[Peace-discuss] A counter balance of hope to the previous article I posted

[David Johnson]

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The U.S. Is Bombing at Least Six Countries. How Can the Anti-War Movement
Step Up?

A discussion of the future of the peace movement.

October 5, 2017 | October Issue

  _____  

 <http://inthesetimes.com/community/profile/322171> Phyllis Bennis

Time for the Anti-War Movement to Throw Down for Racial and Economic Justice

Why peace activists must look beyond our own movement.

 
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When the United States threatened to bomb Syria in 2013, an outpouring of
public opposition helped stop the Obama administration from launching a new
air war.

But this success also transformed existing disagreement over the conflict
among anti-war organizers into bitter debates. Activists disputed the nature
of the Assad regime and Syria’s domestic opposition forces; they diverged on
what to do about ISIS, the neighboring countries and their militia proxies,
and intervention by global powers. The intense intra-movement battle
involved only a small cohort of people, largely on social media. But, while
both sides agreed on many things, the feud derailed the rise of a unified
and internationalist anti-war movement—a movement that would focus on ending
the Syrian wars, rather than urging victory for a preferred side.

Of course, the movement’s mission extends beyond Syria. Anyone monitoring
U.S. wars today is whipsawed as military crises—along with U.S. drones,
bombers, troops, weapons and more—bounce from continent to continent, target
to target. Iraq to Syria, North Korea to Yemen, Iran to Afghanistan, the
Philippines to Somalia. Ending those lethal wars demands our urgent
attention even as Charlottesville, Flint and Standing Rock continue to claim
our time, commitment and passion.

An independent anti-war movement, especially a divided one, cannot take this
on alone. Challenging the wars abroad, while at the same time addressing
domestic crises, requires that we focus on building a larger, broader
people’s movement in which the struggle against war and militarism is
inextricably linked to the fight against racism, for equality, for the Earth
and for justice.

During the George W. Bush years, the movement achieved significant
victories, most notably the Feb. 15, 2003, global mobilization against the
Iraq War. This may not have prevented the U.S. invasion, but it created a
model for what a truly international protest could look like, helped keep
Bush from attacking Iran and later helped inspire the 2011 overthrow of
Hosni Mubarak in Egypt.

When Barack Obama was elected, some activists believed that with a
supposedly anti-war president, they could move on. In addition, the economic
crisis meant that many more people faced newly desperate circumstances,
necessitating a greater focus on urgent domestic issues, including housing,
jobs and healthcare.

The movement strategized on how to respond. Should we focus on rebuilding an
independent movement? Or prioritize building an anti-war component into
other progressive movements? Supporters of the first idea won the debate,
and produced some powerful short-term mobilizations. But subsequent
movement-building efforts failed to sufficiently respond to the new
political conditions. People of color and (excepting veterans) younger
people were still underrepresented, and the movement still failed to
sufficiently link militarism to the economic and racial justice campaigns on
which younger activists had cut their political teeth.

This is why we must build on the vision of Martin Luther King Jr., who, in
his 1967 “Beyond Vietnam” speech, called for a unified movement against “the
giant triplets of racism, extreme materialism and militarism”—adding, as Dr.
King surely would have, protection of the planet.

Yet, we still must figure out the dynamics of particular conflicts to
determine how—and convince others why—to end specific wars. Today’s wars are
vastly more complex than U.S. interventions during the Cold War. In those
years, many activists supported “the other side”—the National Liberation
Front in Vietnam, the African National Congress in South Africa, the
Sandinistas and the FMLN in Central America. It’s more  difficult to ground
our movements in international solidarity when “the other side” is composed
of fighters we don’t support, who hold anti-democratic, extremist religious,
misogynist or other reactionary views. We still have progressive
counterparts—the Iraqi oil workers union, some Syrian opposition activists
and more—but they’re not the ones engaged on the battlefield. 

