A-list message, [A-List] Fw: [UICNoWarIraq] GI Special 5D21: "I Didn't Join To

GI Special:

thomasfbarton@xxxxxxxxxxxxx

4.22.07

Print it out: color best. Pass it on.

GI SPECIAL 5D21:

[Ma'Moun Sukkar April 15, 2007]

Report >From Ansbach:

[The 12th Combat Aviation Brigade]

?One Of The Young Soldier/Boys Looked At Me And Said ?I Didn?t Join To Go To This War??

?Increasing Resistance Developing Inside The US Military?

?Remember that white GI, with the black hair, you gave the CD-Rom and DVD to?? My German friend, soon after, followed him into the toilet to talk with him and found him there just standing and reading the liner notes of the ?Sir, No Sir? DVD crying his heart out. What nerve had we struck? What demons had been suddenly awakened? It must have been a moving scene and this ain?t no movie.

From: Stop The War Brigade

To: GI Special

Sent: April 14, 2007

I'm sending you several files.

?1st Call? is the speech I gave in front of the home of the ?12th Combat Aviation Brigade? on Easter Sunday in Ansbach/Katterbach.

Also, a report about the activities I was involved during my stay in Ansbach. I just received 2 newspaper articles one of which is full of lies and misrepresentations. That's the one which has a photo of me.

They outright lied in the article. They wrote that I told the soldiers to desert, which is not the case. I will and have told the soldier to desert, that's not the question. I read a statement from an army deserter who himself asked the soldiers to desert.

That's some information that this newspaper did not want to report on for obvious reasons. It doesn't fit in with plans to run propaganda supporting the expansion of the base.

In Germany it is illegal to call on soldiers to desert although we've done it on many occasions and will continue to call on soldiers to desert. But it seems that they want to set us up for something. I'll send you a translation of the article soon.

All and all, it's a good article because it shows their frustration, fear and weaknesses.

We'll be coming back at them in a big way because now they've given us an opening and they've stepped on their proverbial.

A storm is brewing and we'll be there giving the weather report.

Darnel Stephen Summers

?Stop The WAR Brigade?

********************************************

?The Gazebo?

?Another Female Soldier Told Me That Things Were Really Bad In Her Unit And At The Breaking Point. She Said, Verbatim, ?They(The Brass), Only Care About Themselves??

?You Only Have To Extrapolate To Figure What Can Happen Next With A Situation Like That Brewing Inside The 12th Combat Aviation Brigade?

By Darnel Stephen Summers, ?Stop The WAR Brigade?

Since the 1950?s here in Germany it has been traditional for Easter Marches to be held all over the country. The main theme of these marches is peace.

I?m compelled to write about these events for a number of reasons.

There?s been a lot of discussion continually about what is exactly the role of Veterans and Active-Duty Soldiers have to play in the Anti-War Movement.

People should get a copy of ?Sir, No Sir? from David Zeiger for a more than cursory look at the role that soldiers played during the Viet Nam War and afterward.

That would be a good starting point for those who have absolutely no idea about that history and also for those who need a refresher?s course or just a kick in the butt.

As a member of the ?Stop The WAR Brigade? I personally have been asked, on numerous occasions, to speak at rallies, demonstrations, meetings and small gatherings.

We?ve seen Ebbs and Flows in the movement since the STWB came into existence in 1991. We?ve also seen at one time or another a reluctance to extend an invitation to the STWB to speak and speak out, in fact for a while it seemed that we were being banished from the ?scene? entirely.

We heard through the grapevine that some anti-war forces here in Germany were objecting to our ?Radical? positions. No of them had the nerve to confront us politically, about their disagreements and it was known that we would under no circumstances back down from our position.

We kept coming up with soldiers who were actively supporting the STWB. That was and continues to be a big problem for them.

We were actually asking the soldiers to ?Refuse, Resist and Rebel?. That never sat well with some groups from Jump-Street.

That Slogan brought certain groups into direct conflict with their own government and that government?s insidious and conniving role in supporting the US in its prosecution of the War.

We keep doing our work regardless because we have a vast reservoir of potential recruits that not too many other organizations are interested in going out to.

While our work is seriously hampered, quite frankly, by the reluctance of the movement to accept the fact that Soldiers & Vets must play a major role in this struggle, we have met with success in spite of these contradictions but we can?t just be satisfied with the situation.

We need a major breakthrough.

To some extent there?s been a shift in the wind. We had more requests to speak than we could handle this year.

The number of requests had to do with the increasing resistance that?s developing inside the US Military.

I spoke in a small town, Ansbach, over the Easter Weekend which has a population of 40,000 and an additional migrating sub-population of a few thousand GIs and their ?Weapons of Mass Destruction?.

By that I mean that the GIs are constantly being deployed and re-deployed and believe me, it?s taking its toll.

