Ifoto nguJoseph Sohm/Shutterstock.com
February 15 marks the day, 17 years ago, when global demonstrations against the pending Iraq invasion were so massive that the New York Times called world public opinion “the second superpower.” But the U.S. ignored it and invaded Iraq anyway. So what has become of the momentous hopes of that day?
The U.S. military has not won a war since 1945, unless you count recovering the tiny colonial outposts of Grenada, Panama and Kuwait, but there is one threat it has consistently outmaneuvered without firing more than a few deadly rifle shots and some tear gas. Ironically, this existential threat is the very one that could peacefully cut it down to size and take away its most dangerous and expensive weapons: its own peace-loving citizens.
During the Vietnam war, young Americans facing a life-and-death draft lottery built a powerful anti-war movement. President Nixon proposed ending the draft as a way to undermine the peace movement, since he believed that young people would stop protesting the war once they were no longer obligated to fight. In 1973, the draft was ended, leaving a volunteer army that insulated the vast majority of Americans from the deadly impact of America’s wars.
Despite the lack of a draft, a new anti-war movement—this time with global reach—sprung up in the period between the crimes of 9/11 and the illegal U.S. invasion of Iraq in March 2003. The February 15, 2003, protests were the largest demonstrations in human history, uniting people around the world in opposition to the unthinkable prospect that the U.S. would actually launch its threatened “shock and awe” assault on Iraq. Some 30 million people in 800 cities took part on every continent, including Antarctica. This massive repudiation of war, memorialized in the documentary We Are Many, led New York Times journalist Patrick E. Tyler to comment that there were now two superpowers on the planet: the United States and world public opinion.
The U.S. war machine demonstrated total disdain for its upstart rival, and unleashed an illegal war based on lies that has now raged on through many phases of violence and chaos for 17 years. With no end in sight to U.S. and allied wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia, Libya, Syria, Palestine, Yemen and West Africa, and Trump’s escalating diplomatic and economic warfare against Iran, Venezuela and North Korea threatening to explode into new wars, where is the second superpower now, when we need it more than ever?
During the Vietnam war, young Americans facing a life-and-death draft lottery built a powerful anti-war movement
Ifoto nguJStone/Shutterstock.com
Since the U.S. assassination of Iran’s General Soleimani in Iraq on January 2, the peace movement has reemerged onto the streets, including people who marched in February 2003 and new activists too young to remember a time when the U.S. was not at war. There have been three separate days of protest, one on January 4, another on the 9th and a global day of action on the 25th. The rallies took place in hundreds of cities, but they did not attract nearly the numbers who came out to protest the pending war with Iraq in 2003, or even those of the smaller rallies and vigils that continued as the Iraq war spiraled out of control until at least 2007.
Ukusilela kwethu ukumisa imfazwe yase-US e-Iraq ngo-2003 kwakudimaza kakhulu. Kodwa inani labantu abasebenzela umlo wokulwa imfazwe e-US lancanca ngakumbi emva konyulo luka-2008 lukaBarack Obama. Uninzi lwabantu aluzange lufune ukubonakalisa u-Mongameli wokuqala omnyama welizwe, kwaye uninzi, kuquka ne-Nobel Peace Prize Committee, bakholelwa ukuba uza kuba "ngumongameli woxolo."
While Obama reluctantly honored Bush’s agreement with the Iraqi government to withdraw U.S. troops from Iraq and he signed the Iran nuclear deal, he was far from a peace president. He oversaw a new doctrine of covert and proxy war that substantially reduced U.S. military casualties, but unleashed an escalation of the war in Afghanistan, a campaign against ISIS in Iraq and Syria that destroyed entire cities, a ten-fold increase in CIA drone strikes on Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia, and bloody proxy wars in Libya and Syria that rage on today. In the end, Obama spent more on the military and dropped more bombs on more countries than Bush did. He also refused to hold Bush and his cronies responsible for their war crimes.
Obama’s wars were no more successful than Bush’s in restoring peace or stability to any of those countries or improving the lives of their people. But Obama’s “disguised, quiet, media-free approach” to war made the U.S. state of endless war much more politically sustainable. By reducing U.S. casualties and waging war with less fanfare, he moved America’s wars farther into the shadows and gave the American public an illusion of peace in the midst of endless war, effectively disarming and dividing the peace movement.
