Monday, December 12, 2005

VFP Chapter #100 Saturday breakfast meeting

Chapter #100 - Alaska

Veterans For Peace & friends:

Please set aside a couple of hours of your Saturday morning to attend to chapter business and enjoy the fellowship at our breakfast meeting, 17 December, 0800, at the Back Room of the Silverbow, 2nd Street between Main and Seward. Here's a partial agenda:
  • Chapter officers' election status report.
  • Proposed amendment of bylaws to split the position of Secretary-Treasurer into two separate positions.
  • The Chapter's "What I Heard About Iraq" dramatic production project - progress report and discussion.
  • VFP Convention 2006 (Seattle) planning and chapter participation.
  • SEATIR (SouthEast Alaska Truth In Recruiting) Chapter project - progress report and discussion.
  • Report on the 7 December Veterans' Forum in Anchorage.
  • Chapter website development report.
  • News from VFP around Alaska - membership, new chapter development, actions. *
    * Members are urged to email me with news of Alaska statewide VFP members and groups; I'll pass it on.

Please take special note of the bylaw amendment proposal (2nd item above); this constitutes the notice that is required in the Chapter bylaws. If you can't attend the meeting, members may submit a vote on this matter by email, to me or to Sec'y-Treas. Don Birdseye, not later than Friday night 16 Dec.

Let's Wage Peace over bagels and coffee!

John Dunker
President, VFP Chapter #100


Wednesday, November 23, 2005

A Soldier's Perspective on the Debate

Check out this article from TruthOut.ORG.

Get Some

By William Rivers Pitt, t r u t h o u t | Perspective
Wednesday 23 November 2005

Fallujah Films 11/29 Anch Museum 7 pm

Click Fallujah Film Showing at Museum

Friday, November 11, 2005

Veterans Day -- Nov. 11

Support Our Troops

We see them every day on the back windows of SUVs, on the fuel doors of sedans--stickers and magnets that say "Support Our Troops." Sometimes they sport yellow ribbons; sometimes American flags. Often they are weathered, peeling off the metal or glass. We see them so often it's easy to tune them out. Like the inoffensive "Have a nice day," the slogan is a pleasant sentiment that skims across our consciousness and disappears into the air.

On Veteran's Day, when we honor all of those who have served our country through the military, it's helpful to take a closer look at these three words that have become so familiar: What does it mean to truly support our troops?

Often, when people ask us to support our troops, they are asking us to support the Bush Administration's decisions in Iraq. But is the Administration supporting our troops by sending them into a war based on lies? By sending them into one battle after another with inadequate body armor, inadequately armored vehicles? By bringing home the wounded in the dead of night so we can pretend they don't exist? By cutting veteran's benefits upon their return, so they have to struggle to pay for their housing, their groceries, their medical care? By making young men and women fight an unwinnable war, a war that no longer has the backing of the American people?

Since March, peace groups including CodePink and Veterans for Peace have been staging a weekly candlelight vigil in front of Walter Reed Hospital in Washington, DC, to highlight the needs of injured soldiers. Lately, the vigils have been met by aggressive counterdemonstrators, who line up on the opposite side of the street with signs denouncing the vigil. These people support the war in Iraq and argue that demonstrations are demoralizing to the recovering soldiers. But how demoralizing must it be for soldiers coming home to discover that in state after state, Veterans Administration hospitals are being shut down? How demoralizing must it be for injured soldiers to have to fight for disability benefits, to be faced with increased co-payments, to be told that their post-traumatic stress disorder is not war-related?

What is the impact on soldiers still in Iraq to learn that the Bush Administration manipulated the intelligence about weapons of mass destruction in order to justify an invasion? How must they feel when they learn that Iraqis don't want us there or understand that their acts of bravery are not making their families safer at home? How demoralizing must it be to see their buddies die in a war that increasing numbers of soldiers don't even believe in?

More than 2,000 of our troops have been killed, and more than 15,000 injured. These numbers are important to remember, but it is also important to remember that our troops are not numbers, not statistics. They are human beings, and there are actions we can take to support them that are much more meaningful than blindly supporting our President or slapping a magnet on the back of our gas-guzzling car.

