"Veterans recall horrors of war in live broadcast" - from the Sunday Boston Globe

[Breeze54]

Veterans recall horrors of war in live broadcast

http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2008/03/16/veterans_recall_horrors_of_war_in_live_broadcast/

By Anna Badkhen
Globe Staff / March 16, 2008

CAMBRIDGE -

Liz Jackson's eyes were fixed on a screen showing a live broadcast of anguished testimonies by Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans describing what they had seen and done during their combat tours.
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Jeffery Smith recalled how his Army unit beat and humiliated Iraqi prisoners. Former Marine Bryan Casler recounted how fellow Marines urinated and defecated into food and gave it to Iraqi children. Former Marine Matthew Childers talked about how he used to humiliate Iraqi civilians during predawn raids on their homes. When he described turning away an Iraqi father who was asking American troops to help the badly burned baby he carried in his arms, Jackson began to weep silently.

"These soldiers are saying: 'I'm complicit,' " said Jackson, 29, a community organizer from Cambridge.
"But every American citizen who saw this happen and isn't out there protesting is complicit. I include myself."

Hundreds of soldiers and Marines from across the country are testifying this weekend in the "Winter Soldier: Iraq and Afghanistan" hearings, a four-day event held at the National Labor College in Silver Spring, Md. The event is named after the 1971 Winter Soldier hearings in which Vietnam War veterans testified in a Detroit hotel about war crimes they had participated in or witnessed.

The hearings, which began Thursday and end today, were organized by the Iraq Veterans Against War, a national antiwar organization, and broadcast live in locations across the country. The veterans who testified called for an immediate withdrawal of US troops from Iraq.

"In the United States today people's minds have gotten off the war. We are trying to get their attention," said Paul Shannon, whose New England United antiwar network organized the live screening shown yesterday in First Parish Unitarian Church in Harvard Square, in a side room that was packed with about 300 antiwar activists, former troops, local residents like Jackson, and curious passersby.

On Friday, more than a dozen Iraq and Afghanistan veterans from Massachusetts drove to Silver Spring to observe and participate in the hearings.

One of them, Ian J. Lavallee, an Iraq war veteran from Jamaica Plain, said in a phone interview yesterday that although he was not planning to testify, he wanted to attend the hearings because it was his "duty to the people of the world" to condemn an "occupation that is being waged in our name and with our tax dollars."

"We dehumanized people. The way we spoke about them, the way we destroyed their livelihoods, their families, doing raids, manhandling them, throwing the men on the ground while their family was crying," recalled Lavallee, 23, who served in Iraq in 2005 and was honorably discharged from the Army in 2006 after he attempted suicide.

"I became a person I never thought I would become," he said. "It really upset me that I did these things."

From a folding chair in the Cambridge church, a fellow veteran, Patrick Dougherty, watched the hearings intently.

"It just takes me back there," he said. The testimonies reminded him "how malicious we were over there."

Dougherty, who was deployed to Baghdad and Mahmoudiya for 14 months beginning in 2003, "felt from the start that we had no intention to win hearts and minds," he said, his hands nervously running from the stubble on his chin to his hair and back to his chin.

"The way we treated our detainees like animals, kept them in cages in the hot sun all day - " said Dougherty, 24, who studies biology at the University of Massachusetts and lives in Fields Corner.

Dougherty was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder. He said he had considered testifying at the Winter Soldier hearings, but his doctor talked him out of it because the event could conjure memories too difficult for the veteran to bear.

Most of the people who came to watch the testimonies were members of antiwar groups in Massachusetts. Jennifer Magee, who works at Harvard University Art Museums, came because her roommate, an antiwar activist, had told her about it.

"These are the stories you never hear in the paper," said Magee. "It's really powerful to hear from the veterans."

Charles Gluck, a social worker from Long Island who was visiting Cambridge yesterday, wandered in after he saw a poster outside the church advertising the event.

"Some of the things I heard were shocking," Gluck said after listening to several testimonies. "My hope is that a movement like this would expand and . . . give people opportunity to make a more informed decision as to who the next president will be."

No public screening of the hearings will be held today. Recordings of the testimonies are available at http://www.ivaw.org/winter- soldier/howtowatch.

Testimony from vets in D.C. fires up local protesters

http://news.bostonherald.com/news/regional/general/view.bg?articleid=1080667&srvc=home&position=3

By Renee Nadeau
Sunday, March 16, 2008 - Updated 23m ago

A dozen Massachusetts veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars piled into a van bound for Washington, D.C., on Friday or traveled by other means to spend the weekend testifying about their experiences overseas and to protest the five-year war in Iraq.

A portion of the four-day “Winter Soldier: Iraq and Afghanistan” public testimony at the National Labor College, just outside the capital in Silver Springs, Md., was shown at the First Parish Church in Harvard Square yesterday.


Jason Pramas leads a group of anti-war protesters to Cambridge’s
First Parish Church where some 250 people listened to some or all
of an eight-hour live broadcast from Iraq and Afghanistan veterans
opposed to the wars there.


Liz Jackson of Cambridge and Susan Lees of Arlington watch
and listen at Cambridge’s First Parish Church to live-stream,
anti-war eyewitness accounts of the war in Iraq and Afghanistan.


The group stands in Harvard Square to protest the war.


Jason Pramas of Cambridge leads a group
of anti-war protesters through Harvard Square.

“I feel it’s not just something we should be against but we should actively work to end,” said Liam Madden, a Northeastern University sophomore and ex-Marine sergeant. “Our presence there could not fix the harm we had done.”