Umgaqo-nkqubo wemfazwe oyimfihlo wase-Obama uxhaswa ngumkhankaso okhohlakeleyo ngokuchasene nabanempempe abanesibindi abazama ukuyikhupha ekukhanyeni. UJeffrey Sterling, uThomas Drake, uCanning Manning, uJohn Kiriakou, uEdward Snowden kwaye ngoku uJulian Assange batshutshiswa kwaye bavalelwa entolongweni phantsi kwenkcazo entsha engazange ibonwe ngaphambili yeWWI-era Espionage Act.
Ndikunye noDonald Trump kwi-White House, siva abantu baseRiphabhlikhi besenza izizathu ezifanayo zikaTrump-owayebaleka kwiqonga elilwa nemfazwe-le Democrats yenzela u-Obama. Okokuqala, abaxhasi bakhe bamkela inkonzo yomlomo malunga nokuphelisa iimfazwe kwaye babuyise amajoni ekhaya echaza eyona nto ayifunayo umongameli, njengokuba esalusa iimfazwe. Okwesibini, basicela ukuba sibe nomonde ngoba, nangaphandle kwabo bonke ubungqina benene behlabathi, bayaqiniseka ukuba usebenza nzima emva kwezikhuselo zoxolo. Okwesithathu, kwikopi yokugqibela ejongela phantsi ezinye iimpikiswano zabo ezimbini, baphakamisa izandla zabo besithi "kuphela" ngumongameli, kwaye iPentagon okanye "imeko enzulu" inamandla kakhulu kuye.
Obama and Trump supporters alike have used this shaky tripod of political unaccountability to give the man behind the desk where the buck used to stop an entire deck of “get out of jail free” cards for endless war and war crimes.
Since the U.S. assassination of Iran’s General Soleimani in Iraq on January 2, the peace movement has reemerged onto the streets
Ifoto nguJohn Gomez/Shutterstock.com
Indlela ka-Obama no-Trump "yokufihlakala, ezolileyo, neyeendaba" emfazweni iye yanyanzela iimfazwe zaseMelika kunye nomkhosi ochasene nentsholongwane yedemokhrasi, kodwa iintshukumo ezintsha zentlalo zikhulele ukujongana neengxaki kufutshane nasekhaya. Ingxaki yemali ikhokelele ekunyukeni kweNtshukumo yezaBasebenzi, kwaye ngoku imeko yemozulu kunye nogqatso lweMelika oluzinzileyo kunye neengxaki zokufudukela kwelinye ilizwe zonke zivuselele intshukumo entsha yengca. Amagqwetha oxolo aye akhuthaza ezi ntshukumo ukuba zijoyine umnxeba wokuncitshiswa okukhulu kwePentagon, enyanzelisa ukuba amakhulu ezigidi ezigciniweyo anganceda ekuxhaseni yonke into ukusuka kwiMedicare for All to the Green New Deal ukuya kwizifundo zasekholejini zasimahla.
A few sectors of the peace movement have been showing how to use creative tactics and build diverse movements. The movement for Palestinians’ human and civil rights includes students, Muslim and Jewish groups, as well as black and indigenous groups fighting similar struggles here at home. Also inspirational are campaigns for peace on the Korean peninsula led by Korean Americans, such as Women Cross the DMZ, which has brought together women from North Korea, South Korea and the United States to show the Trump administration what real diplomacy looks like.
There have also been successful popular efforts pushing a reluctant Congress to take anti-war positions. For decades, Congress has been only too happy to leave warmaking to the president, abrogating its constitutional role as the only power authorized to declare war. Thanks to public pressure, there has been a remarkable shift. In 2019, both houses of Congress voted to end U.S. support for the Saudi-led war in Yemen and to ban arms sales to Saudi Arabia for the war in Yemen, although President Trump vetoed both bills.