The local population is up in arms about planned expansion of the military base. The Pentagon has literally taken over the whole town. It all looks like some very bad B-Movie Western starring John Wayne. The US has all of the politicians in the area in their back pocket. Yeah, it?s a beautiful setup except for one thing. Some people in the area have some consciousness and the will to organize. And battle lines are being drawn. This has all of the ear markings of a long and protracted struggle. They need help. Our help and I mean that in the broadest possible sense.

Many of the citizens of Ansbach are beginning to realize that their small town is playing a big role in the suffering of the Iraqi People. Here is a clear cut example of the treachery.

There?s direct connection that can?t be avoided. The local Politicians with the support of the Federal Government is running a line of bullshit about how the town can prosper economically while The US ARMY brings in more Apache Helicopters and kicks farmers off their land to make for more space for their war-games.

It?s ironic. They christen their death machines after a decimated Indian Tribe and then move to steal the indigenous population?s land with the promise of better days ahead. But it gets even better than that.

I rode into town a few days before the March. I visited a few of the GI watering holes. I listened first night to a lot of drunken banter but on the second night, the night before the march, things really got interesting.

I went with a group of local activists(Ansbacher Friedensbündis/Ansbach Peace Coalition) to a place called the ?Gazebo?.

A smoke-filled bar with a number of pool tables full of young GIs. GIs were playing pool at every one of the tables. Now, I can shoot a little pool but I?m not ?Fast Eddie? by any stretch of the imagination but I have a few tricks up my sleeve. ?No brag, just fact? as Walter Brennan used to say.

Damn, later on I could have sworn that those Cues were all crooked. No kidding.

I saw my chance of reaching some of these GIs lay in getting a game with one of the GIs. A gamed ended and I stepped to the table and asked if I could have the next game. ?Sure, why not,? the young soldier replied.

He racked and I busted.

I probably played the worst game of my life and still I won 2 out of 3 games, but he was drunk and at least he had an excuse for his poor play. I was definitely trying to beat this inebriated soldier.

Everyone in the bar was expecting a better game from me. I cut an imposing figure at 200 lbs. with long flowing dreadlocks. I could have been their 1st Sergeant.

I caught people glancing at our game out of the corner of their eyes. I downed a few nice bank shots. Things settled down and I started observing the other GIs, while my opponent took turns talking to a beautiful young woman who was sitting at the foot of the pool table, and taking his shots after I invariably would miss.

The dog life of a young soldier. I couldn?t help but smile. It was Dejavu.

I had a backpack full of ?STWB CD-Roms? and the now famous ?Sir, No Sir? DVD?s. The one-two punch.

Who would get the first ?gift??

Suddenly, there he was, sitting alone at one of those high tables next to my pool table just day-dreaming it seemed.

I talked to many GIs that night but the encounter with a few of them was especially moving and at the same time distressing.

I gave that first GI his package and after a while he suddenly disappeared, to where I didn?t know until later. I always mention to the soldiers that what they will see in those CD Roms and DVDs will shock and amaze them.

A little while later one of the German activists ran up to me and asked, ?Remember that white GI, with the black hair, you gave the CD-Rom and DVD to?? I replied that I did. Well it turns out that that particular GI went into the toilet, so as not to been seen, and took a closer look at what I?d passed on to him.

My German friend, soon after, followed him into the toilet to talk with him and found him there just standing and reading the liner notes of the ?Sir, No Sir? DVD crying his heart out. What nerve had we struck? What demons had been suddenly awakened? It must have been a moving scene and this ain?t no movie.

Those assholes in the White House and Pentagon are literally sending Babies to war. I don?t say that with any disrespect but it?s a god-damned lie that war makes men and women out of boys and girls. It Destroys them and everything around then.

Two days before the Demo I went to the local ?McDonalds? in Ansbach and met and talked with some young soldiers.

They were sitting there eating that crap Mickey D?s calls food. I suspect they were there to mainly socialize and just hang out, all the time having an eye out for the young women who were coming in and out in Droves.

There were four of them.

Everyone of them lost in his own thoughts in some peculiar way, drifting in and out each other?s presence. They talked with each other, but of things of little or no consequence.

It?s not my style necessarily to provoke the soldiers but I wanted to scream.

I approached them, shook their hands, and asked them about their strange recruit haircuts, thinking that they were just fresh out of ?Basic Training?, but that wasn?t exactly the case.

Although they were in for less than a year, they were Permanent-Party and the order had come down proclaiming that these ridiculous haircuts were mandatory and now the standard.

They?d all have to look sharp marching off to War and an uncertain Future. They were very nervous during our conversation looking around to see if anyone was watching them.

The fact that they new that I was a Viet Nam Vet had an almost magical effect on them. It seemed that they were overwhelmed with my presence and my experience. They knew that I?d been where they had yet to go.

One of the young soldier/boys looked at me and said. ?I didn?t join to go to this war? and his head then sank back into his hamburger.

It was his way of demonstrating his opposition in a subtle manner to me and his fellow soldiers sitting there at the table. It was such a sad _expression_ that his face wore.

