Washblog

Winter Soldier Hearings and More

By buddy georgia
Mon Mar 24, 2008 at 06:05:26 PM PST
Section: Diary Topic: Alternative and Community Media

OP-ED sent to Walla Walla Union Bulletin

At 7PM on March 12th  Tony, my brother in Veterans For Peace, picked me up at the airport in Baltimore and drove me to the National Labor College in Silver Springs, Maryland. We spent four days there providing security during the "Winter Soldier" hearings.

The hearings were organized by Iraq Veterans Against The War. Testimony was given by men and women who had served in Iraq and Afghanistan. There were also members of Military Families Speak Out, former military officers and intelligence personnel, representatives of independent media and authors of books relevant to the testimony.

On the 13th I attended security officer training. We were told that a group known as Gathering of Eagles was planning a demonstration outside the campus, with the intention of gaining access and creating a disturbance during the hearings.

The next day testimony began and my station was the hallway leading to the debriefing room. My primary concern was to keep media people away from those who testified until they were ready to be interviewed. I also was to provide security for a broadcast room and the IVAW media team.

While my job prevented me from attending the hearings, I could tell by the emotional state of my brothers and sisters as they came off stage that the memories were still cause for great pain.

There are three panels that come to mind when I reflect on after testimony healing. Those were; Rules of Engagement, Military Sexual Trauma, and Suicide as told by MFSO. After returning home I have watched about two hours of testimony, and I realize this is going to be a difficult event to wrap my head around.

Another issue that concerns me is the concept that those who testified are somehow less patriotic? To be patriotic is to suffer in silence? Gathering of Eagles make it a point to display "SUPPORT THE TROOPS" banners and bumper stickers, but it seems to me the correct phrase would be "SUPPORT SOME OF THE TROOPS".

While we may not always agree on every issue, I believe it's crucial that we don't lose sight of the fact that as veterans we are part of a brotherhood. How many families do you know that always agree on everything? Go online to the IVAW website and watch some of the testimony. If you don't shed a tear or two, "well then mister you're a better man than I".

Thomas Jefferson said, and I paraphrase, dissent is the highest form of patriotism. Segue to the second part of this piece. I was able to attend Winter Soldier because of the assistance of a group of patriotic women known as Code Pink, and the support of a network of friends such as Walla Walla Community Coalition For Peace.

After completion of the WS hearings I joined with Code Pink in DC for demonstrations to Restore the Constitution, and commemorating the 5th anniversary of the war. While their efforts to end the occupation, stop torture, and hold this administration accountable for war crimes is common knowledge, what is not as well known is their support of veterans.

Veterans, and all elected representatives take an oath to preserve and protect the constitution. An oath I believe most of us take seriously, but the constitution also places that responsibility on all citizens. Code Pink takes that responsibility seriously as well.

It was an honor and a privilege to have had a small part in Winter Soldier, and I feel humbled to have the opportunity to join with the women and men of Code Pink during this time in our nation's history.

To remain silent when our country is being led astray is to be complicit. Now is not the time for citizens or our media to sleep.

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Winter Soldier Hearings and More | 8 comments (8 topical)
Excellent that you could attend
I find it very meaningful hearing about the first hand experiences that you had helping at Winter Soldier and at the actions of the week.

I watched and listened to testimony.  It made me weep.

I just hope that we can End This War and help our brothers, sisters, children - another generation - recover.

by ktkeller on Tue Mar 25, 2008 at 05:55:30 PM PST

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Thanks very much for this report
I've been reading some of the Winter Soldier testimony and it's very painful. These Vets are tremendously couragous.

by dinazina on Wed Mar 26, 2008 at 05:25:30 AM PST

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Can you say more about the veterans giving
testimony?  Appreciating your account and the Op-Ed you sent, and appreciating your appreciation to Code Pink for getting you there, the story is about the returning Iraq veterans.  I value and appreciate that Code Pink has been instrumental in helping financially in a number of the anti-war related events over the years, but this is not their story.

I'd like to hear more about your experience with the veterans themselves.  It is their story - their narrative - their experience.  You said you provided security in keeping the people of the Screaming Eagles - oh, no, that's what my ex-husband said of the 101st when he was deployed with that division in Vietnam.  Oh, it's the Gathering of The Eagles - yes that group that believes it's mission to be beating up on a Gold Star father - Carlos Arredondo,  while he is publicly demonstrating the grief of the loss of his son, Lance Corporal Alexander Scott Arredondo killed in Iraq in August 2004.  

Thank you Sir, for your willingness to go and provide security for the event as those returning Iraq veterans gave their own accounts of what they experienced and witnessed while deployed in Iraq.  Their biggest crime, it would seem, to the likes of such as the Gathering of Vultures, is in speaking out and not keeping the code of silence. But the Gathering Vultures need not fear; there was little to no media coverage of the weekend for the Vultures to have to counter with their empty flag waving.

