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As we prepare to listen this evening to President Bush’s latest effort to justify the US war in Iraq, and to regain some support from the American people, here are two other takes on the war.

Sen. John Kerry, in an op-ed piece in this morning’s New York Times, says the President should immediately make clear that the US will not maintain a long-term military presence in Iraq; must press the Iraq interim government toward a more inclusive political process and toward finish work on their constitution; must speed up training and funding of Iraqi troops; must get Iraq’s neighbors involved; and must set forth a clear plan for the transfer of military and police responsibilities to Iraqis after the December elections.

Read this in the New York Times, or on TruthOut.org

Robert Dreyfuss, writing for TomPaine.com, ponders the parallels between America’s current predicament in Iraq, with our situation in Vietnam over 30 years ago. He says:

It is perfectly clear what the United States has to do. It must abandon its deformed offspring in Baghdad, the hapless regime of Shiite fanatics and Kurdish warlords, and pray that it can establish direct talks with the people it is fighting.

There is no other exit strategy.

His article >>

"Things are getting worse by the day."
[6-13-05]

This is a periodic email from Dahr Jamail, an Iraqi-American living in Alaska. He has been working in Iraq as a reporter, writing for such journals as the Inter Press Service, The Asia Times and many other outlets. His reports have also been published with The Nation, The Sunday Herald, Islam Online, and the Guardian.

This report, dated May 31, begins:

The mayhem continues in Iraq, with today at least 40 people dead, including five US soldiers in Diyala province as the meltdown of the failed US-led occupation continues.

This information came from the Washington Office on May 25:

Only this morning have we learned that the House Rules Committee has permitted Rep. Lynn Woolsey to offer an amendment on Iraq to the Defense Authorization bill. The amendment is a sense of the Congress amendment that asks President Bush to develop a plan as soon as practicable to withdraw American troops from Iraq. It is likely to be voted on tonight. Please
call the following number to call your member of congress about this amendment. (202) 224-3121. You can use the following talking points in support of the amendment.

We urge you to vote for the Woolsey sense of the Congress amendment that asks President Bush to develop a plan as soon as practicable to withdraw American troops from Iraq.

Debate over the future of the American intervention into Iraq is overdue in Congress. After more than two years of fighting, the authorization of more than $200 billion to fight the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, over 1,600 American deaths and 12,000 wounded, and many more Iraqi
casualties, this country needs a dialogue on the future American policy towards Iraq.

The Woolsey amendment provides no deadlines and no timeframe. It simply calls for the President to submit a plan to Congress on the withdrawal of American forces. This amendment is consistent with the stated policy of President Bush not to stay in Iraq indefinitely. On April 13, 2004,
he stated "As a proud and independent people, Iraqis do not support an indefinite occupation and neither does America."

This amendment is being offered in the context of declining public support for the war. As USA Today reported on May 3, 2005, "Support for the decision to go to war in Iraq has fallen to its lowest level since the campaign began in March 2003 . . . 41% say the war was worth it; 57%
say it wasn't."

If the Woolsey amendment is adopted, it will begin to reframe the debate about Iraq and lead to discussion about how to move towards total Iraqi sovereignty and U.S. withdrawal.

The letter, signed by more than 800 faculty members, alumni, students and friends of the school, was published as a full-page ad in the Grand Rapids Press.    [5-26-05]

Here's the full text of the letter:

Open Letter to George W. Bush; Signed by 823 students, faculty and alumni of Calvin College

Dear President Bush:

We are alumni, students, faculty and friends of Calvin College who are deeply troubled that you will be the commencement speaker at Calvin on May 21st. In our view, the policies and actions of your administration, both domestically and internationally over the past four years, violate many deeply held principles of Calvin College.

Calvin is a rigorous intellectual institution, and a truly Christian one. Since its inception in 1876, Calvin has educated its students to use their minds and hearts to transform the world into a "beloved community" where no one is an outcast and all of God’s children are cared for. Calvin teaches its students to work for peace and justice, and to be good stewards of God’s creation.

By their deeds ye shall know them, says the Bible. Your deeds, Mr. President—neglecting the needy to coddle the rich, desecrating the environment, and misleading the country into war—do not exemplify the faith we live by.

Moreover, many of your supporters are using religion as a weapon to divide our nation and advance a narrow partisan agenda. We are deeply disappointed in your failure to renounce their inflammatory rhetoric.

We urge you not to use Calvin College as a platform to advance policies that violate the school’s religious principles. Furthermore, we urge you to repudiate the false claims of supporters who say that those who oppose your policies are the enemies of religion.