Send care packages to Iraq: books and snacks and toiletries to mitigate some of the harshness of the desert war zone. Donate to organizations, like the National Coalition for Homeless Veterans, that provide help for returning soldiers struggling to put their lives together after war. Stand on street corners with candles and signs that spotlight the injustices our troops face. Support groups like Iraq Veterans Against the War, made up of courageous soldiers speaking out against the war. Urge elected officials to end this misbegotten military adventure. Support clean, green energy programs and lifestyles that move us off our dependence on other countries' oil.

As we honor the sacrifice and courage of our veterans, let us recognize that the best way to support our troops is to call for their swift exit from Iraq, to guarantee them the care they deserve when they return, and to make policy changes that will stop us from ever again rushing into a reckless war.


From the Nation
Support Our Troops

Wednesday, November 02, 2005

Staying the Course?

Vet's

Here is a powerful arguement for not "staying the course." Everything that opponents of a pullout say would happen if the U.S. left Iraq is happening already, says retired Gen. William E. Odom, the head of the National Security Agency during the Reagan administration. So why stay?

Even some of the establishment is coming around to seeing the tragedy and folly of this war.

Remember the Faith Community Planning Meeting on Peace next Tuesday, 11/8 at 7 pm in Waldron Hall at St. Mary's Episcopal Church (Lake Otis & Tudor)

What’s wrong with cutting and running?

FROM: Nieman Watchdog ASK THIS August 03, 2005
http://www.niemanwatchdog.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=ask_this.view&askthisid=129
(Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard University)What’s wrong with cutting and running?

By William E. Odom diane@hudson.org

If I were a journalist, I would list all the arguments that you hear against pulling U.S. troops out of Iraq, the horrible things that people say would happen, and then ask: Aren’t they happening already? Would a pullout really make things worse? Maybe it would make things better.

Here are some of the arguments against pulling out:


1) We would leave behind a civil war.
2) We would lose credibility on the world stage.
3) It would embolden the insurgency and cripple the move toward democracy.
4) Iraq would become a haven for terrorists.
5) Iranian influence in Iraq would increase.
6) Unrest might spread in the region and/or draw in Iraq's neighbors.
7) Shiite-Sunni clashes would worsen.
8) We haven’t fully trained the Iraqi military and police forces yet.
9) Talk of deadlines would undercut the morale of our troops.

But consider this:

1) On civil war. Iraqis are already fighting Iraqis. Insurgents have killed far more Iraqis than Americans. That’s civil war. We created the civil war when we invaded; we can’t prevent a civil war by staying.

For those who really worry about destabilizing the region, the sensible policy is not to stay the course in Iraq. It is rapid withdrawal, re-establishing strong relations with our allies in Europe, showing confidence in the UN Security Council, and trying to knit together a large coalition including the major states of Europe, Japan, South Korea, China, and India to back a strategy for stabilizing the area from the eastern Mediterranean to Afghanistan and Pakistan. Until the United States withdraws from Iraq and admits its strategic error, no such coalition can be formed.

Thus those who fear leaving a mess are actually helping make things worse while preventing a new strategic approach with some promise of success.

2) On credibility. If we were Russia or some other insecure nation, we might have to worry about credibility. A hyperpower need not worry about credibility. That’s one of the great advantages of being a hyperpower: When we have made a big strategic mistake, we can reverse it. And it may even enhance our credibility. Staying there damages our credibility more than leaving.

Ask the president if he really worries about US credibility. Or, what will happen to our credibility if the course he is pursuing proves to be a major strategic disaster? Would it not be better for our long-term credibility to withdraw earlier than later in this event?

3) On the insurgency and democracy. There is no question the insurgents and other anti-American parties will take over the government once we leave. But that will happen no matter how long we stay. Any government capable of holding power in Iraq will be anti-American, because the Iraqi people are increasingly becoming anti-American.

Also, the U.S. will not leave behind a liberal, constitutional democracy in Iraq no matter how long it stays. Holding elections is easy. It is impossible to make it a constitutional democracy in a hurry.

President Bush’s statements about progress in Iraq are increasingly resembling LBJ's statements during the Vietnam War. For instance, Johnson’s comments about the 1968 election are very similar to what Bush said in February 2005 after the election of a provisional parliament.

Ask the president: Why should we expect a different outcome in Iraq than in Vietnam?

