What a superb book!
Well, I’ll call it a masterpiece.
Nan Levinson seeks to tell the story of those veterans who fought in Iraq and Afghanistan and came home disillusioned and determined to end these wars. But I would say that she has compiled a larger documentation of the whole “anti-war movement” in a way that has not been done before. It is jam-packed with details of events, conferences, and anti-war organizations whose members were not part of the military.
She reports on the activity of anti-war veterans’ organizations such as Vietnam Veterans Against the War, Veterans for Peace, Iraq Veterans Against the War, but also the American Friends Service Committee, Gold Star Mothers, Code Pink, Military Families Speak Out, True Majority, MoveOn, The Action Mill, Warrior Writers, Answer Coalition, Southern Christian Leadership Conference, the ACLU and more.
She tells this story from “the inside” as she walks and talks with veterans, beginning with their recruitment to their coming home. She is with them in their pain, their traumatic experiences, their mistakes, and their feelings of shame. She came to know these soldiers first hand and quotes them with accuracy.
It is important to see the evolution of these antiwar veterans. Vietnam Veterans Against the War (VVAW) is a national veterans' organization that was founded in New York City in 1967 after six Vietnam vets marched together in a peace demonstration. It was organized to voice the opposition among returning veterans of that deadly war in Indochina.
Veterans for Peace (VFP) was organized in 1985 and members pledged to act nonviolently in all demonstrations. It was inclusive of all those who had fought in wars going back to the Spanish Civil War. By 2005 it had 6,500 members, organized with 120 independent chapters; today its anti-war members cut across all wars. VFP then became instrumental in helping Iraq Veterans Against the War (IVAW) to get started and helped support new chapters.
The author’s study includes the experience of members in these veteran’s groups but it also covers the antiwar movement as a whole. For example, the author did considerable research around the life of Cindy Sheehan, an antiwar activist whose son was killed by enemy action during the Iraq War. The author reports first-hand on Cindy’s protest at a makeshift camp outside President George W. Bush’s Texas ranch and pulls no punches. She describes all the local arguments and squabbles that developed among the members.
This honest type of research is equally true in her depiction of other antiwar organizations. She is after the facts like a good journalist. There is no idealism about harmony inside all these organizations.
She informs us about the one hundred “joint terror task forces” (JTTFs) designed by the government to investigate terrorist activity. In fact, by 2011 at least eight hundred thousand local and state law enforcement officials were working with the JTTS, feeding information into “fusion centers” with over 1.5 billion records stored in the FBI’s National Security Branch Analysis Center. The above antiwar organizations were watched carefully and filmed by these government agencies many times.
Many readers will want to follow the author’s finely written experiences she had with non-soldier organizations, but I was interested in what happened to the veterans themselves. These soldiers tell about events that you would not see on CBS, NBC, and ABC.
There are stories about shooting bullets to the heads of Iraqi civilians, the killing of small children, the raiding of the Iraqi homes when there was no reason for doing so. Veterans reported on the Iraqi civilians killed at checkpoints. One Marine counted thirty “kills” within a matter of days.
Soldiers talked about “unnecessary killings” that happened but not in the interest of the war. They said that such killings were not isolated, as the mass media would have it. The government referred to these killings as done by a few “bad apples.” These Iraq soldiers said, “No.” The killings were systematic.
Yes, there were formal “rules of engagement” but soldiers knew “what was required of them.” Iraqi prisoners were tortured for information. One Marine told the author about sledgehammering the wrists and elbows of captured Iraqis to prevent them from returning to the battlefield upon their release.
One great value of this book is its careful documentation of real events with the names of major participants. Soldiers had cameras and took pictures of dead Iraqis and Afghans, which became like war trophies. Veterans posted them on blogs and websites. It was in the culture of these wars.
Many soldiers returning home were haunted by their actions. One soldier said he left Iraq with two duffle bags. The first one held his gear, the second one held his guilt.
The rate of soldier suicides in 2008 wasone inevery thirty-six hours. And that statistic remained steady over the years of combat. The author reports on the complexity in counting suicides in footnotes that altogether are packed with details on all events.
TheWinter Soldier Investigationwas sponsored by VVAW from January 31, 1971 to February 2, 1971. Veterans wanted to publicize the atrocities and war crimes perpetrated by the U.S. Armed Forces and their allies in the Vietnam War. It was a media event in which they challenged the morality and conduct of the war by showing the direct relationship between military policies and war crimes in that country.
This event then inspired veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan to hold their ownWinter Soldierevent in 2008.At least seventy U.S. military veterans provided accounts of their experiences in Iraq and Afghanistan. They testified for hours in all the grim details, about how the rules of engagement were broken, how the enemy was dehumanized; the suicides, and the deployment of sick troops. They spoke of military sexual trauma and how “first kills” became a cause for congratulations, and about the extensive profiteering by military contractors.
Of special interest to me in the 2008Winter Soldiertestimonies were the tactics that carried a special jargon with them. Aweapons free zonesignified not an area of free of weapons but a situation in which soldiers are permitted to use weapons freely, which translates into shooting anyone who might pose a danger. The termrecon by firemeant starting a firefight if you feel threatened. Adrop weaponrefers to the extra AK-47 you carry in case you accidentally kill an unarmed Iraqi, so you can put it next to his corpse to make him look like an insurgent. When youlight someone upyou shoot him.
The soldiers revealed types of resistance on the warfront “ranging from rejiggering a duty roster to turning patrols into search-and-avoid missions to refusing or sabotaging orders to the extremes of mutinying or murdering officers.” With all of this, the author notes that most direct and controversial resisters were the conscientious objectors (COs).
During the Vietnam War there were at least seventeen thousand COs. By 1972 there were more COs than draftees.
The author concludes that the protest movement among these veterans helped them move back into civilian life. It gave them a sense of mission when they needed it. It taught them lessons in organizing, honed their skills in planning and negotiating. It helped them become more articulate, and allowed them to find a common identity with abiding friendships. Most of all perhaps, they showed that dissent could be as principled as military service.
Nan Levinson has done us all a service by writing this excellent book. She shows us the ugly underbelly of war and the efforts of so many organizations to resist. This book should be made more visible to the public. It has enough data to serve as part of a set of readings in courses on war and peace. It has the power to be made into a movie; in fact, the great details of resistance she offers in her report are enough for a television series. It should be part of a national conversation on the meaning and price of these American wars.