Madden served in Haditha, Iraq, from September 2004 to February 2005. He is on the board of directors of Iraq Veterans Against the War and helped organize the events. He did not give testimony.

“Over the last five years, many peole have expressed that they want to support the troops. This gives an opportunity to listen to the troops,” said Angela Kelly, outreach coordinator of Massachusetts Peace Action, one of the groups that sponsored the Cambridge event under the name New England United.

“Hearing the testimonies puts a real human face on the experience that has gone on for the last five years.”

Some 250 people packed the Cambridge church for the eight-hour live broadcast. Kelly said more and more chairs had to be brought in to accommodate viewers.

The term “winter soldier” pays homage to the similar event held by Veterans of Vietnam Against the War, at which Sen. John Kerry spoke, and a play on the words of Thomas Paine.

The Founding Father stated that winter soldiers will stand up for the soul of their country, even in its darkest hours, while summer soldiers will turn their backs, according to IVAW.

The group plans to release a documentary in the coming months.

[proud2BlibKansan]

1. K AND R

Thank goodness for DU cause this story isn't getting nearly enough coverage in the MSM.

[Breeze54]

3. "These are the stories you never hear in the paper," said Magee

You can say that again, Magee! And I haven't heard one thing about it on any news channel. :(

[proud2BlibKansan]

4. I am in DC and even local news is avoiding it

There was a brief story buried in a back page of the Wash Times. Nothing on TV.

[Breeze54]

5. Nothing on my local news either but I fell asleep before the news

last night and I only caught the weather this morning. So, to be fair,
I'll have to see at 6 PM tonight. But I doubt it will be reported.
And if it is, it will be to late. :(

You traveled to DC? Good on you!!!! :D March & shout for me!!

[Breeze54]

2. I found 584 Results doing a google search for "Winter Soldier"

Results 1 - 10 of about 584 for winter soldier and I got 19 related articles when I narrowed it to NEWS only

War stories echo an earlier winter
MSNBC - Mar 15, 2008
By Steve Vogel Grim-faced and sorrowful, former soldiers and Marines sat before an audience
of several hundred yesterday in Silver Spring and shared their ...

US veterans urge soldiers to speak out against Iraq war
AFP - Mar 13, 2008
WASHINGTON (AFP) — US veterans and active-duty soldiers on Thursday kicked off an event
in Washington to protest the war in Iraq, urging other members of ...

War lost amid shifting crises
Barre Montpelier Times Argus, VT - 6 hours ago
By JOSEPH GAINZA We are told that the attention of the American people has turned from
the US occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan to the faltering economy at ...

Winter Soldier 2008; speaking out against war
Joplin Independent, MO - Mar 14, 2008
A soldier has one paramount concern: coming back alive. But what happens when he or she
does return but with a conscience wracked by guilt? ...

The Irony and Absurdity of Occupation (Winter Soldier Day 2)
OpEdNews, PA - Mar 14, 2008
by Kevin Gosztola Page 1 of 2 page(s) ***This article will not do the first full day of
hearings in the Winter Soldier Investigation justice. ...

Veterans groups offer different views of conflict
Stars and Stripes, DC - Mar 14, 2008
By Leo Shane III, Stars and Stripes WASHINGTON —
A pair of veterans groups on opposite sides of the country this week are offering
drastically different ...

Winter Soldier: Hundreds of Veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan ...
Democracy Now, NY - Mar 14, 2008
Hundreds of Iraq and Afghanistan veterans are gathering in Maryland this weekend
to testify about their experiences in the wars. The testimony begins at 9 ...

Winter Soldier testimonials
Real News Network, NY - Mar 14, 2008
This month, for four days in Washington, DC, beginning on March 13, there will be
a second Winter Soldier gathering – 37 years after the first. ...

Winter Soldier: Hundreds of Veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan ...
Bay Area Indymedia, CA - Mar 14, 2008
by via Democracy Now Friday, March 14, 2008 :Hundreds of veterans and active-duty soldiers
of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars are gathering today for the ...

Iraq Soldiers to Testify about War Crimes: KPFA Radio to Broadcast ...
Bay Area Indymedia, CA - Mar 13, 2008
by KPFA Radio To listen to the historic Winter Soldier broadcast, tune into KPFA Radio
94.1 or 88.1 FM in Northern California or http://www.warcomeshome.org ...

Milwaukee Event Calendar
OnMilwaukee.com, Milwaukee - Mar 13, 2008
In the largest gathering of Iraq Veterans Against the War (IVAW) to date, hundreds
of IVAW members will gather near Washington, DC for public testimony ...

Iraq and Afghanistan Soldiers Testify at "Winter Soldier 2008 ...
OpEdNews, PA - Mar 13, 2008
by Elaine Brower Page 1 of 1 page(s) In 1971 Viet Nam Veterans’ Against the War (VVAW)
conducted a testimonial based on the atrocities and horrors they ...

Vets from Iraq and Afghanistan Wars to Report Experiences at ...
Bay Area Indymedia, CA - Mar 13, 2008
In 1971, Vietnam veterans held a conference that they called the Winter Soldier
Investigation, to speak out about what was really going on in the Vietnam ...

Shouts of Wrongdoing: Will veterans protests against the wars be ...
Minneapolis City Pages, MN - Mar 13, 2008
Hundred of veterans will travel to Washington, DC this weekend to speak out against
the US occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan in effort to expose what Iraq ...

Afghan & Iraq Vets Tell War Atrocities
Free Market News Network, FL - Mar 14, 2008
As the war in Iraq approaches its fifth anniversary, veterans of that conflict and
the war in Afghanistan will give first-hand accounts, supported by ...

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