearded generals and Pickett's charge-type battle studies. Historians continue to debate the core cause of the war, and movies get made like Glory, Gettysburg, Cold Mountain, and Robert Redford's recent The Conspirator.

No matter, most of us like to go on a Memorial Day shopping spree, warm up the coals, pull out the cooler and slap shrimp tacos on the broiler.

I don't care how Memorial Day is spent, whether in a relaxed holiday mood or a visit to the dead. I've walked through the military graves at my nearest military graveyard, the 114-acre national cemetery near UCLA with its huge adjacent Veterans Administration hospital and old soldiers' home, full of sick and traumatized ex-combatants, and a homeless encampment of veteranos under the 405 freeway, a grenade's throw away from cemetery where some of their buddies lie under white crosses or stars of David.

Meaning no disrespect, but on this "war heroes' weekend," isn't it time to also honor those who have "fallen" in a different battle -- against the slaughtering wars?

Over time, my attitude to conscientious objectors and deserters has shifted. Once, I held them in contempt. But the Vietnam war, when I came into contact with war resisters, changed me. I saw then, and see now, that often it takes a different kind of moral and, yes, even physical courage to resist a call to serve your country in a war you believe is a crime, when all your family, friends, teachers and the vast American majority support joining up.

When I was called to my war, I went with shining eyes and revenge in my heart and couldn't wait to get my hands on a .30-calibre machine-gun to wipe out those Nazi bastards.

But what about those "cowards," "traitors," and "slackers" who don't want to kill other people? They're an odd breed who count among their number such as Muhammad Ali, Mahatma Gandhi, Sergeant York, David Hockney, three U.S. weapon-refusing combat medics who won the medal of honor, and the 27 Israeli air force pilots who refused orders to "track and kill" civilians in Gaza and the West Bank.

I continue to be amazed at the stupendous bravery of any currently serving soldier or marine who goes out on foot patrol in Afghanistan knowing beforehand that his command -- after spending $20 billion on an "anti-IED" project -- still has no clue how to protect him from a cheap roadside bomb that causes 80% of our casualties. (On Wednesday, seven Americans on a single patrol were blown up and killed by an IED in Kandahar province.)

But what kind of guts does it take for war objectors, whether they're Quakers, Jehovah's Witnesses, Mennonites, or secular, who simply don't want to kill?

On this Memorial Day, it might be a time to think about the outcasts who refuse to take life.

[Clancy Sigal, is a screenwriter and novelist in Los Angeles. Chicago-born, he has worked precincts for Democratic candidates since his teens. He emigrated to the UK during what David Caute calls the "Great Fear" and returned to America after the 1984 miners' strike. He is a reformed Fleet Street journalist. This article was distributed by AlterNet.]

The Rag Blog

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Victor Agosto Released from Bell County Jail

Holly Baker of Georgetown and Col. Ann Wright of Honolulu, Hawaii, look at the arm band of Victor Agosto, who was sentenced to a month in jail and stripped of his Army rank for refusing orders to deploy, during a celebration of his release Saturday at Under the Hood in Killeen. Agosto was assigned to the 57th Expeditionary Signal Battalion at Fort Hood. Photo: Herald/Catrina Rawson.
War objector gets out of jail
By Rebecca LaFlure / August 30, 2009

A Fort Hood soldier who was arrested for refusing orders to deploy to Afghanistan was released from jail Saturday.

Victor Agosto, 24, who believes the wars in the Middle East violate international law, pleaded guilty to disobeying a lawful order during a summary court martial at Fort Hood earlier this month.

The Iraq veteran, assigned to the 57th Expeditionary Signal Battalion, was sentenced to 30 days in Bell County Jail and demoted to private, the lowest Army rank. Agosto ripped the specialist rank off his uniform after the sentence was read.

Now, after a 24-day stint behind bars, Agosto said his only regret is that he didn't refuse orders sooner.

"People always say, 'I can't imagine what you've gone through,'" Agosto, said Saturday, wearing a T-shirt that read, "The people united will never be defeated."

"I don't feel like I've had to endure a lot of difficulties. … You'll never regret following your conscience."

Agosto said he expects to receive an other-than-honorable discharge from the Army. He'll likely be chaptered out by his unit in the coming weeks, and his unit commanders will decide the appropriate discharge.

Agosto said his stint in jail was "relaxing." He received daily letters from around the world, including Ecuador and Germany.

"Everyone was very supportive," Agosto said. "I received many post cards from people thanking me for what I did."

During the Aug. 5 trial, Agosto said he did not oppose the wars in the Middle East when he enlisted in 2005.

It was not until he deployed to Iraq that he began to have doubts, he said. When Agosto returned from Iraq in November, he thought his Army contract would end this summer. Instead, Agosto was ordered to Afghanistan under the stop-loss program, which extends the tours of military service members beyond their contracts.

At the end of April, Agosto went public about his intent to resist the war, and in May, he refused an order from his company commander to prepare to deploy. Agosto said he did not apply for conscientious objector status because he does not oppose all wars.

Col. Ben Danner, III Corps public affairs officer, said on Aug. 5 that Agosto's court-martial was not about a soldier who refused to deploy for combat, but rather, one who refused a lawful order from a noncommissioned officer to report to the Soldier Readiness Check site.

"The Army is a values-based organization that embraces the values of loyalty, duty, respect, selfless service, honor, integrity and personal courage," he said. "For a soldier to violate military law by refusing to obey orders is a serious matter."

Celebrating his release

Peace activists flooded the Under the Hood Café in Killeen Saturday evening to celebrate Agosto's release.

