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Protesters Hit Streets Worldwide
LET THERE BE PEACE ON EARTH
AND LET IT BEGIN WITH ME.
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SOLDIERS' FAMILIES HELD ANTI-WAR RALLY
On 2nd Anniversary Of America's Invasion Of Iraq.
Groups such as Iraq Veterans Against The War
and Gold Star Families for Peace,
whose members have lost relatives in Iraq,
played a prominent role.
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WHERE MANY WAR PROTEST TOOK PLACE:
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Posted on Sat, Mar. 19, 2005
North Carolina Mmilitary Town Draws Anti-War Rally
BY DAHLEEN GLANTON -- Chicago Tribune.
FAYETTEVILLE, N.C. - (KRT)
Two years ago this weekend, Michael Hoffman, then a U.S. Marine, was marching across the border of Kuwait as the war in Iraq began. On Saturday, he marched through the streets of this military town with other veterans, military family members and anti-war activists protesting the invasion he now believes was wrong.
On the second anniversary of the war's start, thousands of people across the country voiced their opposition in a carefully orchestrated movement designed to place pressure on the military and get attention from Washington. More than 700 marches, rallies, peace vigils and protests were held in communities from California to Illinois to New York, twice the number as last year, according to national organizers.
The demonstrations come as national anti-war efforts try to regain footing after the re-election of President Bush. While protesters found a platform during the national political conventions last summer and the presidential campaign, these efforts have struggled to gain the spotlight since November.
That is partly why one of the biggest events was held in Fayetteville, home of Ft. Bragg Army base, the Army Special Operations Command and the 82nd Airborne Division, now on its second tour of duty in Iraq. Thousands of people gathered in a city park Saturday for the largest anti-war rally in Fayetteville since Jane Fonda appeared here in a protest during the Vietnam War. Events in Fayetteville began Friday.
There were also numerous demonstrations supporting the troops this weekend.
For protesters such as Hoffman, marking the anniversary is personal.
"I was part of that shock and awe. I didn't have to watch it on TV because it was right in front of my eyes," said Hoffman, 25, a former lance corporal who spent two months in Iraq with the 1st Marine Division out of Camp Pendleton, Calif. "While I was there, I also saw a lot of American casualties and a lot of Iraqi civilians and military laying dead on the side of the road. I saw towns destroyed. I helped do that, and it disturbed me deeply."
Following his discharge, Hoffman returned to his home in Philadelphia and began organizing a group of veterans, who like himself, served in the war because it was their duty but increasingly believed it was unjustified.
Last year he co-founded Iraq Veterans Against the War, which has about 150 members, including active duty and recently discharged troops. The group will hold its first national meeting in Fayetteville on Sunday.
The participation this year of Iraq Veterans Against the War and family groups, such as Military Families Speak Out and Gold Star Families for Peace, shows that the Fayetteville rally, which grew from a one-day event last year, has growing appeal, said Bill Dobbs, spokesman for United for Peace and Justice, a New York-based coalition of peace and anti-war groups.
"In 2003, people were criticizing us as being unpatriotic, even traitors, but as time went on people saw that the rationale for the war was an exaggeration or false. Now we have a broad movement that is charging farther than it ever has to end this senseless and futile war," Dobbs said.
While the White House did not comment on the planned protests, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld in Washington on Friday praised the troops in Iraq and their families and pointed to what he described as that country's improved economy as proof that progress is being made.
Wearing an "America Supports You" pin on his lapel, Rumsfeld said hundreds of people across America are participating in activities that show support for the troops.
A nationwide poll by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press conducted in February found that 54 percent of Americans believe things are going at least fairly well in Iraq, mostly as a result of elections in late January.
But Dobbs said the protests also will focus on the rising human and financial costs of the war. According to The Associated Press, 1,519 members of the U.S. military have died since the American-led invasion began on March 20, 2003.
A demonstration in support of the war also took place in Fayetteville this weekend in the same park as the war protest.
"They're not holding an anti-war protest, it's an anti-American protest," said Kristinn Taylor, spokesman for FreeRepublic.com, a conservative news and activism Web site. "They are trying to undermine the morale of the troops and their families."
Organizers have accused outsiders of coming in and stirring up the emotions of troops and their families.
But Lou Plummer, 40, co-founder of Fayetteville Peace with Justice, said he and Chuck Fager, director of the Quaker House of Fayetteville, invited national peace groups to Fayetteville to give people in the community a chance to speak out.
Plummer, a former National Guard member whose father fought in the Vietnam War and whose grandfather fought in World War II, said the rally was called by people in North Carolina and is not an "invasion force from New York City."
"The thing about protesting in a small town is that we know the police and we know the counterdemonstrators because we went to high school with them and we live in the same neighborhoods," Plummer said. "We talk and we all want the same thing, that the soldiers come home alive and be taken care of by the military when they get here."
Events Friday in Fayetteville attracted well-known activists such as Lila Lipscomb, who appeared in Michael Moore's film "Fahrenheit 9/11" and founded Gold Star Families for Peace after her son, Army Sgt. Michael Pederson, was killed in Iraq. Michael Berg, the father of Nick Berg, a private contractor killed in Iraq, and David Couso, the brother of Spanish TV cameraman Jose Couso, who was killed in a U.S. tank attack on the Hotel Palestine in Baghdad, also attended. So did local people.
Kara Hollingsworth is not a typical peace activist. She lives on base at Ft. Bragg. Her husband, a specialist in the 18th Airborne Corps, is serving his second tour of duty in Iraq. And just about everyone she knows in Fayetteville is associated with the military.
Yet, as a member of Military Families Speak Out, she has traveled around the country talking about the need for open discussions about the war.
"Fayetteville is the appropriate place for this because I don't want people to believe if they ask a question or speak out that they are disrespecting people like my husband," said Hollingsworth, 25. "This is not an anti-military message."
Still, Hollingsworth said there are plenty of people in this pro-military town with more than 20,000 troops who disagree with her, and sometimes that is frightening.
"I'm extremely scared," said Hollingsworth, adding that she has her husband's support. "It's important to me that the people in my husband's unit understand what I am doing and that what I am saying is not disrespectful of them. I really care about that."
© 2005, Chicago Tribune.
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ANTIWAR PROTESTERS HIT STREETS WORLDWIDE:
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LIST OF WHERE SOME PROTEST WERE HELD.