January 8, 2005
Flex your Political Muscle
by Susan Galleymore
[This essay will appear in CodePink's forthcoming book, How to Stop the Next War Now]
Military moms, dads, spouses, grandparents, and siblings are learning to flex our political muscle. We invite you to join us.
When we gathered in the streets to protest preemptive war our president said, "I don't listen to focus groups." And we went home.
When our loved ones were deployed to Afghanistan to seek Osama bin Laden and to Iraq to seek Weapons of Mass Destruction, we watched events on television: the chaos in Kabul, the terror in Tora Bora, and the bombing of Baghdad. Our president announced, "Mission Accomplished." And we stayed home.
When our president told us, "Our brave men and women in uniform are sharing the gifts of freedom and democracy to those who don't understand liberty…but we'll teach 'em," we watched our military bomb Fallujah…and Karbala…and Najaf… and Samarra …and Ramadi…and Sadr City. And we saw Iraqis resist our gifts of liberty.
When our dead soldiers were brought to Dover Air Force Base under cover of dark our president said, "It's disrespectful to the families of the dead to show flag-draped coffins." And, we nodded and thanked god the next dead soldier wasn't our child.
Then, suddenly, it was our child, or our child's friend, or our friend's child. Then a few of us responded, "Wait a minute. What about the dead children of Kabul, and Tora Bora, and Baghdad, and Fallujah, and Karbala, and Najaf, and Samarra, and Ramadi, and Sadr City? Our sons and daughters are supposed to liberate their sons and daughters, not kill them."
Then we learned that military recruiters lie to our idealistic high school students to persuade them to enlist. We learned that, despite our president's promises to allocate funds to train, feed, clothe, and raise the pay of our soldiers, many of our soldiers are not adequately trained and don't have wholesome food or water, or protective armor, and their pay has been reduced. We learned that the Department of Defense misrepresents the numbers of Americans killed and wounded …and never mentions the numbers of civilians killed and wounded. We learned that our mainstream media parrots the rhetoric of fear our president uses to coerce us into silence.
But we will not be silent anymore.
Now we follow military recruiters into high schools and counter their lies.
Now we speak out about the exploitation of our troops, their lack of adequate training, food, uniforms, and armor.
Now we invite the media to join us as we retrieve the flag-draped remains of our loved ones from the military. And we assure other Americans that it is not disrespectful to our families to share our grief.
Now we tell fellow Americans that our president and our military glosses over the Geneva Conventions and implies it's okay to abuse civilians; that our loved ones face mortal danger protecting corporate contractors on their mission to privatize Iraq's industries; that our military dispenses anti-depressants to our troops to dull their misgivings about killing in Baghdad…and Fallujah…and Karbala…and Najaf…and Samarra…and Ramadi…and Sadr City. Now we tell fellow Americans that The War on Terror is making all of us less safe at home and more reviled around the world.
And we have more to do.
Let's bring home the 165,000 troops from military bases in Afghanistan and Iraq. But let's not stop there. Let's bring home our troops from Camp Bondsteel and Camp Monteith in Kosovo, from Camp Sarafovo in Bulgaria, from Camp Doha in Kuwait, from Camp Andy in Qatar, and from the over 38 bases on Okinawa and over 100 bases in South Korea. Let's bring home the half a million troops from the network of over 725 other US military bases around the world. Let's refuse to support these bases and the social and cultural displacement of civilians forced to participate in the bars and brothels surrounding them and the drunkenness, drugs, and violence that accompany them.
Let's funnel the billions of dollars currently spent on these bases toward the education, health, and well being of fellow Americans. But first let us fully fund the healing of our wounded soldiers, our toxic chemical contaminated soldiers, and our psychologically traumatized soldiers. Let us fully fund the housing of our homeless soldiers and the generative futures of the widows and orphans of our dead soldiers.
Let's levy an excess profit tax on corporations and individuals reaping huge profits from war and occupation. Let's spend these millions on reparations to Afghans and Iraqis for the destruction we've wreaked on their homelands.
Let's not stop there. Let's immediately halt the manufacture and use of depleted uranium munitions, cluster bombs, fuel air bombs, land mines, and nuclear bunker busting bombs. And let's stop selling and donating these weapons to governments around the world.
Military families are learning to do these things. Join us. Together, we can realize our power, flex our political muscle, and create a truly democratic world.
© Susan Galleymore is a military mom, writer/producer, and founder of MotherSpeak, an organization that fosters cultural awareness by sharing the stories of those affected by war and terror (www.motherspeak.org).