Ask the president if he intends to leave a pro-American liberal regime in place. Because that’s just impossible. Postwar Germany and Japan are not models for Iraq. Each had mature (at least a full generation old) constitutional orders by the end of the 19th century. They both endured as constitutional orders until the 1930s. Thus General Clay and General MacArthur were merely reversing a decade and a half totalitarianism -- returning to nearly a century of liberal political change in Japan and a much longer period in Germany.

Imposing a liberal constitutional order in Iraq would be to accomplish something that has never been done before. Of all the world's political cultures, an Arab-Muslim one may be the most resistant to such a change of any in the world. Even the Muslim society in Turkey (an anti-Arab society) stands out for being the only example of a constitutional order in an Islamic society, and even it backslides occasionally.

4) On terrorists. Iraq is already a training ground for terrorists. In fact, the CIA has pointed out to the administration and congress that Iraq is spawning so many terrorists that they are returning home to many other countries to further practice their skills there. The quicker a new dictator wins the political power in Iraq and imposes order, the sooner the country will stop producing well-experienced terrorists.

Why not ask: "Mr. President, since you and the vice president insisted that Saddam's Iraq supported al Qaeda -- which we now know it did not -- isn't your policy in Iraq today strengthening al Qaeda's position in that country?"

5) On Iranian influence. Iranian leaders see US policy in Iraq as being so much in Teheran's interests that they have been advising Iraqi Shiite leaders to do exactly what the Americans ask them to do. Elections will allow the Shiites to take power legally. Once in charge, they can settle scores with the Baathists and Sunnis. If US policy in Iraq begins to undercut Iran's interests, then Teheran can use its growing influence among Iraqi Shiites to stir up trouble, possibly committing Shiite militias to an insurgency against US forces there. The US invasion has vastly increased Iran's influence in Iraq, not sealed it out.

Questions for the administration: "Why do the Iranians support our presence in Iraq today? Why do they tell the Shiite leaders to avoid a sectarian clash between Sunnis and Shiites? Given all the money and weapons they provide Shiite groups, why are they not stirring up more trouble for the US? Will Iranian policy change once a Shiite majority has the reins of government? Would it not be better to pull out now rather than to continue our present course of weakening the Sunnis and Baathists, opening the way for a Shiite dictatorship?"

6) On Iraq’s neighbors. The civil war we leave behind may well draw in Syria, Turkey and Iran. But already today each of those states is deeply involved in support for or opposition to factions in the ongoing Iraqi civil war. The very act of invading Iraq almost insured that violence would involve the larger region. And so it has and will continue, with, or without, US forces in Iraq.

7) On Shiite-Sunni conflict. The US presence is not preventing Shiite-Sunni conflict; it merely delays it. Iran is preventing it today, and it will probably encourage it once the Shiites dominate the new government, an outcome US policy virtually ensures.

8) On training the Iraq military and police. The insurgents are fighting very effectively without US or European military advisors to train them. Why don't the soldiers and police in the present Iraqi regime's service do their duty as well? Because they are uncertain about committing their lives to this regime. They are being asked to take a political stand, just as the insurgents are. Political consolidation, not military-technical consolidation, is the issue.

The issue is not military training; it is institutional loyalty. We trained the Vietnamese military effectively. Its generals took power and proved to be lousy politicians and poor fighters in the final showdown. In many battles over a decade or more, South Vietnamese military units fought very well, defeating VC and NVA units. But South Vietnam's political leaders lost the war.

Even if we were able to successfully train an Iraqi military and police force, the likely result, after all that, would be another military dictatorship. Experience around the world teaches us that military dictatorships arise when the military’s institutional modernization gets ahead of political consolidation.

9) On not supporting our troops by debating an early pullout. Many US officers in Iraq, especially at company and field grade levels, know that while they are winning every tactical battle, they are losing strategically. And according to the New York Times last week, they are beginning to voice complaints about Americans at home bearing none of the pains of the war. One can only guess about the enlisted ranks, but those on a second tour – probably the majority today – are probably anxious for an early pullout. It is also noteworthy that US generals in Iraq are not bubbling over with optimistic reports they way they were during the first few years of the war in Vietnam. Their careful statements and caution probably reflect serious doubts that they do not, and should not, express publicly. The more important question is whether or not the repressive and vindictive behavior by the secretary of defense and his deputy against the senior military -- especially the Army leadership, which is the critical component in the war -- has made it impossible for field commanders to make the political leaders see the facts.

