President's Report (VFP)

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President's Report
by Elliott Adams


We have been struggling for 5 years, first to prevent, and now to stop the occupation of Iraq. In that time we have won support of the public, of the soldiers, of the Iraqis, and of the world. Even so this administration has not budged toward ending the occupation. This does not mean we have failed, rather it means we are in a higher stakes struggle than many of us realized.

For those few who are profiting from this occupation the profits are so great they will not give it up with ordinary dissent. What we have done in these 5 years would have been more than adequate to correct normal problems in normal times, but these are not normal times and we face extraordinary problems. If our government was, like the American Dream, a government of the people for the people, we would have stopped this occupation already.

This struggle is longer and more serious then we originally thought. We need to reassess our resources and ourselves. Instead of being like farmers who grab a rifle and run out to shoot from behind a stonewall, we need to study and train as seriously as we did when were in the military. For this struggle we need new tools, the tools and strategies of nonviolence. We all are familiar with them at some level, but we are not proficient. We are sort of like Boy Scouts who have learned to pitch a tent and dig a latrine but are far from being soldiers; we are not disciplined proficient nonviolent warriors. Since we lack organized systems for spreading the knowledge and skills of nonviolence, becoming proficient will be its own challenge. Each member, maybe each Chapter, is going to have to take responsibility for studying and practicing the skills and strategies of nonviolence themselves or in small groups. Fortunately there are many resources available: web sites, workshops, and books. There are materials we can use ranging from light introductory to scholarly works; covering personal nonviolence to nonviolent strategies for social change; on the practical and on the theoretical. And there is a well-documented history of nonviolent strategies that have created social change, overthrown violent and powerful despots, and even opposed armies.

But external strategies are not enough because the power holders will actively try to destroy us from within. Like the days of Co Intel Pro they will use informants, agent provocateurs and subversives in our midst. We must counter their use of these tactics. Secrecy is the lifeblood of the Informant Agents; by using only tactics that do not rely on secrecy we can disable these agents. We can limit the impact of Agents Provocateurs by being disciplined, not giving into frustration and emotion, and by always thinking about the strategic implications of our actions. The Subversive Agents who sow dissent and distrust are probably the most damaging and hardest to neutralize. They plant rumors and even false evidence to get us to distrust our brothers and sisters, our leaders, and our organizations. It is their work to tear apart our movement from within and divide us. To neutralize them we must learn to question every rumor, and to doubt words of meanness about our brothers and sisters. We know many of the techniques that are effective against these agents, they are just hard to actually do. These are the basic skills for getting along with each other: generosity and open mindedness in judging each other, conflict resolution tools, believing that we all have a piece of the truth, and loving thy neighbor as thy self. In the 60's Co Intel Pro agents would make one of our own appear to be a government agent and incite us to form a circular firing squad. We must be strong and self disciplined, instead of attacking our own, we must help those who the government will target, our most vulnerable brothers and sisters.

The members and chapters of Veterans For Peace have done incredible actions in this struggle, both in terms of personal commitment and in terms of impact on the whole peace movement. Because of what our members have done, the peace movement looks up to VFP as a leader in the movement. And make no mistake about it, the movement has had a very big impact. You can see the change in every poll and in the attitudes on every street corner of the USA. This has happened because we kept the issue in the public eye. For example remember how they didn't want to talk about Iraq during the elections? We kept Iraq in the forefront and made the elections into a plebiscite on the Iraq. The Democratic leadership does not want to talk about impeachment; we are not letting them sweep it under the table. The military does not want the public to hear from the soldiers who now see the truth; we help to keep them in the limelight. From coast to coast and issue by issue VFP is at the forefront and making a difference.

We are in a deadly struggle. Everyday we don't stop this war more of our brothers and sisters die in the sand. And, even though we wage a nonviolent movement, the power holders will do whatever they can to stop us, they will beat and kill some of us. But we cannot loose heart, our brothers and sisters in uniform are depending on us, our nation depends on us, even the world needs us to abolish war as an instrument of national policy.

While the dark cloak of war wraps around us we see them, once again, using war and fear mongering to steal away our rights, killing our brothers and sisters, and robbing the wealth of the nation. We, Veterans For Peace, must stand at the forefront of the defense of the true principles of this nation. We must stand together and stand strong.