The next day we were in the center of the city. The activists had set up a Literature table and were asking people to sign a petition condemning plans to expand the base which is situated just outside the city. Many passersby signed the petition and engaged in lively conversation about the proposed expansion and the influx of more Apache Helicopters.

It just so happened that on several occasions GIs walked by. It was great talking with them. The general mood as they described it was that of a fundamental unwillingness of the troops wanting to go. I surely know about that from my own experiences.

Another female Soldier told me that things were really bad in her unit and at the breaking point.

Soldiers in the unit let it be known that they didn?t trust their command and weren?t particular about following them anywhere.

She said, verbatim, ?They(the Brass), only care about themselves.?

You only have to extrapolate to figure what can happen next with a situation like that brewing inside the 12th Combat Aviation Brigade.?

To let this War continue one more day is a crime of the first order and magnitude. These politicians are pimping people?s misery. Every time I hear the _expression_ ?Pimp my this, pimp my that?, I get angry.

People use that word and don?t realize what that word really conveys. It is a disgusting undertaking and its real meaning should not be obscured or diluted. Pretty soon you?ll have the Presidents and all of his stooges saying it?s alright to pimp the Nation. Not that that?s not what they are already doing but all of this sickness just adds validity to the scam.

Right now a big controversy is ensuing over the racists, insensitive and out of line comments made by Don Imus on his radio Program, which I never liked anyway.

They?ve found an issue to literally distract us from fundamental issues.

Where was the indignation when a 14 year old Iraqi girl was repeatedly raped and then her body burned beyond recognition and the rest of her family liquidated because they witnessed that travesty, by a sick group of GIs?

Some GIs even rape women in their own ranks.

Incidentally I saw rape, child molestation, you name it, during my tour in Viet Nam on a daily basis. Get the Point?

Women suffer tremendously under cloak of war.

They?ve extended the tours. The odds of being injured or killed have suddenly gone up exponentially. This government just doesn?t and never did care. Let?s wakeup and smell the coffee.

The Troops stationed in Ansbach are now being prepared for Deployment at this very moment.

Most of the soldiers are shaken to the bone by past war experiences and the prospect now of having to relive the nightmare once again.

They will be forced to move out shortly.

They need our assistance and guidance in this crucial moment in their lives and maybe, just maybe, it?s possible for us to save more that a few lives.

That is the task that lies before us.

Over and Out.

From the Front Lines,

Darnell Stephen Summers

Stop The WAR Brigade

www.stopthewarbrigade.com

stopthewarbgde@xxxxxxxxxxx

MORE:

?Soldiers Are Waking Up In Droves?

?Don't Let The Army Fuck You Anymore?

?You Don't Have To Spend A Year In Some Country As An Occupying Force?

?The Fact That I Wear This Soldier?s Uniform Is Solid Proof That The Resistance In The Us Military Is Growing Day By Day?

?Lets show that we haven't turned into the imperialist tyrants that our forefathers fought against 230 years ago.

Speech by Darnell Stephen Summers in front of the home of the ?12th Combat Aviation Brigade? on Easter Sunday in Ansbach/Katterbach.

***********************************************

My Name Darnell Stephen Summers, I?m a member of the ?Stop The WAR Brigade? and The VVAW-AI.

I served in the US Army from 1966 to 1970. I?m a Viet Nam Veteran.

Today is a historic day for me. I have met many soldiers over the years, men and women, the young and the not so young.

I have found them to be just like anyone else on this planet with all of the good and bad things you can say about someone. The strengths and the weaknesses, in short they?re just Human beings.

But there are some differences.

Sometimes the question of life and death is all too present and severe.

It slaps them in the face on a daily basis. Your life passes before your eyes every second, minute, hour. There is no pause and they can?t escape it.

People sometimes ask me why I on occasion wear a military jacket or shirt. They think that my wearing such clothing contradicts my stand against the war and gives people the impression that by doing so I promote war.

When I left the military during the Viet Nam war it was customary for many soldiers on their return to wear a part of the old uniform, usually the field jacket.

I was one of them and like many former soldiers I wore it to Demonstrations and political meetings because I wanted people to know that I had served and that I had been to war.

I still remember how people would look at you, there was wonderment and respect in their eyes and you could see that the ?civilians? wanted you around, you were welcome.

They wanted someone who had been there and that now was raising his or her voice against it. It strengthened the call against the War.

A few weeks ago I met with a soldier who had decided that he would desert. He wanted no more of the US Military and was about to go underground. He came to our meeting with a big bag. He told me that he had a few things for me and pulled out his new Combat Uniform and told that he wanted to give it to me.

I gladly took it and thanked him. I understood his gesture and there was no need to discuss the obvious. Then I began to think about that singular act. Then I remembered that many times over the years, when a soldier(s) who I knew was leaving, to go wherever, some of them would give my a piece from their uniform.

In 35 years I?ve seen the Army change it?s Uniform several times and I have had at least one article from each era. This Shirt is part of the newest version of Battle Dress for the US Army, but this shirt will never see battle in a lost and criminal cause. I wear it today to honor and give respect to the soldier who had the courage to say no and walk away from an inhumane and unjust war.