Ngoku iCongress isebenza kwiibhili zokuthintela ngokucacileyo imfazwe engagunyaziswanga e-Iran. Le mithetho isayilwayo ingqina ukuba uxinzelelo loluntu lunokuyisusa iCongress, kubandakanywa neSenethi elawulwa yiRiphabhlikhi, ukuba ibuyise amandla ayo omgaqo-siseko kwimfazwe noxolo kwisebe lesigqeba.
Another bright light in Congress is the pioneering work of first-term Congressperson Ilhan Omar, who recently laid out a series of bills called Pathway to PEACE that challenge our militaristic foreign policy. While her bills will be hard to get passed in Congress, they lay out a marker for where we should be headed. Omar’s office, unlike many others in Congress, actually works directly with grassroots organizations that can push this vision forward.
A new president like Bernie Sanders in the White House would create a new opening for peace
Ifoto nguJohnny Silvercloud/Shutterstock.com
The presidential election offers an opportunity to push the anti-war agenda. The most effective and committed anti-war champion in the race is Bernie Sanders. The popularity of his call for getting the U.S. out of its imperial interventions and his votes against 84 percent of military spending bills since 2013 are reflected not only in his poll numbers but also in the way other Democratic candidates are rushing to take similar positions. All now say the U.S. should rejoin the Iran nuclear deal; all have criticized the “bloated” Pentagon budget, despite regularly voting for it; and most have promised to bring U.S. troops home from the greater Middle East.
Ke, xa sijonga kwikamva kulo nyaka lonyulo, ngawaphi amathuba ethu okuvuselela amandla ehlabathi yesibini kunye nokuphelisa iimfazwe zaseMelika?
Absent a major new war, we are unlikely to see big demonstrations in the streets. But two decades of endless war have created a strong anti-war sentiment among the public. A 2019 Pew Research Center poll found that 62 percent of Americans said the war in Iraq was not worth fighting and 59 percent said the same for the war in Afghanistan.
On Iran, a September 2019 University of Maryland poll showed that a mere one-fifth of Americans said the U.S. “should be prepared to go to war” to achieve its goals in Iran, while three-quarters said that U.S. goals do not warrant military intervention. Along with the Pentagon’s assessment of how disastrous a war with Iran would be, this public sentiment fueled global protests and condemnation that have temporarily forced Trump to dial down his military escalation and threats against Iran.
Ke, lo gama urhulumente wethu wasasaza emfazweni waqinisekisa abantu abaninzi baseMelika ukuba asinamandla okuphelisa iimfazwe zentlekele, iye yasilela ekuqinisekiseni uninzi lwabantu baseMelika ukuba asiphosakalanga. Njengakweminye imiba, ubutshantliziyo bunezithintelo ezibini eziphambili ekufuneka zisiwe: okokuqala ukweyisela abantu ukuba kukho into engalunganga; okwesibini ukubabonisa ukuba, ngokusebenzisana ukwakha intshukumo edumileyo, singenza okuthile ngayo.
The peace movement’s small victories demonstrate that we have more power to challenge U.S. militarism than most Americans realize. As more peace-loving people in the U.S. and across the world discover the power they really have, the second superpower we glimpsed briefly on February 15, 2003 has the potential to rise stronger, more committed and more determined from the ashes of two decades of war.
Medea Benjamin protesting war with Iran
Ifoto nguMaria Oswalt/Shutterstock.com
A new president like Bernie Sanders in the White House would create a new opening for peace. But as on many domestic issues, that opening will only bear fruit and overcome the opposition of powerful vested interests if there is a mass movement behind it every step of the way. If there is a lesson for peace-loving Americans in the Obama and Trump presidencies, it is that we cannot just walk out of the voting booth and leave it to a champion in the White House to end our wars and bring us peace. In the final analysis, it really is up to us. Please join us. Z
UMedea Benjamin ungumseki weCODEPINK yoXolo, kunye nombhali weencwadi ezininzi, kubandakanya Ngaphakathi kwe-Iran: Imbali Yembali kunye nezopolitiko zeRiphabhliki yase-Iran.
UNicolas JS Davies yintatheli ezimeleyo, umphandi nge-CODEPINK kunye nombhali we Igazi Ngezandla Zethu: Ukumenywa kweMelika kunye nokubhujiswa kweIraq.