May 2005

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Reflections on Organizing to Stop the US War Against Vietnam

David Hartsough is co-founder of and Strategic Relations Director for the Nonviolent Peaceforce (www.nonviolentpeaceforce.org). Peaceworkers/Nonviolent Peaceforce, 721 Shrader St., San Francisco, CA 94117, 415/751-0302. He lives in San Francisco, CA.

Organizers across the country are discussing strategy. What approaches will help us stop the war in Iraq: civil disobedience, congressional lobbying, or both? Here are a few reflections on this question from my own experience during the US war against Vietnam.

From 1965-70 I was a Friends Committee on National Legislation (FCNL) lobbyist in Washington working to help end the war. As part of that work, we worked hard to help Congress and others in Washington to understand the truth about what was going on in Vietnam. The truth was hard to find from anything coming out of the Administration -- or even from the mainstream media, especially in the early years of the war. Later, we worked with sympathetic members of Congress to introduce legislation: in particular the McGovern-Hatfield amendment to cut off funding for the war (For an interview with Senator Hatfield, see www.sojo.net/index.cfm?action=magazine.article&mode=printer_friendly&issue=soj9609&article=960922).

While working hard to help educate and bring political pressure to bear on Congress to help end the war, I also participated in nonviolent direct action to help end the war. This included:

1. Reading the names of the US soldiers killed in Vietnam while standing on the Capitol steps every Wednesday at noon for many weeks. Each week, police arrested us.

2. Participating in the Vietnam moratorium in October 1969 and helping organize a "stopping business as usual" action in the House of Representatives. While hundreds of thousands demonstrated throughout the country, anti-war members of Congress held a "Teach In" in Congress.

3. Helping to organize and participating in the People's Blockade of ships carrying arms, bombs, and munitions to kill the people of Vietnam.

4. Participating in the massive nonviolent anti-war demonstrations in DC in the spring of 1971, where over 13,000 people were arrested in one week (For more information on the 1971 Mayday actions, see www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa4053/is_200212/ai_n9149052).

After we had been reading the names of the US war dead for many weeks, and after being arrested and hauled off to jail with a number of other concerned Quakers, I visited Congressman George Brown of California. I shared with him what we were doing and what was happening to us for solemnly attempting to read the names of all the US war dead. I asked him what he might be able to do to help us.

I will never forget George's response. He said, "I think I will join you tomorrow. I will write a letter to every member of Congress telling them I am joining you and inviting them to join me in reading the names of the war dead too."

The next day, George Brown and two other members of Congress joined us. When the rest of us were arrested, the Congressmen were left reading the names since they had Congressional immunity and could not be arrested. That got good national publicity. Within days, tens of thousands of people were reading the names of the US war dead at Federal buildings and in front of post offices across the country.

When we were nonviolently blocking the ships carrying bombs to kill our brothers and sisters in Vietnam (in our canoes and small sailboats), we had the opportunity to meet personally with some of the sailors on the Navy ships. When one of the ships, the USS Nitro, lifted anchor in Leonardo, NJ, we paddled madly to keep in front of it to block it from taking the bombs to Vietnam. Seven sailors jumped off the front of the ship and attempted to join our nonviolent blockade. This garnered major publicity around the world and I believe helped give a big boost to the resistance within the US military. Our resistance had given the sailors courage. This encouraged many others in the military to stand up for what they believed ñ even if this meant ending up in the military brig (for more information on the revolt in the US armed forces, see http://chss.montclair.edu/english/furr/Vietnam/heinl.html). The depth of resistance in the military, in addition to the growing anti-war sentiment across the country, finally convinced Congress to cut off funds for the war.

I believe nonviolent witness and civil disobedience was complementary to the work of lobbying Congress to help end the war. The nonviolent direct actions engaged in by thousands and eventually tens of thousands of people across the country helped Congress realize the depth of concern and resistance to continuing the war. It helped give them more courage to speak out and eventually vote to defund and help end the war. Of course, it is critical, for strategic as well as ethical reasons, that resistance remain completely nonviolent. A mixed nonviolent and violent resistance makes it much more difficult to keep the focus on the issue, since the media often get sidetracked into covering the violence rather than the reason for our resistance.

Yes, lets keep resisting this horrendous war and US occupation of Iraq in every nonviolent way we can think of. The lives of the Iraqi people hinge on it. The future of the soul of America depends on it.

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