The fact that I wear this soldier?s uniform is solid proof that the resistance in the US Military is growing day by day. Soldiers are waking up in droves.

I?d like to read a message from that very soldier to all of you inside this installation who are now facing deployment to Iraq in a few weeks.

There is no question that some of you will not return and under certain circumstances it is more than possible that none of would return or very few of you.

There is always the chance that you could be wiped out.

You won?t be in the best tactical situation in Iraq not to mention Afghanistan. The whole world is turning against this war.

The only people who are for it are those who profit from and those who have been misled. This is something that the president and his henchman don?t discuss with you.

You?re nothing but mere pieces on a chessboard and they?ll sacrifice you if need be or why else would they send a few hundred thousand personnel to fight millions?

This is an untenable situation, a no win situation.

Here Is The Message From The Soldier:

?Soldiers I know you have either just gotten to Germany, been deployed, or are getting ready to deploy. You don't have to do this anymore.

?I am an Iraq veteran. I am AWOL. I am not going to Afghanistan as I was supposed to.

?I went straight from arriving to Germany to getting ready to deploy just weeks later.

?Don't let the army fuck you anymore.

?You don't have to spend a year in some country as an occupying force.

?There are many ways out of this mess.

?Of course your commanders and 1st sergeants and sergeant majors don't want you to know about these ways (because they're dicks). All you have to do is walk away. The number of deserters is far greater then you think.

?If you take the time to look you will find the way out as I have.

?If you need help contact the GI rights hotline. Tell them you don't want to do this anymore and you're willing to do what it takes to get out.

?Serve your country as it truly needs to be served. Not by occupying smaller countries that never stood a chance against us, but by showing that Americans still have a backbone.

?Lets show that we haven't turned into the imperialist tyrants that our forefathers fought against 230 years ago.

?They call you America's finest. Its time to show them you truly show the finest human qualities that make up americans and say no.

?Face it; if you don't you are going to be veterans of a war that was immoral and lost from the very beginning.

?At least you will be able to look back at some point in the future and say to yourself ?I made one of the best choices of my life by not being a part of that bullshit anymore?

?When They Tell You To Go,

Just Say NO!!!

Thank You?

Do you have a friend or relative in the service? Forward GI Special along, or send us the address if you wish and we?ll send it regularly. Whether in Iraq or stuck on a base in the USA, this is extra important for your service friend, too often cut off from access to encouraging news of growing resistance to the war, inside the armed services and at home. Send email requests to address up top or write to: The Military Project, Box 126, 2576 Broadway, New York, N.Y. 10025-5657

IRAQ WAR REPORTS

IED Kills One U.S. Soldier Southwest Of Baghdad; Two Wounded

4.21.07 Multi National Corps Iraq Public Affairs Office, Camp Victory

A Task Force Marne Soldier was killed and two were wounded when their dismounted patrol was struck by a roadside bomb 15 miles southwest of Baghdad today.

U.S. Soldier Killed, Three Wounded By Baghdad IED

4/21/2007 HEADQUARTERS UNITED STATES CENTRAL COMMAND Casualty Report 07-01-03C

BAGHDAD - An MND-B Soldier died and three others were wounded when their vehicle was struck by an improvised explosive device, followed by small arms fire in a southwestern section of the Iraqi capital April 21. The unit was conducting a combat patrol in the area when the attack occurred.

U.S. Soldier Killed, Another Wounded By Small Arms Fire In Baghdad

4/21/2007 HEADQUARTERS UNITED STATES CENTRAL COMMAND Casualty Report 07-01-03C

BAGHDAD - An Multi-National Division - Baghdad Soldier died and another was wounded when a combat security patrol was attacked with small arms fire in an eastern section of Baghdad April 21.

THIS ENVIRONMENT IS HAZARDOUS TO YOUR HEALTH;

COME HOME, NOW

Mosul, Iraq: A US soldier examines debris in a crater following a truck bombing.

Photograph: Mauricio Lima/AFP/Getty News [Thanks to JM, who sent this in.]

TROOP NEWS

THIS IS HOW BUSH BRINGS THE TROOPS HOME:

BRING THEM ALL HOME NOW, ALIVE

The casket of Army Pfc. Daniel A. Fuentes April 16, 2007 at Long Island National cemetery in Farmingdale, N.Y. Fuentes, 19, of Levittown, N.Y., was killed in Baghdad, April 6, when his vehicle struck a roadside bomb. (AP Photo/Mary Altaffer)

?Iraq And Afghanistan Combat Vets Comfortable Serving With Gays And Lesbians?

[Thanks to Mark Shapiro, who sent this in.]

April 03, 2007 By Clarence Page, Washington Post [Excerpts]

How much harm do gays and lesbians really cause in the United States military? Not much, it turns out.

Judging by the latest discharge figures, the military's real policy goes like this: ?Don't ask, don't tell - just keep fighting.?