Here, we can learn from the strong anti-war movement following the 9/11
attacks. The two big coalitions—United for Peace and Justice (UFPJ) and
ANSWER—divided over organizing strategy and whether to criticize the Saddam
Hussein government. The broader of the two, UFPJ—powerfully anti-war but
willing to criticize Hussein—grew far more influential, partly because its
more nuanced position encouraged engaging a wider range of domestic and
international organizations.

Today, we must ensure that opposing U.S. intervention in Syria does not
blind us to Bashar al-Assad’s legacy of torture and collaboration with other
U.S. wars, just as we have to acknowledge that however progressive and
indeed heroic the original protest movement of Syria’s Arab Spring, the
majority of those now engaged in armed anti-regime fighting are not those
progressive heroes. While activists facing brutal repression in Syria or
Libya or elsewhere may call for U.S. intervention, we must not uncritically
accept that call. 

Similarly, we have to recognize that Washington’s continued violation of the
Non-Proliferation Treaty, requiring it to move toward full nuclear
disarmament, is a major reason North Korea is so determined to produce
nuclear weapons of its own. At the same time, we must insist that Kim
Jong-Un’s threats are unacceptable.

To strengthen all our movements, we must also understand that militarism is
a key cause of domestic crises: Military spending strips funds from the
social safety net; excess Pentagon equipment sent to local police
departments militarizes our communities; Islamophobia rises in response to
wars abroad; militarism’s outsized carbon footprint threatens us all. The
Movement for Black Lives, the new Poor People’s Campaign, various
environmental and economic justice organizations, and many others already
recognize this. 

We in the anti-war movement must do better in getting accessible information
and analysis—on the human, environmental and economic costs of war and
militarism, and the integral links between war and racism—into the hands of
today’s resistance. 

 <http://inthesetimes.com/community/profile/322171> Vijay Prashad

We Must Find Common Ground Without Giving In to Liberal Interventionists

An effective anti-war movement's first priority must be stopping U.S.
imperialism.

 
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Phyllis writes with characteristic sense and sensitivity about the dilemmas
of the U.S. anti-war movement. She is right that the current conjuncture is
quite different than that of the Cold War. Then, there was a clearer sense
of international solidarity—in the U.S. wars and coups of that period, the
U.S. Left could find progressive allies. No such easy solidarity is possible
today. Comparing the two eras, there is a wide gulf between Algeria’s FLN
and al-Qaeda, between El Salvador’s FMLN and Mexican drug gangs. A great
deal of confusion reigns.

As Phyllis notes, the Western Left tore itself apart over Syria. One section
sees the Assad government as the enemy, while another sees that government
as the victim of imperialist attack. But the vast bulk of Western leftists
fall between these two poles, in part because they do not know how to
understand the Syrian war. The imperialist media has confounded judgment,
offering a theory of humanitarian intervention that clouds over previous
certainty about the wrongness of imperialist wars of aggression. It is this
bewilderment and insecurity that has led to fratricidal debates.

We saw evidence of the American anti-war movement’s weakness at the Women’s
March, where few anti-war positions took center stage. There have been
marches against the Muslim Ban and for science, but no comparable march
against U.S. bombings in Syria and Iraq, U.S. arms delivery to Saudi Arabia
for its brutal war on Yemen, and U.S. escalation in Afghanistan. The liberal
wing of the resistance to Trump is simply disoriented when it comes to war,
having been associated with the Democratic Party’s wars during the Obama
years. It has surrendered to liberal interventionism and the war machine.

If a serious anti-war movement is to be part of the new resistance to Trump,
it would have to come from the Left. But this is not possible given that
this Left is not only weak but fractured. The divides are old—the American
Left has been arguing about Cuba, for instance, since 1959, and some
continue to believe the country’s government is a state capitalist system
that should be removed. Infighting has prevented the American Left from
uniting around a clear anti-imperialist platform—one that centers the
violence wrought by the U.S. government.

But there ought to be agreement on some core issues that could unite the
Left and rejuvenate the anti-war movement:

• Reduction of the military budget.

• Freeze on U.S. arms sales to Saudi Arabia and Israel.

• Reduction of the U.S. military footprint through bases and naval
expansion.