See the full-page newspaper ad, including all the signatures >>

The Washington Post carries a report on the President’s commencement address

The Detroit Free Press tells more about the protest.

A large coalition of faith groups has called for "peace not poverty," and an end to the US war in Iraq.  In light of that, this suggestion seems worth consideration: 

Opponents of the U.S. military occupation of Iraq are struggling to find a way to translate widespread disillusionment with war into effective political pressure on the administration to withdraw, just as was the case in Vietnam in the late 1960s.

Advancing such a plan for peace negotiations now would avoid a battle over unilateral withdrawal that the anti-war forces are unlikely to win. Instead, it would outmaneuver the administration, making it far more difficult for it to justify the occupation. Such a plan would avoid the administration’s political strengths while taking fullest advantage of the political strengths of the anti-war forces.

Gareth Porter was codirector of the Indochina Resource Center, an anti-war lobbying organization in Washington, DC, from 1974 to 1976. He has written about negotiated settlements of wars in Vietnam, Cambodia, and the Philippines, is a contributor to FPIF (online at http://www.fpif.org) and is the author of Perils of Dominance: Imbalance of Power and the Road to War in Vietnam, forthcoming from University of California Press.

Witherspoon co-sponsors “Peace Not Poverty” witness  [3-24-05]

The executive committee of the Witherspoon Society has committed to co-sponsor the interfaith witness for “Peace Not Poverty,” which will culminate in a declaration that will be read at the "Beyond Iraq" interfaith service on April 4 in Riverside Church in New York City.

You can play a role in drafting the statement.

On March 30, a one-million-person community of conscience will gather online to create a declaration against the Iraq War. This "write-in" is the second of four events planned by progressive religious leaders and organizations to launch a movement to build what the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. called the Beloved Community.

Witherspooner Jean Rodenbough sends her reflections on the protest rally she joined in Fayetteville, NC, outside Fort Bragg.

The Chicago Tribune reported on the demonstrations with a focus on the action outside Fort Bragg, but covering the broader picture as well.

TruthOut presents a long collection of web reports from participants in actions around the country.

Peace Not Poverty -- bearing witness for the “Beloved Community”   [3-14-05]

Another helpful Witherspooner, Jean Rodenbough, of Madison, NC, calls our attention to something few of us saw on Inauguration Day – or any time since.

Sister Joan Chittister wrote in the National Catholic Reporter on Jan. 28, while she was in Dublin, about seeing vivid photos in the Dublin paper, which were apparently circulating rapidly all over Europe. They depicted the shooting of a car-load of Iraqi civilians in Tal Afar, when their car did not slow down for an American check point. (Sounds sadly close to today’s news of the shooting of Giuliana Sgrena, an Italian journalist just released from weeks of being held hostage by Iraqis in .)

The series of photos of the incident includes one of a little girl screaming beside her family car, the blood of her parents splattered on her dress.

Jean adds: “I cannot even now remember that photo without getting choked up. Yet it has not appeared in US papers, at least around here, nor did the Greensboro paper publish a letter I wrote about it (whether it was because it didn't fit any of their criteria, or because they didn't want to touch this subject, I dunno).”

You can look at Joan Chittister's article or go directly to look at the photos. Jean asks, “Is there something that can be done to publicize this? That 3rd picture stands on a par with the Vietnamese girl running naked down the street during the Vietnam War. I am just appalled that this news story never reached US media. According to Chittister's article, it spread like wildfire across Europe.”

An op-ed column in today's New York Times relates the experience of Maher Arar, a Canadian citizen who was picked up in the fall of 2002 by John Ashcroft's Justice Department and shipped off to Syria for a year of brutal treatment -- thanks to the US's pattern of outsourcing torture, now renamed "extraordinary rendition."

Well, some people in the community of faith will be raising their voices in the coming weeks to remind our nation and our government that the war was wrong to begin with, and hasn't improved with age.

Sojourners reminds us that "Saturday, March 19, 2005, marks the second anniversary of the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq. The human and financial costs of war on all sides continue to mount at an alarming pace. In these dire times people of faith are called to raise their voices for peace."

A month ago we posted Peter Hodgson's theological critique of "the war on terror."

A PBS film airing tonight shows the soldiers' story of fighting in Iraq

The film A COMPANY OF SOLDIERS will be broadcast next Tuesday night (February 22) on PBS at 8 PM (Central time). It is the soldiers' story of fighting in Iraq - a month in the life of the 1st Battalion of the 8th Cavalry stationed in South Baghdad. It was shot last November during one of the most dangerous times for that unit. A COMPANY OF SOLDIERS was made by October Films under the umbrella of the PBS Frontline Series and we'd like to ask you to email this to everyone you know with a request for them to send it on to everyone they know.