In 2006, it turns out, gay-related discharges fell to 612 from a peak of 1,273 in 2001.

That continues a revealing trend: Gay-related discharges rose sharply after the Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy went into effect in 1994 when such discharges numbered only 617.

Gay-related military discharges fell to 906 in 2002 and 787 in 2003.

Did the return of war bring a sudden upsurge in tolerance among troops and commanders for their fellow soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines (the Pentagon's numbers don't include the Coast Guard)?

As a practical matter, it appears, bigotry about gays and other groups fades rather quickly the closer one gets to the front lines of combat.

It's painfully ironic that, at a time when the military is facing recruiting and retention troubles, gays and lesbians who want to serve are not officially being allowed to serve, even when they work in such valuable jobs as translators and weapons technology.

Unofficially? That's another matter.

?We know for a fact that there are gay and lesbian service members who are serving openly,? [Steve Ralls, a spokesman for the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network] said.

?Their commanding officers are fully aware of their status and neither their commanders nor their fellow service members care one iota.?

As a Vietnam-era Army vet, that revelation doesn't fill me with shock or awe.

There's nothing new about the presence of gays or lesbians in the military. Military ranks reflect the diversity of the civilian world.

Gays in the military were not an issue that was talked about as much back in my day. In this era of political culture wars, top commanders find they have to take a public stand, whether it matches their personal positions or not.

A younger, more tolerant ?Will & Grace? generation is moving up, Ralls says, referring to the popular TV show that features a gay characters in leading roles.

A Zogby poll of Iraq and Afghanistan combat vets in December appeared to back him up.

Almost three-fourths of the vets said they were comfortable serving with gays and lesbians.

IRAQ RESISTANCE ROUNDUP

Assorted Resistance Action

04/21/2007 By SINAN SALAHEDDIN Associated Press Writer & Reuters & KIM GAMEL, Associated Press Writer

Mussayab Mayor Mehdi Abdul Hussein al-Najem and two of his bodyguards were killed in an ambush, police said. A roadside bomb exploded next to their vehicles in the attack at Mussayab, 60 km (40 miles) south of Baghdad, and guerrillas then opened fire. Three other guards were wounded.

Insurgents shot the head of the Falluja municipal council, Sami Abdul-Amir al-Jumaili, in central Falluja, police said.

Abdul-Amir was gunned down by attackers in a passing car as he was walking outside his home in central Fallujah, 40 miles west of Baghdad, according to police. It had been a month since he agreed to take the dangerous job.

The four city council were killed over the past 14 months as insurgents target fellow Sunnis willing to cooperate with the U.S. and its Iraqi partners.

IF YOU DON?T LIKE THE RESISTANCE

END THE OCCUPATION

OCCUPATION ISN?T LIBERATION

BRING ALL THE TROOPS HOME NOW!

FORWARD OBSERVATIONS

At a time like this, scorching irony, not convincing argument, is needed. Oh had I the ability, and could reach the nation?s ear, I would, pour out a fiery stream of biting ridicule, blasting reproach, withering sarcasm, and stern rebuke. For it is not light that is needed, but fire; it is not the gentle shower, but thunder. We need the storm, the whirlwind, and the earthquake. Frederick Douglas, 1852

One day while I was in a bunker in Vietnam, a sniper round went over my head. The person who fired that weapon was not a terrorist, a rebel, an extremist, or a so-called insurgent. The Vietnamese individual who tried to kill me was a citizen of Vietnam, who did not want me in his country. This truth escapes millions.

Mike Hastie

U.S. Army Medic

Vietnam 1970-71

December 13, 2004

April 16, 1971: Magnificent Anniversary:

There Were Never More Honorable Soldiers

Carl Bunin Peace History April 16-22 & PBS.org

Members of Vietnam Veterans Against the War (VVAW) threw medals they had earned in Vietnam on the U.S. Capitol steps in protest of the Vietnam War.

Songwriter/Singer Country Joe McDonald wrote and first performed the 'I Feel Like I'm Fixing to Die Rag' in 1965. The chorus of that song, which gained fame at the 1969 Woodstock Music Festival, was as follows.

And it's one, two, three,

What are we fighting for?

Don't ask me, I don't give a damn,

Next stop is Vietnam;

And it's five, six, seven, eight

Open up the pearly gates,

Well there ain't no time to wonder why,

Whoopee! We're all gonna die.

The strongest verse of the song was:

Well, come on mothers throughout the land,

Pack your boys off to Vietnam.

Come on fathers, don't hesitate,

Send 'em off before it's too late.

Be the first one on your block

To have your boy come home in a box.

And it's one, two, three,

What are we fighting for?

Don't ask me, I don't give a damn,

Next stop is Vietnam;

And it's five, six, seven, eight

Open up the pearly gates,

Well there ain't no time to wonder why,

Whoopee! We're all gonna die.

