Camp Casey, War Resistors and a mothers womb
By Dede Miller
My sister had her womb removed yesterday. There was an abnormality on one ovary and now the scare of cancer looms over us. The cradle that held Casey, Carly, Andy and Janey now sits in a pathologists office in a jar. My sister lives her life for her children. All adults now they miss their mother's constant presence but understand their mothers work. They are incredibly well adjusted. As I sit in the hospital outside of Cindy's room a new mom just rolled by. New baby son in her arms. I remember the night Casey was born. He was the first in our family. Looking into baby Casey's eyes we knew he was an old soul, destined for big things. His dying in order to inspire his mom to spark the peace movement was really not what we expected.
Cindy's quest since shortly after Casey was killed was to end the war so the no more families and in particular mothers don't have to suffer the extreme pain of the loss of a child.
A few years ago I was watching a National Geographic special on Snow Monkeys. One segment examined how a mother snow monkey grieved the loss of her baby. The snow monkey mom held her baby and wailed the most mournful sound I had ever heard in my life, until Casey died. The sounds of grief that came from my sister came from a place so deep I really can't fathom it. An Aunties pain though very real does not compare. Losing a child is an abomination and the pain is primordial. A universal pain that is felt by snow monkey moms, American moms, Iraqi moms, Israeli moms, Lebanese moms, Palestinian moms, etc..
This summer we have declared Camp Casey a sanctuary for war resistors. The war in Iraq is an illegal and immoral war. We were lied to about the reasons for going into Iraq as proved by the Downing Street memo and the Valerie Plame/ Joe Wilson or Plame gate leak. Our soul purpose for invading and occupying Iraq was for regime change. Which no matter how many different ways you wish to spin this fact is a clear violation of the war powers act. We are torturing prisoners. Our presence in Iraq is killing on average 100 INNOCENT Iraqis a day. Our presence in Iraq has sent a terrifying tsunami of violence through out the middle east. Most in the Peace movement believe that the Israeli/ Hezbollah 'skirmis'? was an attempt to bate Iran into action to justify on attack on Iran. This nonsense goes on and on. And daily more babies die from this spreading cancer of violence.
It is every soldiers duty to resist illegal immoral orders. It is every military persons right to resist and to refuse to carry out illegal and immoral orders. According to statistics given to us by a member of the G.I. Rights Hotline more than 40,000 soldiers have gone AWOL. They understand that what they are being asked to kill and die for is not what they volunteered to do, defend our country. They are killing and dying for the insane agenda of the Project for the New American Century spearheaded by the Carlisle group. Whose goal is to, and this is a quote from the PNAC website, 'control the worlds energy reserves to gain a new world order'. If that doesn't chill your bones well..?? It is a very brave and noble thing to do to stand up for what you feel is right. Such as Camillo Mejia, Aiden Delgado, Pablo Paredes, Kevin Benderman, Lt. Watada, Susanne Swift and numerous others who chose the path of the Conscientious objector /resistor status
We have had several very good actions while here at Camp Casey. Outside of Ft. Hood we held signs with the G.I. Rights hotline number. The response from the soldiers leaving Camp for the weekend was overwhelmingly supportive. We got many thumbs ups, Honks for Peace and peace signs flashed back at us. Several soldiers stopped to talk. Many concerned about being redeployed very shortly. Many did not acknowledge our presence. A few took down the G.I. Rights number as they were stopped at the light. One young G.I. was approached by what appeared to be an NCO and was told he could get in trouble for talking to us. The boy left with a stack of Hotline cards. Today we get word that the local G.I Rights hotline has been inundated with calls from Ft. Hood.
We disrupted Karl Roves speech at a republican fundraiser in Austin. With a reading of the crimes Rove committed to the chant 'CITIZENS ARREST' When Austin PD incited a riot GSFP/Code Pinker Tiffany Burns was arrested for participating in a riot of one, the police responded violently to some of us who were coming to Tiffany's aid. I was asked by a local reporter what we were trying to accomplish by our actions and was it worth the arrest and bruises. My answer "Unless we take our actions to the limit the media no longer covers the peace movement. Unless we put our bodies and souls on the line the war gets back seat to poor little Jon Benet." We in the Peace movement are doing as much as we can to end the war. We need the G.I.s now to say No More. We need the G.I.s to know that we got their backs.
Cindy lost her womb but opened Camp Casey with loving arms as a metaphoric womb to those brave souls willing to say no more. Willing to say that they love their country enough to stand up for what is right and against what is wrong.
www.campcasey3.org
http://girights.objector.org/Dede
Proud Auntie of Casey, Carly, Andy and Janey
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