Family members of soldiers now in Iraq have become a central pillar of the US movement against war and occupation. Military families and veterans groups mobilised for a protest on March 20 in Fayetteville, North Carolina, the home of Fort Bragg.
Susan Shuman is a member of Military Families Speak Out (MFSO). Her son, staff sergeant Justin Shuman, was deployed to Iraq from Fort Bragg a year ago this month. Susan was interviewed by Wayne Stanley, for the US Socialist Worker newspaper, about the struggle to bring US troops home now.
You were one of the spokespersons for the launching of the Bring Them Home Now campaign. Could you explain how that came about?
In late May, the president announced that the war was over and that "the world was a more peaceful place". At the same time, I was receiving emails from my son, who said "the US just doesn't understand. There are 30-40 major incidents a day, wherever there are Americans." It was clear that the war was not over, and in the following weeks, the news made it clear that Bush and Rumsfeld had mired the troops in a quagmire of an urban guerrilla war.
In July, after Bush's inane and reckless "Bring 'em on" challenge to armed Iraqis resisting the occupation, it was time to tell the truth. MFSO joined with Veterans for Peace and other veterans' organisations to launch the campaign. As military families and veterans, we could have a special, credible voice to challenge the administration's lies.
The response to our press conference at the National Press Club in Washington on August 14, followed by another press conference in Fayetteville, was remarkable. In 24 hours, MFSO received 6,000 emails from military families and soldiers — some vicious — but mostly thanking us for speaking out. By September, MFSO had grown from a couple of hundred families to a couple thousand.
We heard from many wives and families of soldiers who asked to remain anonymous, having been told they would jeopardize the careers of their loved ones, but saying, as one woman did as she wept in my arms, "Thank you for speaking out for me. My husband says MFSO.org is his lifeline."
Within the anti-war movement, there has been a debate about the slogan "Bring them home now!". What are your thoughts on this?
It was wrong to go to war in Iraq, and it's wrong to stay. When I told Justin about our campaign, his first response was that we had to stay to clean up the mess we made. But the mess we made won't be solved by military occupation, only exacerbated.
The reconstruction of Iraq is a job that requires skills and expertise of civilian non-government organisations. Our soldiers don't have those skills. Most of the GIs have never been overseas, never encountered another culture, another language.
We have certainly witnessed the consequences of their inability to understand what is happening around them in the past months with the killing of so many Iraqi civilians through simple misunderstanding of cultural cues. There will be no stability in Iraq as long as it is an occupied nation.
The administration's policy of unilateral control of oil and water resources in the Middle East is clear. The war on terrorism is a masquerade for the selfish, narrow financial interests of the Bush oligarchy.
Why do you think the anti-war movement caught on among soldiers and their families so quickly?
More than 60% of the infantry troops in Iraq are National Guard and reserves. These are citizen soldiers, not full-time military personnel. While aware that they run the risk of being called to active duty, it is at great personal sacrifice to them and their families (who also have no benefits accorded to regular military).
At the same time, we hear Bush tell us that we will be engaged in endless war. I think people are smart, and when they are asked to put on uniforms without just cause, they protest.
What repercussions have GIs and their families faced for speaking out against the war?
There is a lot of pressure to keep your mouth shut. Soldiers are told to keep their political opinions to themselves. Some have been threatened with court martial.
MFSO has heard from a lot of soldiers asking about their rights to speak out. The GI Rights Hotline is very helpful. My son has been harassed a couple of times by other soldiers for my outspoken position on the war, but he defends my right to speak out, saying, "My job as a soldier is to defend the Constitution, and that means the right to political expression."
[A full version of this article is available at <http://www.socialistworker.org>.]
From Green Left Weekly, March 24, 2004.
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