The Warsaw Ghetto Uprising

April 19, 1943: Solemn Anniversary:

In Memory Of Those Who Died Courageously Resisting An Imperial Army Of Occupation, Arms In Hand

Carl Bunin Peace History April 16-22 & PBS.org

The Warsaw Ghetto Uprising began when Nazi forces attempted to clear out the Jewish ghetto in Warsaw, Poland, and were met by unexpected gunfire from Jewish resistance fighters.

The Warsaw Ghetto, the largest ghetto established by Nazi Germany and in existence for three years, was the site of one of the first mass uprisings in Nazi-occupied Europe. The Nazis sealed the ghetto in 1940.

Through disease, Nazi-created starvation diets and deportations to concentration camps and extermination camps, the population diminished from 450,000 to 37,000.

The Nazis conducted mass deportations from July to September 1942.

An underground resistance movement rose up in response. Then came the second wave of deportations, resulting in hand-to-hand resistance.

The deportations continued for a few more days, then ended, after which resisters, weakened from disastrous conditions, united for the ultimate uprising, which was a pivotal event in the history of Jewish resistance to Nazi tyranny.

The Nazis began the final liquidation of the ghetto the eve of Passover, April 19, 1943.

Resisters held off the Nazis for three weeks, using precious few and largely ineffectual weapons, but they were determined to go out fighting, decrease the number of Nazis, and hopefully serve to let the whole world know of the plight of the Jews.

The Ludlow Massacre

April 20, 1914:

Infamous Anniversary:

Soldiers Dishonor Their Uniforms Slaughtering Women And Children To Serve The Rich:

Except For A Few Honorable Soldiers Who Resist, The Colorado National Guard Becomes Notorious All Over The World As Foul, Cowardly Strike-Breaking Scum

Eighty-two soldiers in a company on a troop train headed for Trinidad refused to go. The men declared they would not engage in the shooting of women and children.

Carl Bunin Peace History April 16-22 & PBS.org

A lot more than 2,000 miles separated the Rockefeller estate from Southern Colorado when on Monday April 20, 1914, the first shot was fired at Ludlow.

One of history's most dramatic confrontations between capital and labor ? the Ludlow massacre ? took place at the mines of the Rockefeller-owned Colorado Fuel and Iron Company (CF&I).

Troops from the Colorado state militia attacked strikers, killing 25 (half women and children), in Ludlow. Two women and eleven children who suffocated in a pit they had dug under their tent.

Having struck the Rockefeller-owned Colorado Fuel and Iron Company the previous September for improved conditions, better wages, and union recognition, the workers established a tent camp which was fired upon and ultimately torched during the 14-hour siege.

The Ludlow Massacre

[The following was excerpted from Howard Zinn's A PEOPLE'S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES (pgs 346-349).]

?... shortly after Woodrow Wilson took office there began in Colorado one of the most bitter and violent struggles between workers and corporate capital in the history of the country.

This was the Colorado coal strike that began in September 1913 and culminated in the 'Ludlow Massacre' of April 1914.

Eleven thousand miners in southern Colorado ... worked for the Colorado Fuel & Iron Corporation, which was owned by the Rockefeller family.

Aroused by the murder of one of their organizers, they went on strike against low pay, dangerous conditions, and feudal domination of their lives in towns completely controlled by the mining companies.?

?When the strike began, the miners were immediately evicted from their shacks in the mining towns. Aided by the United Mine Workers Union, they set up tents in the nearby hills and carried on the strike, the picketing, from these tent colonies.

The gunmen hired by the Rockefeller interests -- the Baldwin- Felts Detective Agency -- using Gatling guns and rifles, raided the tent colonies.

The death list of miners grew, but they hung on, drove back an armored train in a gun battle, fought to keep out strikebreakers.

With the miners resisting, refusing to give in, the mines not able to operate, the Colorado governor (referred to by a Rockefeller mine manager as 'our little cowboy governor') called out the National Guard, with the Rockefellers supplying the Guard's wages.

?The miners at first thought the Guard was sent to protect them, and greeted its arrival with flags and cheers.

They soon found out the Guard was there to destroy the strike.

The Guard brought strikebreakers in under cover of night, not telling them there was a strike.

Guardsmen beat miners, arrested them by the hundreds, rode down with their horses parades of women in the streets of Trinidad, the central town in the area.

And still the miners refused to give in.

When they lasted through the cold winter of 1913-1914, it became clear that extraordinary measures would be needed to break the strike.

?In April 1914, two National Guard companies were stationed in the hills overlooking the largest tent colony of strikers, the one at Ludlow, housing a thousand men, women, children.

On the morning of April 20, a machine gun attack began on the tents.

The miners fired back.

Their leader was lured up into the hills to discuss a truce, then shot to death by a company of National Guardsmen.

The women and children dug pits beneath the tents to escape the gunfire.

At dusk, the Guard moved down from the hills with torches, set fire to the tents, and the families fled into the hills; thirteen people were killed by gunfire.