One word of warning is that the film graphically shows the risks and consequences of what it is to fight in Iraq - so if you haven't told your loved ones, they might be in for a shock. One senior confidential source at the Pentagon who has seen the film told us: "It is compelling stuff. It proves once again that it is our Soldiers who are our best spokespeople. It is not only courageous filmmaking (both figuratively and literally), but it's also an example of very insightful filmmaking. The film captures our Soldiers' humanity, putting a human face on a very complex set of issues - that is priceless stuff."    [2-22-05]

We have received this note from Witherspooner Gary Campbell

I thought you might want to share with members of Presbyterian Peace Fellowship, Witherspoon Society and Binational Servants the following message from Veterans for Peace National Administrator Woody Powell with exchange of letters between VFP member Bill Compher and former U.S. President Jimmy Carter.

At the 46th annual meeting of the Society of Christian Ethics, many members proposed what they say is a powerful third alternative to absolute pacifism or the "just war" theory: the application of "just peacemaking theory" as a method of defusing current conflicts and preventing future wars.

The Rev. John Mann, who was recently called to serve a church in Glasgow, Scotland, after years as a minister in the PC(USA), has been deeply involved in ministering to and standing with Rose Gentle, whose son was killed in Iraq in June, 2004.

In the past couple days we've received two provocative comments on the state of U.S. troops in Iraq, and how we might be genuinely supportive of them.   [12-16-04]

Help them see options

Mike Kress, an Air Force veteran (1987-'94) who served in the Persian Gulf (Operation Southern Watch) and left the military as a conscientious objector, urges peace groups to work with young people who are being targeted for military recruitment, and with men and women currently in the military, to help them see other options than the "spiraling cycle of violence" now being carried on in Iraq.

This is posted on the Common Dreams website.  Thanks to Kathy Conner for pointing us to it.

Be really helpful

And Susan Lenfestey, a Minneapolis writer, suggests that we might support our troops in ways more useful than those "now-ubiquitous support-our-troops vinyl ribbons" that we see on so many gas-guzzling SUVs. For instance, she people might contribute for the legal defense of the eight soldiers who are challenging the Army's action to extend their service in Iraq well beyond the time that they agreed. Or, she asks, might it mean "visiting some of the 10,000 wounded and maimed soldiers in a veterans hospital near you?" That might be difficult, since the government doesn't really want us to know they're there.

On May 26 we posted a suggestion that people wear something red each Friday, as a memorial to those (on all sides!) who have died in the U.S. invasion and occupation of Iraq, and as a protest against the violations of the most basic human rights that are being perpetrated in the name of freedom.

We've received a passionate and inspiring response from a mother whose son, a Marine, was killed in action on April 6, 2004.   For now, we'll post the whole note here:

Great Idea!

I just read the suggestion today, Sunday, and am glad that I inadvertently made a statement last Friday. My son, Staff Sgt Allan K. Walker, USMC, was killed in action April 6, 2004. Friday his high school honored him as a part of their regular Memorial Day observance, and I wore a red jacket.

I get so tired of people telling me "You shouldn't say things like 'Rumsfeld, Cheney and Bush are no better than mass murderers because your own son died defending your liberties'." EXCUSE ME. My son served in the armed services of this nation, in order to ensure all of our liberties, including mine to speak. He died trying to rescue a wounded Marine. Liberty had nothing to do with the situation in which they found themselves in mortal peril. GREED DID.

I will say it again. Rumsfeld, Cheney and Bush are no better than mass murderers. They are directly responsible for wasting the lives of all the US COALITION AND IRAQI military who have been killed in Iraq, for all the grievous woundings of ALL CASUALTIES, BOTH COALITION AND IRAQI. They are responsible for ALL CIVILIAN DEATHS AND WOUNDINGS, ALL 'COLLATERAL DAMAGE' AND ALL THE LOOTING. Furthermore, by focusing on Iraq rather than Al Quaeda, Rumsfeld, Cheney and Bush can now "claim" ALL THE DEATHS, WOUNDING AND DAMAGE IN MADRID. The good news is, at least Halliburton is now operating in the black instead of the red.

Another thought: I will be attending the Peace and Justice Conference in Seattle and it might be a good idea for conferees to wear red the entire time.

Nancy C. Walker

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A major
Ghost Ranch event this summer!

July 28 - August 3, 2008

Paths toward Peace and Justice:
Spirituality, Earth-Care, and the Prophetic Word in a time of Violence

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