Shock and Awe is having a troubled adolescence. The U.S. government is killing children with flying robot death planes, keeping troops in 175 countries, actively using “special” forces in 150 countries, asking us to ignore what it’s done to Libya so that we’ll support more wars, going silent on Yemen as the supposed model of a country that U.S. warmaking improved rather than ruined, turning down an offer from North Korea to halt nuclear tests, continuing the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan with no end in sight and no longer any pretense of Congressional or United Nations approval, oscillating on the question of starting a war on Iran (and inviting a foreign leader to give Congress its marching orders), actively antagonizing Russia and sending troops to Ukraine, building new nukes, proposing to enlarge the world’s largest military budget next year, and avoiding all accountability for such horrors as human experimentation at Guantanamo.
Nasty vicious celebrations of murder and torture are dominating U.S. entertainment. The militarized thinking and weaponry are reaching local police departments. A jury just convicted a whistleblower on zero evidence for allegedly revealing that the CIA had given nuclear weapons plans (with flaws added) to Iran. The earth’s climate is going crazy, and the single biggest thing we do to worsen that crisis (war) is also the single greatest diversion of resources away from addressing it.
Admit it, if your 11-year-old boy or girl caused a fraction of this sort of trouble, you’d be worried. But you’d also see through to the better tendencies. The U.S. public said no to a war on Syria in 2013. And while it said OK to a war in 2014 it imagined a short, cheap, harmless, beneficial war. It doesn’t want a war on Iran or Russia. It doesn’t want this level of military spending. It favors non-military solutions whenever they are possible, as of course they always are, regardless of what Barbara Boxer might say.
Shock and Awe needs an initiation into a healthier adulthood. Luckily there is a peace movement planning an intervention for Shock and Awe’s 12th birthday, coming up March 18-21 in Washington, D.C.
Spring Rising: An Antiwar Intervention in DC
Coming out of a meeting held in Washington, DC, on January 10, plans are coming together for an antiwar intervention in the U.S. capital. A series of events will be held just as the ongoing U.S. war in Iraq — recently restarted in a new form — passes the 12-year mark since the March 2003 invasion.
Here’s the schedule so far:
Wednesday, March 18: Peace gathering and fellowship.
Thursday, March 19th: Lobbying on Capitol Hill, followed by a tour of the war machine: homes and offices of war criminals.
Friday, March 20th: Afternoon and evening teach-in: Ending Current Wars, Ending the Institution of War. (This event will examine ISIS and U.S. warmaking in Western Asia and elsewhere; the damage militarism does to the natural environment, economies, and civil rights; and how the war system can be replaced with a peace system.)
Saturday, March 21st: Protest at the White House, followed by march.
This nonviolent intervention was originally proposed by Cindy Sheehan’s Soapbox and the Soapbox People’s Network. It has been endorsed and will be supported by (thus far, the list is rapidly growing): Amnesty International Charlottesville, the ANSWER Coalition, the Bill of Rights Defense Committee, the Baltimore Pledge of Resistance, CND CYMRU, CODEPINK, the Granny Peace Brigade of New York City, KnowDrones.com, Maryland United for Peace and Justice, Military Families Speak Out, the National Campaign for Nonviolent Resistance, the Network to Stop Drone Surveillance and Warfare, The No Fear Coalition, United National Antiwar Coalition, Veterans For Peace, Voices for Creative Non-Violence, WarIsACrime.org, Washington Peace Center, Witness Against Torture, World Beyond War, and World Can’t Wait.
This series of events is just coming together with many decisions yet to be made, and I wouldn’t dream of speaking for everyone involved, but I can say why I’ll be going and why I think you should too.
It’s Urgently Needed
We’ve reached a level of war normalization in which we accept and even celebrate limited war as the best possible policy, while the corporate media often proposes to us that only (1) war and (2) nothing exist as possible courses of action. We need a major public initiative that creates other alternatives, that answers the relentless question “Well if you wouldn’t bomb them, what would you do?”
It’s New and Creative
This is not just a protest. It’s an intervention and a reenactment (of past peace movements). It’s teach-ins that are being developed to address the many ways in which war destroys: war makes us less safe, damages the environment, erodes civil rights, drains economies, etc. It’s lobbying and truth telling, nonviolent resistance and rallying, solidarity and outreach. It’s opposing particular wars, but also the much larger and more expensive preparation for wars that has come to seem ordinary.
It’s a United Movement
Second only to “End the wars” among peace activists has always been the demand “Unite the organizations.” Check out that list of organizations a few paragraphs above. It may be twice as long very soon. Your organization can get involved too. This just might be that long-sought holy grail of unity. Let’s not miss it! In fact, let’s expand on it by inviting and including environmental organizations, economic justice organizations, student groups, civil liberties and human rights groups, and opponents of racism and every other injustice that serves the cause of war.
It’s Pro-Peace and Antiwar
I’ve already had peace activists tell me they refuse to go to these events on principle because the word “antiwar” has been used. Had the word “pro-peace” been used, others would have said the same. But here’s the deal, we’re pro-peace AND antiwar. The elimination of war is a beautiful, ennobling, gloriously positive event. The establishment of peace requires the elimination of war. We can’t fail to point out that we’re antiwar because even the Pentagon claims to be pro-peace. We must distinguish ourselves as in favor of peace through means other than war. We also can’t fail to state that we are pro-peace, because war will not be eliminated unless all the systems that support it are replaced by the construction of peaceful ones. We need legal, governmental, economic, and cultural structures that facilitate peace. But we won’t build them if the wars rage on unopposed, and peace in our hearts won’t prevent a single death unless it achieves some external expression.
It Meets the Standard of the Simplistiphiles
As we’ve all been told — very slowly — Thomas Jefferson had way too many complaints in the Declaration of Independence for it to have any sort of impact. We British subjects must have one simple demand if we are to be heard at all.
O.K. You want one simple demand? I’ve got your one simple demand 🙂
/ / / / /
END ALL THE WARS
/ / / / /
It’s Weekday and Weekend in Every Sense
This series of events has got lobbying Congress and protesting Congress. It’s got weekday disruption and weekend crowd maximization. And if there’s something it’s lacking, you can add it.
Obama’s Has Just About Settled In — Finally
When President Obama was first elected there was still a sort of structure — albeit defunded — of a significant peace movement that turned out to have actually been a movement against Republican wars. This structure was simply crawling with people who had arrived at the considered opinion that it was too early to protest Obama. We needed to let him settle in first. After a while it was still too early. A bit later it was still too early. By the time the White House was trumpeting to the New York Times that Obama picked men, women, and children to murder each Tuesday, the movement was pretty well gone.
Well, here’s a good moment in which to bring it back. I dare say Obama has pretty well settled in. The Occupy movement that took off after the last midterm elections is primed for a new start. And the next 18-month election “season” hasn’t really kicked in yet. Once it does, all useful action will have two arms and a leg tied behind its back.
The moment is now.
There is, as a great one said, such a thing as being too late.
I’ll see you in Washington.