?The following day, a telephone linesman going through the ruins of the Ludlow tent colony lifted an iron cot covering a pit in one of the tents and found the charred, twisted bodies of eleven children and two women.

This became known as the Ludlow Massacre.

?The news spread quickly over the country.

In Denver, the United Mine Workers issued a 'Call to Arms' -- 'Gather together for defensive purposes all arms and ammunition legally available.' Three hundred armed strikers marched from other tent colonies into the Ludlow area, cut telephone and telegraph wires, and prepared for battle.

Railroad workers refused to take soldiers from Trinidad to Ludlow.

At Colorado Springs, three hundred union miners walked off their jobs and headed for the Trinidad district, carrying revolvers, rifles, shotguns.

?In Trinidad itself, miners attended a funeral service for the twenty-six dead at Ludlow, then walked from the funeral to a nearby building, where arms were stacked for them.

They picked up rifles and moved into the hills, destroying mines, killing mine guards, exploding mine shafts.

The press reported that 'the hills in every direction seem suddenly to be alive with men.'

?In Denver, eighty-two soldiers in a company on a troop train headed for Trinidad refused to go. The press reported: 'The men declared they would not engage in the shooting of women and children.

They hissed the 350 men who did start and shouted imprecations at them.

?Five thousand people demonstrated in the rain on the lawn in front of the state capital at Denver asking that the National Guard officers at Ludlow be tried for murder, denouncing the governor as an accessory.

The Denver Cigar Makers Union voted to send five hundred armed men to Ludlow and Trinidad.

Women in the United Garment Workers Union in Denver announced four hundred of their members had volunteered as nurses to help the strikers.

?All over the country there were meetings, demonstrations.

Pickets marched in front of the Rockefeller office at 26 Broadway, New York City.

A minister protested in front of the church where Rockefeller sometimes gave sermons, and was clubbed by the police.

?The New York Times carried an editorial on the events in Colorado, which were not attracting international attention.

The Times emphasis was not on the atrocity that had occurred, but on the mistake in tactics that had been made.

Its editorial on the Ludlow Massacre began: 'Somebody blundered ... '

Two days later, with the miners armed and in the hills of the mine district, the Times wrote: 'With the deadliest weapons of civilization in the hands of savage-mined men, there can be no telling to what lengths the war in Colorado will go unless it is quelled by force ... The President should turn his attention from Mexico long enough to take stern measures in Colorado.'

?The governor of Colorado ask for federal troops to restore order, and Woodrow Wilson complied.

This accomplished, the strike petered out.

Congressional committees came in and took thousands of pages of testimony.

The union had not won recognition.

Sixty-six men, women, and children had been killed.

Not one militiaman or mine guard had been indicted for crime.

?The Times had referred to Mexico.

On the morning that the bodies were discovered in the tent pit at Ludlow, American warships were attacking Vera Cruz, a city on the coast of Mexico--bombarding it, occupying it, leaving a hundred Mexicans dead--because Mexico had arrested American sailors and refused to apologize to the United States with a twenty-one gun salute.

Could patriotic fervor and the military spirit cover up class struggle?

Unemployment, hard times, were growing in 1914.

Could guns divert attention and create some national consensus against an external enemy?

It surely was a coincidence--the bombardment of Vera Cruz, the attack on the Ludlow colony.

Or perhaps it was, as someone once described human history, 'the natural selection of accidents.'

Perhaps the affair in Mexico was an instinctual response of the system for its own survival, to create a unity of fighting purpose among a people torn by internal conflict.

?The bombardment of Vera Cruz was a small incident.

But in four months the First World War would begin in Europe.

Tiananmen Square:

April 21, 1989: Honorable Anniversary

Pissed Off People Rise Up Against A Corrupt Government Of Tyrants, Exploiters And Oppressors

Carl Bunin Peace History April 16-22

Six days after the death of Hu Yaobang, the deposed reform-minded leader of the Chinese Communist Party, some 100,000 students from more than 40 universities gathered at Beijing's Tiananmen Square to commemorate Hu, voice their discontent with China's authoritative communist government, and call for greater democracy.

Ignoring government warnings of violent suppression of any mass demonstration, the students were joined by workers, intellectuals, and civil servants.

April 22, 1992: Honorable Anniversary

Serbs Stand Up Against A Politician?s Plan For War

Carl Bunin Peace History April 16-22

50,000 attended an anti-war rock concert in Belgrade, Serbia.

June 1994 By Ivan Vejvoda, New Internationalist [Excerpt]

It may come as a surprise to many Westerners that there was a large, spontaneous opposition within Serbia and Montenegro to the war waged by the Milosevic regime. Mostly it took the form of resisting conscription into the armed forces.

In Belgrade only 10 per cent responded to the call-up to what was then, in 1991, still the Yugoslav People?s Army (JNA).

Thousands of young conscripts went into ?internal exile? hiding with friends and relatives. The latter would ignore knocks at the door so as to avoid receiving the call-up orders. Thousands of potential conscripts left the country and headed for Britain, France, Germany, Holland and Greece. Visas were not needed then ? as they are today.