This is no way to introduce myself to you Buddy Georgia, and I apologize for the bitterness that seems to leak out of me these days.  We are a military family with loved one deployed in Iraq for his second time - his second 'stop-loss' extended 15 month deployment.  We are a military family that has spent several years  in giving voice and speaking out against this Iraq war.  We do deeply appreciate your work in helping with this event.  We do appreciate those who continue to carry on in speaking out against this war and we do appreciate those people who keep trying to find the key that is going to turn this thing around.  

I know one of the Iraq veterans who gave testimony, Hart Viges.  Traveled with him for almost 4 weeks on the 2005 Bring Them Home Now tour; heard his moving account several times and was struck by how powerful it was each time he told it...wondered how he could still be standing at the end and wondered if he was with us or still there in Iraq when he told of his experience.  I personally do know how hard it is on these men and women to tell their stories, to give witness, and a minimum, they deserve to be heard.  

On the fifth anniversary of the Iraq war, the media could easily have turned it's attention to these hearings and given a mention.  I didn't see that happen too much.  If you can say more about the veterans, their stories, your experience of them, it would be useful and appreciated.

On the Surge in Iraq "--we have set the bar so low it's buried in the sand at this point." - Barack Obama

by Lietta Ruger on Sun Mar 30, 2008 at 04:58:55 PM PST

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Houston Chronicle article - one of the few media
Providing excerpts from one of the few newspapers willing to write an article on the Iraq Veterans testimonies; excerpts are from the Iraq veterans testimonies only, but the entire article is worthwhile read for context.  (note; I personally know several of the people quoted in the article, and with bias wanted to have excerpts quoting them)

VOICING DISSENT
War-torn vets speak out
Haunted by their wartime experiences, some Iraq veterans are are protesting

By Claudia Feldman
at Houston Chronicle

April 18, 2008, 11:44AM

Hart Viges walks the streets of Austin in a tunic and carries a sign that reads, "Jesus Against War." It's one of many ways, he says, that he must atone for his actions as an American soldier in Iraq.

Army Sgt. Ronn Cantu says lingering memories of killing a civilian in Iraq led him to start a chapter of Iraq Veterans Against the War at his home -- Fort Hood.

And in Houston, Chris Hauff, an Iraq War vet who returned from combat two years ago, wrestles with the feeling that his best friend died in a misguided war.

"The idea that American soldiers are there to spread democracy and liberate the people is all smoke and mirrors," Hauff says.

After five years and more than 4,000 American deaths, hundreds of anti-war Iraq veterans and even some active-duty soldiers are speaking out in protest. Though they make up a relatively small percentage of all the soldiers who have served, certainly they speak from experience. They've had their boots on the ground.

Nationally, more than 1,000 have joined Iraq Veterans Against the War, which is calling for an immediate troop pullout. At a recent IVAW conference in suburban Washington, D.C., 60 vets addressed about 400 peers. Collectively, they described American soldiers unraveling under pressure -- devolving from fighting for freedom and defending innocents to saving their own lives, protecting their friends and getting revenge.

Viges, tall and reed-slim, spoke as if his entry to heaven were on the line.

"I joined the Army right after September 11th," he began. He ended with, "I don't know how many innocents I've helped kill. ...

"I have blood on my hands."

His story, common among the speakers, began with good intentions and patriotic zeal. Then he realized he couldn't tell friend from enemy, and as he dodged mortar fire and roadside bombs, he feared each new day was going to be his last.

In that atmosphere, Viges and other soldiers assigned to the 82nd Airborne Division aimed countless mortar rounds at the town of As Samawah, southeast of Baghdad. They were trying to root out insurgents, but to this day, Viges doesn't know whom or what they hit.

"This wasn't army to army," Viges said. "People live in towns."

Jason Washburn's testimony is preserved on the Internet. A Marine veteran from Philadelphia, he explained how the rules of engagement kept changing until it seemed there were no rules at all.

"If the town or the city that we were approaching was a known threat, if the unit that went through the area before we did took a high number of casualties, we were allowed to shoot whatever we wanted.

"I remember one woman was walking by, and she was carrying a huge bag, and she looked like she was heading toward us. So we lit her up with the Mark 19, which is an automatic grenade launcher. And when the dust settled, we realized that the bag was only full of groceries. And, I mean, she had been trying to bring us food, and we blew her to pieces for it."

Jon Michael Turner, a Marine veteran from Vermont, described 3 a.m. house raids in which "problem" Iraqi men were subjected to his "choking hand."

It was tattooed in Arabic with an all-too-American epithet.

Turner recalled the first time he shot an Iraqi civilian. He offered no context or explanation except, "We were all congratulated after we had our first kills."

Turner also recalled the blind rage that led him and fellow Marines to start fights, spray bullets indiscriminately and fire on mosques. Eighteen men in his unit were killed by the enemy, he said. After that much bloodsh