Pip Hinman
John Howard is a "fool" for supporting US President George Bush's war on Iraq, the courageous and outspoken anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan told a Mother's Day anti-war protest outside the White House on May 13-14. Sheehan was at the protest with other mothers whose sons and daughters were serving or had served in the US military in Iraq (some of whom had died), actor Susan Sarandon and labour movement leaders. The protest, organised by Code Pink, called for the troops stationed in Iraq to be brought home and took a stand against a US attack on Iran.
Sheehan will be one of the keynote speakers at the Unity for Peace conference being held in Melbourne on May 27, where she will be joining anti-war activists from around Australia. "I am going to be rallying the Australian people, who I know are overwhelmingly against George Bush and this war. Quit supporting my country and supporting crimes against humanity. You don't spread peace by killing people", Sheehan told Australian media at the Mother's Day protest.
"I don't want any more moms to grieve for a child lost in this unjust, unnecessary war in Iraq", Sheehan said.
Sheehan became a household name in the US last August, when she camped outside Bush's ranch in Crawford in Texas, demanding an audience with the US president. She wanted to ask Bush what "noble cause" her son, Casey, had died for, given that all the arguments for invading Iraq had been exposed as lies. Casey was killed in Baghdad in April 2004, only days after arriving in Iraq.
Sheehan told reporters she knew Australians are overwhelmingly against Bush and his war, and that she expected Australians would "work until they get those troops home". Sarandon, another high profile critic of the US war in Iraq, concurred. "Stop supporting Bush and the war crimes", was her message. "It's not working. No matter what you think their role is, it's not happening. So before you sacrifice anyone else you should pull out."
After three years of war and more than 2400 US soldiers and 100,000 Iraqis dead, it's not surprising that US opposition to the war is growing and Bush's approval ratings are plummeting. Six in 10 people now consider the war in Iraq a mistake. Furthermore, 72% of deployed US troops favour a full withdrawal of troops before the end of 2006, according to a February Zogby poll.
A New York Times/CBS poll published on May 9 showed just 31% approved of Bush's overall performance, the third-lowest approval rating of any president in 50 years. (In July 1992, Bush snr was at the same level and four months later he was beaten by Bill Clinton in a presidential election.)
The same poll showed that just 39% of US people thought invading Iraq had been the right thing to do, down from 47% in January; two-thirds had "little" or "no" confidence in Bush successfully ending the war. Even the shady White House operative Karl Rove admitted on May 15: "We're in a sour time ... Being in the middle of a war where people turn on their television sets and see brave men and women dying is not something that makes people happy and optimistic and upbeat."
While media reports on the reality of "liberated" Iraq have helped generate anti-war feeling, if not for the efforts of determined activists like Sheehan, the US movement against the war would not be as strong as it is today.
On April 29, some 350,000 people from across the United States protested in New York, demanding an end to the war in Iraq and opposing any attack on Iran, and in support of immigrants' rights. The protest was organised by United for Peace and Justice.
One of the largest contingents was organised by trade union activists. Some say it was the largest anti-war labour contingent in US history. Bill Henning, vice president of Local 1180 of the Communication Workers of America told the rally, "We used to hear after Vietnam, if only they had let the military fight the whole way, we could have won that war. But now people are saying with Iraq, this is a war that we don't even deserve to win. We made a mistake ... It's destroying the infrastructure here and in Iraq, and we should not fight it any more."
Sheehan speaks for many of the families of troops who have been, or are currently, in Iraq. Her organisation, Gold Star Families for Peace, works with other anti-war groups such as Bring Them Home Now, Iraq Veterans Against the War and Veterans for Peace.
Sheehan's bravery, wrongly portrayed as "one mother's stand", has been a lightening rod galvanising US public opinion against the war. Camp Casey helped rally the US anti-war movement when many activists felt demoralised after Bush's 2004 re-election. Australian activists are hoping that Sheehan's visit will help transform existing widespread anti-war opinion here into greater political action.
Sheehan has no doubt about what can stop the war in Iraq and prevent a new one in Iran. As she said last September during one of her post-Camp Casey tours: "One thing the Camp Casey movement that hunkered down in Crawford, Texas, this past August taught us is that we, the people of America, have the power, and we can and should name our national policy and make sure it is carried out.
"I constantly get asked if we are making a difference and if we think (like we're naive boobs) that we will actually stop the war. Well, looking back at how Vietnam was ended and looking back in the history of our country, most notably in the suffragette, union, and civil rights movements, we the people are the only ones who have been able to transform history and affect true and lasting change here in America. So to those people who question if we are making a difference: I tell them to go back to school and read their history books!"
[For more information about the Unity for Peace Conference, visit <http://www.vicpeace.org/unityforpeace>. Pip Hinman is a co-convener of Sydney's Stop the War Coalition.]
From Green Left Weekly, May 24, 2006.
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