Even among those who did obey the draft, there was resistance.

The story of young Miroslav Milenkovic from a small town in Serbia is a poignant example of the dilemma faced by many.

When the new conscript reached barracks his unit had already split in two ? between those who agreed to go to the front and those who were refusing.

Milenkovic went from one group to another, not knowing which group of friends and relatives to side with. At one point he stopped and, standing between the two groups, took his rifle and shot himself.

Dubbya Horrified

From: Z

To: GI Special

Sent: April 18, 2007

Subject: dubbya horrified

The same White House schmuck who pretends to be horrified by the massacre at Virginia Tech has killed one hundred times more Americans in Iraq -- twice as many in the first eighteen days of this month alone.

If anything, the son of a bitch is delighted that the carnage in Virginia has briefly taken people's minds off the slaughter he's been conducting for years in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Damn, a murderous king like Henry VIII at least never claimed to be horrifed by spouse abuse!

Solidarity,

OCCUPATION REPORT

U.S. OCCUPATION RECRUITING DRIVE IN HIGH GEAR;

RECRUITING FOR THE ARMED RESISTANCE THAT IS

A foreign occupation soldier from U.S. Gator Company 2-12 Infantry Battalion stands guard inside an Iraqi citizen?s home as the homeowner is interrogated by a platoon leader in the al-Dora neighborhood of southern Baghdad. (AFP/David Furst)

Iraqi citizens have no right to resist home invasions by occupation soldiers from the USA. If they do, they may be arrested, wounded, or killed.

[There?s nothing quite like invading somebody else?s country and busting into their houses by force to arouse an intense desire to kill you in the patriotic, self-respecting civilians who live there.

[But your commanders know that, don?t they? Don?t they?]

U.S. Military Dictatorship In Baghdad Imitating Hitler?s Tactics In Warsaw:

?This Is Collective Punishment?

?This Will Make The Whole District A Prison?

[warsaw-life.com]

Warsaw Ghetto Checkpoint

Plans for a Jewish ghetto had in fact existed since the beginning of the Nazi occupation of Warsaw, but in October 1940 they finally began to take form.

In November that area was closed off by a formidable wall, topped with barbed wire.

*****************************************

04/21/2007 By SINAN SALAHEDDIN Associated Press Writer

BAGHDAD- A wall U.S. troops are building around a Sunni enclave in Baghdad came under increasing criticism on Saturday, with residents calling it ?collective punishment? and a local leader saying construction began without the neighborhood council's approval.

The area, located on the eastern side of the Tigris River, would be completely gated, with entrances and exits manned by Iraqi soldiers, the U.S. military said earlier this week.

?This will make the whole district a prison.

?This is collective punishment on the residents of Azamiyah,? said Ahmed al-Dulaimi, a 41-year-old engineer who lives in the area.

?They are going to punish all of us because of a few terrorists here and there.?

?We are in our fourth year of occupation and we are seeing the number of blast walls increasing day after day, suffocating the people more and more,? al-Dulaimi said in an interview.

Community leaders said Saturday that construction began before they had approved an American proposal for the wall.

?A few days ago, we met with the U.S. army unit in charge of Azamiyah and it asked us, as a local council, to sign a document to build a wall to reduce killing and attacks against Iraqi and U.S. forces,? said Dawood al-Azami, the acting head of the Azamiyah council.

?I told the soldiers that I would not sign it unless I could talk to residents first. We told residents at Friday prayers, but our local council hasn't signed onto the project yet, and construction is already under way.?

Warsaw 1940:

?In November that area was closed off by a formidable wall, topped with barbed wire.?

Baghdad 2007:

In April that area was closed off by a formidable wall, topped with barbed wire.

This undated document released by the Azamiyah local council in Baghdad, Iraq on April 20, 2007, shows plans for building a security barrier around a Sunni Muslim neighborhood. (AP Photo/Azamiyah local council in Baghdad)

U.S. Army Paratroopers from the 407th Brigade Support Battalion, 2nd BCT, 82nd Airborne Division, watch as cranes lift and swing concrete barriers into place alongside a road in Azamiyah, Baghdad, April 10, 2007. (AP Photo/Sgt. Mike Pryor, U.S. Army)

Troops Invited:

What do you think? Comments from service men and women, and veterans, are especially welcome. Write to Box 126, 2576 Broadway, New York, N.Y. 10025-5657 or send email contact@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx:. Name, I.D., withheld unless you request publication. Replies confidential. Same address to unsubscribe.

OCCUPATION PALESTINE

[Thanks to Mark Shapiro, who sent this in.]

[To check out what life is like under a murderous military occupation by foreign terrorists, go to: www.rafahtoday.org The occupied nation is Palestine. The foreign terrorists call themselves ?Israeli.?]

If printed out, this newsletter is your personal property and cannot legally be confiscated from you. ?Possession of unauthorized material may not be prohibited.? DoD Directive 1325.6 Section 3.5.1.2.

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