Most surprising to me is that no American political leader today has tried to unmask the absurdity of the administration's case that to question the strategic wisdom of the war is unpatriotic and a failure to support our troops. Most officers and probably most troops don't see it that way. They are angry at the deficiencies in materiel support they get from the Department of Defense, and especially about the irresponsibly long deployments they must now endure because Mr. Rumsfeld and his staff have refused to enlarge the ground forces to provide shorter tours. In the meantime, they know that the defense budget shovels money out the door to maritime forces, SDI, etc., while refusing to increase dramatically the size of the Army.

As I wrote several years ago, "the Pentagon's post-Cold War force structure is so maritime heavy and land force weak that it is firmly in charge of the porpoises and whales while leaving the land to tyrants." The Army, some of the Air Force, the National Guard, and the reserves are now the victims of this gross mismatch between military missions and force structure. Neither the Bush nor the Clinton administration has properly "supported the troops." The media could ask the president why he fails to support our troops by not firing his secretary of defense.

■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■
So why is almost nobody advocating a pullout? I can only speculate. We face a strange situation today where few if any voices among Democrats in Congress will mention early withdrawal from Iraq, and even the one or two who do will not make a comprehensive case for withdrawal now.Why are the Democrats failing the public on this issue today? The biggest reason is because they weren’t willing to raise that issue during the campaign. Howard Dean alone took a clear and consistent stand on Iraq, and the rest of the Democratic party trashed him for it. Most of those in Congress voted for the war and let that vote shackle them later on. Now they are scared to death that the White House will smear them with lack of patriotism if they suggest pulling out.
Journalists can ask all the questions they like but none will prompt a more serious debate as long as no political leaders create the context and force the issues into the open.

I don't believe anyone will be able to sustain a strong case in the short run without going back to the fundamental misjudgment of invading Iraq in the first place. Once the enormity of that error is grasped, the case for pulling out becomes easy to see.

Look at John Kerry's utterly absurd position during the presidential campaign. He said “It’s the wrong war, in the wrong place, at the wrong time," but then went on to explain how he expected to win it anyway. Even the voter with no interest in foreign affairs was able to recognize it as an absurdity. If it was the wrong war at the wrong place and time, then it was never in our interest to fight. If that is true, what has changed to make it in our interest? Nothing, absolutely nothing.

The US invasion of Iraq only serves the interest of:

1) Osama bin Laden (it made Iraq safe for al Qaeda, positioned US military personnel in places where al Qaeda operatives can kill them occasionally, helps radicalize youth throughout the Arab and Muslim world, alienates America's most important and strongest allies – the Europeans – and squanders US military resources that otherwise might be finishing off al Qaeda in Pakistan.);

2) The Iranians (who were invaded by Saddam and who suffered massive casualties in an eight year war with Iraq.);

3) And the extremists in both Palestinian and Israeli political circles (who don't really want a peace settlement without the utter destruction of the other side, and probably believe that bogging the United States down in a war in Iraq that will surely become a war between the United States and most of the rest of Arab world gives them the time and cover to wipe out the other side.)

The wisest course for journalists might be to begin sustained investigations of why leading Democrats have failed so miserably to challenge the US occupation of Iraq. The first step, of course, is to establish as conventional wisdom the fact that the war was never in the US interest and has not become so. It is such an obvious case to make that I find it difficult to believe many pundits and political leaders have not already made it repeatedly.


Lieutenant General William E. Odom, U.S. Army (Ret.), is a Senior Fellow with Hudson Institute and a professor at Yale University. He was Director of the National Security Agency from 1985 to 1988. From 1981 to 1985, he served as Assistant Chief of Staff for Intelligence, the Army's senior intelligence officer. From 1977 to 1981, he was Military Assistant to the President's Assistant for National Security Affairs, Zbigniew Brzezinski.

E-mail: diane@hudson.org

Thursday, October 27, 2005

Welecome Peace Vets

I would like to have us use this blog to keep in touch with each other and to let each other know about what is going on with the Peace Movement in Southcentral Alaska. Let me know what you think.

I can put a link on the home page of the website for Alaskans for Peace & Justice to this blog to get it wider visibility.

Jon Lockert, 250-4986