>So what needs to be done is to find something where we could
>succeed. Now the billion dollar question: what would that be?
The Institute for Policy Studies spearheaded a campaign called "Cities for Peace" <http://www.ips-dc.org/citiesforpeace/resolutions.htm> before the invasion began. Activists did the same with student governments on college campuses (including the Ohio State University) <http://www.ips-dc.org/citiesforpeace/studentresolutions.htm> and trade unions <http://uslaboragainstwar.org/article.php?list=type&type=51>. Judging by the number of cities, student governments, and trade unions that passed resolutions against the Iraq War, you can probably call the campaigns successful on their own terms.
Labor activists who organized to have their unions pass anti-war resolutions created a national organization called US Labor Against the War <http://uslaboragainstwar.org>, a step forward from what labor activists could do during the Vietnam War.
According to Military Families Speak Out, their "membership currently includes over 2,000 military families, with new families joining daily" (at <http://www.mfso.org/>). That is a historically unprecedented success.
In addition to established activist veterans' organizations such as Veterans for Peace, Vietnam Veterans Against the War, etc., there is a group of anti-war Iraq veterans: Iraq Veterans Against the War, <http://ivaw.net/>. After the March 19th demonstration, IVAW had its national meeting on the 20th in Fayetteville, NC. IVAW's formation came sooner in the course of the Iraq War than VVAW's during the Vietnam War (VVAW was not founded until 1967).
We have many strengths on which we can build, some of which the anti-war movement did not have during the Vietnam War era.
We also have a strength that is a legacy of the movement against the Vietnam War: the power elite's fear of political costs of the draft. The power elite are afraid of backlashes against the draft, so they have hesitated to reinstate it, but they have NO recent experience using a volunteer military in a long and brutal counter-insurgency war, and it is not clear if they can. The stop-loss policy and other administrative changes -- signs that true volunteers alone do not suffice for a deadly and protracted colonial war -- turned many volunteers into reluctant volunteers, which should fuel the growth of MFSO, IVAW, and like organizations.
Best of all, military recruitment has been falling, despite increases in recruiters, sign-up bonuses, death benefits, etc.: "The Army National Guard fell '30 percent below recruiting goals' at the end of last year.4 Black volunteers for the Army have fallen 41 % (from 22.7% to 13.9%) since 2000.5" (<http://montages.blogspot.com/2005/03/iraq-war-fact-sheet.html>). See, also, Monica Davey, "Un-Volunteering: Troops Improvise to Find Way Out" (<em>New York Times</em>, <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/18/national/18soldiers.html">March 18, 2005</a>); and Ann Scott Tyson, "Two Years Later, Iraq War Drains Military" (<em>Washington Post</em>, <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A48306-2005Mar18.html">March 19, 2005</a>, p. A1).
Activists should emphasize, "No Troops, No Wars," highlighting declines in recruitment and reenlistment, calling attention to the costs of the war (in terms of lives lost, bodies and minds damaged, money wasted), protecting soldiers who refuse to follow orders or go back to Iraq, and supporting working-class youths who say No to military recruitment. MFSO, IVAW, and other organizations' campaign to question the use of the National Guard -- i.e., citizen soldiers -- in Iraq is very promising. As I said, it already succeeded in passing useful resolutions in Vermont <http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/pipermail/lbo-talk/Week-of-Mon-20050228/004425.html>, and the campaign will spread to other states. -- Yoshie
* Critical Montages: <http://montages.blogspot.com/> * Greens for Nader: <http://greensfornader.net/> * Bring Them Home Now! <http://www.bringthemhomenow.org/> * OSU-GESO: <http://www.osu-geso.org/> * Calendars of Events in Columbus: <http://sif.org.ohio-state.edu/calendar.html>, <http://www.freepress.org/calendar.php>, & <http://www.cpanews.org/> * Student International Forum: <http://sif.org.ohio-state.edu/> * Committee for Justice in Palestine: <http://www.osudivest.org/> * Al-Awda-Ohio: <http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Al-Awda-Ohio> * Solidarity: <http://www.solidarity-us.org/>