• Call for an investigation of civilian casualties by U.S. bombings and
U.S.-backed militias from Afghanistan to Syria.

• End to the CIA secret arming of reactionary forces across the Third World.

• Call for the conversion of military industrialism into a peace economy not
rooted in arms sales.

Such a concrete platform would find broad agreement across the American
Left. Unity in action should be possible if we are able to set aside—for
now—the debates around Syria and Venezuela. The American Left, weak beyond
measure, can be strengthened by taking a strong class position against the
warfare state—one that not only itches to sell arms and bomb countries
abroad, but then turns these same weapons on its own people.

 <http://inthesetimes.com/community/profile/322171> Ali Issa

The U.S. Anti-War Movement Must Reject a U.S.-Centric View of the World

We don't have to choose between U.S. empire and regional
dictatorships—activists on the ground are fighting for a better alternative.

 
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Phyllis and Vijay’s reflections on how to rebuild the U.S. anti-war movement
couldn’t come at a better time. In the wake of Trump’s recent announcement
that he plans to send more troops to Afghanistan, and his escalation of U.S.
bombings in several other countries, one wonders: Is there an anti-war
movement at all?

Phyllis and Vijay rightly perceive a lack of large-scale political work
against U.S. militarism. Both point to debates around Syria and other
conflicts, and suggest areas of common ground. Engaging these debates is
essential.

But I would like to offer another reason for the movement’s absence: Many in
the anti-war Left fall prey to an inverted form of U.S. exceptionalism, in
which U.S.-caused harm is so central to our messaging, analysis and strategy
that little room remains for the agency of people in other parts of the
world, or the solutions they could offer.

Growing up in an Iraqi-American household in the 1990s—a period when
military attacks and crippling sanctions on Iraq provided frequent reminders
of U.S. cruelty—I’ve long been aware of the harmful role the United States
plays in the world. It wasn’t until 2014, however, that I discovered the
work that Iraqi organizations on the ground were doing to respond to the
skyrocketing number of birth defects linked to radiation from U.S. munitions
in the northern town of Hawija. I spoke to local leaders over Skype, and
learned how, through fundraising, lobbying the Iraqi government and building
global awareness, they were able to open a needed treatment clinic. They
were also organizing against both right-wing movements linked to ISIS and
anti-woman laws backed by the neighboring government of Iran. This helped me
understand that, while the liberation Iraqis were working toward depended on
what we did here in the United States, we were also completing a much
broader picture together—one that involves building alternatives that could
someday replace U.S. (and regional) hegemonies. This understanding honestly
changed my life.

Going forward, deepening our internationalist engagements is necessary in
opposing U.S.—indeed all—militarism. Though it takes effort, grounding
strategic campaigns in the lived experience of those on the front lines
provides the accountability and inspiration we need. The Grassroots Global
Justice Alliance (GGJ), in its opposition to U.S. support of repression
abroad, highlights the legacy of Berta Cáceres, a remarkable indigenous
leader assassinated in the fallout from the U.S.-backed coup in Honduras
eight years ago. GGJ has educated people in the United States on the
Honduran indigenous land-protector movement of which Cáceres was part,
pushed for Congress to suspend U.S. security assistance to the Honduran
military and police, and helped build in-person relationships between U.S.
grassroots organizers and Honduran activists. Bringing this lesson to Syria,
how very different would our relationship to that war be if our analysis
began with the popular 2011 movement for freedom and justice that was
crushed by the Assad regime?

These are not easy questions, but as Vijay acknowledges, these debates
aren’t new. Anti-war organizers have been navigating this terrain for
decades. In 1982, for example, the U.S.-based Campaign for Peace and
Democracy was founded to support dissidents working for human rights in the
Soviet Bloc.

Just as we need not choose between “domestic” and “global” concerns, but
rather must see them as intertwined, we need not choose between a focus on
U.S. empire and regional dictatorships, as ultimately each relies on the
other. The deeper question is: Can we step back from our insistence on a
U.S. focus, allow others the spotlight and see an internationalist vision
through?

 

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