[Peace-discuss] Recruiting news

[Barbara kessel]

 Recruiting For Iraq War Undercut in Puerto Rico
    By Paul Lewis
    The Washington Post

    Saturday 18 August 2007

    San Juan, Puerto Rico - The political activists, brown envelopes
tucked under their arms, staked out the high school gates just after
sunrise. When students emerged from the graffiti-scorched streets of
the Rio Piedra neighborhood here and began streaming toward their
school, the pro-independence advocates ripped open the envelopes and
began handing the teens fliers emblazoned with the slogan: "Our youth
should not go to war."

    At the bottom of the leaflet was a tear sheet that students could
sign and later hand to teachers, to request that students' personal
contact information not be released to the U.S. Defense Department or
to anyone involved in military recruiting.

    The scene outside the Ramon Vila Mayo high school unfolded at
schools throughout Puerto Rico this week as the academic year opened.
On this island with a long tradition of military service,
pro-independence advocates are tapping the territory's growing
anti-Iraq war sentiment to revitalize their cause. As a result, 57
percent of Puerto Rico's 10th-, 11th- and 12th-graders, or their
parents, have signed forms over the past year withholding contact
information from the Pentagon - effectively barring U.S. recruiters
from reaching out to an estimated 65,000 high school students.

    "If the death of a Puerto Rican soldier is tragic, it's more
tragic if that soldier has no say in that war," said Juan Dalmau,
secretary general of the Puerto Rican Independence Party (PIP). His
efforts are saving the island's children from becoming "colonial
cannon meat," he said.

    Under the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001, all schools receiving
U.S. federal funding must provide their students' names, addresses and
phone numbers to the military unless the child or parents sign an
opt-out form. Puerto Rico received $1.88 billion in U.S. education
funds this year. For five years, PIP has issued opt-out forms to about
120,000 students in Puerto Rico and encouraged them to sign - and
independista activists expect this year to mark their most successful
effort yet.

    Such actions come as other antiwar groups on the island are
seeking to undercut military recruiting, as well. For example, the
Coalition of Citizens Against Militarism, an association of pacifist
groups, plans to visit about 70 schools on the island in the coming
days, meaning that many students will receive two, or even three,
opt-out forms by the end of August.

    Antiwar advocates have even gained direct access to Puerto Rican
classrooms under a controversial directive issued last September by
Rafael Aragunde, the island's education secretary, granting "equal
access" by pacifist groups and military recruiters.

    Although he will not bar recruiters from schools, Aragunde said,
he has a "lot of sympathy" for what pacifist groups are trying to
accomplish. "I've always felt that one of the byproducts of a good
educational system is that you have citizens who will defend
pacifism," he said. "I think that just like we have to insist on
ecological values, we have to insist on pacifist values." Aragunde
described his relations with military recruiters as "cordial."

    Bill Carr, deputy undersecretary of defense for military personnel
policy, acknowledged that the counter-recruiting campaigns are having
an impact. "We're drawing less than the national average" in Puerto
Rico, he said.

    In the 2003-06 period, 4,947 Puerto Rican men and women enlisted
in the Army or Reserves, or approximately 123 people per 100,000
residents, according to Pentagon data. That is below the average
contribution of U.S. states, and far below the numbers in states such
as Alabama, Kansas, Montana and Oklahoma, each of which enlists more
than 200 men and women per 100,000, according to Army data.

    "We're not taking more than our share from Puerto Rico," Carr
said. "We're taking less than our share, because that's what they'll
give us." Carr said he suspects that opt-out rates for states in the
continental United States rarely break beyond 10 percent - a far cry
from the nearly 60 percent on the island.

    Reaction outside the gates of the Ramon Vila Mayo school this week
seem to confirm that suspicion. A few students shrugged off the
political activists' overtures, while others smiled and declared their
interest in joining the "Yankee" military. But most of the teens
politely accepted the forms, nodded and even fetched pens from their
school bags.

    Calls for Puerto Rico's independence have existed since the days
of Spanish colonial rule and continued after the United States seized
control of the island in 1898. In the 1950s, a branch of the movement
attempted a violent uprising. Although many Puerto Ricans express deep
patriotism for the island, the independence impulse has never
translated in the polls - either in elections or in successive
plebiscites on the status of the territory, in which independence has
repeatedly been rejected.

    Leaders from the island's two major political parties say that
their PIP opponents are exploiting young people to advance their
separatist grievances. And Pentagon officials accuse the activists of
"manipulating" impressionable young people.

    "What's going on in Puerto Rico is an artificial circumstance,
where a group is trying to persuade students to take their name off a
list, and of course that's going to meet in some change in behavior,"
Carr said. "In the event that someone approaches a young person and
their voluntary behavior is to take an opt-out card and give it to
their teacher, there's nothing we can or should do in that case.
That's free speech. But it's curious speech, because it's manipulating
the flow of information . . . and that is unhealthy."

    The Pentagon said it is on track to meet its recruiting targets
for this fiscal year. However, despite a $3.2 billion national
recruitment campaign, the military was forced to bring back 1,000
former recruiters to help with the summer months - the peak recruiting
period - and late last month introduced a $20,000 "quick-ship" bonus
for recruits willing to enter training before October. Carr said that
Puerto Rico's anti-military drive could force recruiters to focus on
states such as Texas, where they meet with less resistance.