Bryan Hannah, an Iraq War veteran, attended Saturday's event. Hannah refused to deploy to Iraq in November after he was stop-lossed. The former Fort Hood soldier never faced a court-martial, but instead received an Article 15. He was demoted from specialist to private and given an honorable discharge from the military.

"There's nothing in Iraq I would have died for," Hannah said, who's now a student at Austin Community College.

Ann Wright, a retired Army colonel and U.S. State Department official, addressed the crowd of Agosto supporters Saturday. Wright was one of three State Department officials who publicly resigned in direct protest of the March 2003 invasion of Iraq.

"It takes great principle and courage to say, 'I love my country, but I'm not loving what my country's doing,'" she said.

Agosto is not the only Fort Hood soldier who has resisted the war in Afghanistan because of his beliefs. Sgt. Travis Bishop, also with the 57th Expeditionary Signal Battalion, was sentenced to a year in jail, stripped of his Army rank and given a bad conduct discharge during a special court martial at Fort Hood Aug. 14.

Unlike Agosto, Bishop went absent without leave (AWOL) the day he was supposed to deploy to Afghanistan. He turned himself into his unit a week later.

An eight-member jury found him guilty of two counts of missing movement, disobeying a lawful order and going AWOL.

Bishop, who said fighting in a war violates his Christian ethics, filed for CO status. His original application was denied, but James Branum, his attorney, said he is currently writing a rebuttal on the grounds that the Army chaplain evaluation did not meet legal requirements.

Working for peace

Agosto said he plans to remain an active member of the peace movement. He's considered a possible speaking tour, and wants to eventually go to college for sociology.

"Some kind of major where I don't make any money," he said.

He hopes to influence other soldiers against the wars in the Middle East to follow their conscience, he said.

"That was part of the idea of doing what I did," he said.

Source / Killeen Daily Herald

Thanks to Alice Embree / The Rag Blog

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Support for the Shministim : Concientious Objectors in the Israeli Army

'These are young adults, just out of high school, who have managed to break through all the myths that they have been immersed in and figured out for themselves what the Army actually does.'
By Rebecca Vilkomerson / December 19, 2008

It is hard to convey, and impossible to overstate, just how completely saturated Israeli culture is by the heroic image of the Israeli Army. In school, advertisements, marketing campaigns,store discounts, discussions with neighbors, every way you can imagine, the Army is portrayed as the ultimate form of service to the country. When I took my daughter, who is five, to the doctor recently, the doctor began her explanation of how vaccines worked in this way: "you know how Israel has an Army that protects us? Well the vaccines are your body's army…"

It is simply everywhere.

That is what makes the shministim all the more remarkable. These are young adults, just out of high school, who have managed to break through all the myths that they have been immersed in and figured out for themselves what the Army actually does. Having reached the conclusion that being in the Army would force them to commit immoral actions, they have taken the next obvious---but in no way easy---step of taking action by refusing to serve. All in the face of family pressure, peer pressure and societal pressure that is absolutely intense. They are willing to pay the price, which can and does include jail time, for standing up for what they know is right.

As far as I am concerned, as a mother who is raising two Israeli daughters, they could not be better role models.

So I invited my daughter to join me at the December 18th Day of Action in Solidarity with the Shministim, and I was thrilled that she even agreed to leave her sister's Chanukah party early to accompany me.

The Day of Action had already attracted welcome attention: a front page article this morning in Haaretz, a moving statement of solidarity from U.S. Army war resisters, and a strongly worded statement of support from Amnesty International.

When we arrived, the first thing we saw was box after box after box after box lined up on the street. These were the letters and postcards that had been generated by the international campaign, over 20,000 in total.

We were arrayed across the street from the imposing kiriya, the Army headquarters. This was as close as the police would allow us to get. We were a small group, about two hundred people, and this reminded me just how brave and still isolated the refusenik movement in Israel is, and therefore how much the international support really means.

The spirited crowd chanted and yelled support as some of the shministim--Omer Goldman, Sahar Vardi, Raz Bar-David Varon--and the relatives of Yuval Ophir-Auron and Sahar Vardi, took turns bringing the boxes of letters to the locked gates of the kiriya, where eventually two men in suits agreed to take them all inside. They make a nice group, indicative of how a refusenik can come from any part of Israeli society, as Omer's father made his career high up in the Mossad and Sahar's family are relentlessly dedicated left-wing activists.

There is a traditional belief in Yiddish culture, which comes from the Jewish mystical tradition, about the lamedvavniks, the thirty six righteous and humble people for whom God saves the world. The shministim are our lamedvavniks-our voice of conscience, our tiny flickering hope of building a society that does not willingly participate in controlling, terrorizing, and killing the Palestinian people-enforcing the checkpoints, demolishing homes, destroying ancient olive groves, building the Wall, confiscating land, enforcing siege and all the other immoral and illegal actions of the occupation.

In the last minutes of the demonstration, I talked briefly with one of the organizers. She said, "you know, there's a lot more we can do with these letters. We can hand them out on the streets of Tel Aviv. There are all sorts of things we can do." She was clearly buoyed and excited about building on the movement the Day of Action had generated. And as we got back on our bike to ride home in the still-warm December air, my daughter said to me, "Mama, I never want to be in the Army."

This is how it can begin. Because what if instead of six, or ten or sixty, six hundred refused? What if 6000 refused? The occupation would be over.

Israeli Conscientious Objectors -- Shministim -- say why they refuse to serve in the Israeli army that occupies the Palestinians.



For more information, go to Jewish Voice for Peace.

To sign a letter of support, go here.

Thanks to Fran Hanlon / The Rag Blog

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