You did not desert me My Brothers in Arms. VFP in Crawford

BOHICA's KOS Diary
Fri Aug 26th, 2005 at 20:46:52 EST

I got this story from my VFP list. This is one of the reason I am a member of Veterans for Peace. I snipped out part of the story which you can read in full at the link.
I have also had to deal with some of what this story reports, the PTSD that is resurfacing in veterans because of this war. But we are holding together because we know to not do so would be to abandon our duty to each other.
Don't know what else to say except I see the VFP's President actually supports the troops.



[I Am Posting the Whole article that BOHICA used for this Diary, because like him one of the Reasons I'm a Proud Member, with my Brothers and Sisters of Veterans For Peace, is to Help those that Suffer the PTSD of War and to Educate those who Have/Will Never Experiance that Trauma. While many can suffer the Nightmares of Tragedy, in a War/Conflict these Single Incidents that bring about PTSD can Occur in any time frame 24/7 and often for many occurred Over and Over, each as Devestating as the Last or more so! It isn't only the Military Personal that are Devestated by what they See or Do but the Civilian Populations of these Wars/Conflicts as well!!!Visit the 'Daily KOS' link to Read the Responses to 'BOHICA's' Diary!]

Warriors in Crawfordby APRIL FITZSIMMONS
http://www.laweekly.com/ink/05/40/news-fitzsimmons.php

CRAWFORD, TEXAS — “I just wanted to see what all the fuss was about,” I told the hulking Secret Service man standing over me in front of the entrance to George W. Bush’s vacation home. It was my first day in Crawford, Texas, at Camp Casey and I had traveled there with Patrick, an Arlington West peace group staple and a conscientious objector from the ’60s.On Tuesday, Day 3 of Cindy Sheehan’s stand in Crawford, Kathleen from Arlington West, Woody from the Topanga Peace Alliance, and June from Global Exchange packed 1,000 crosses in Los Angeles into the back of a donated Suburban and sped to Texas. By Thursday the crosses, a visual representation of the human cost of war, stood next to Camp Casey as a show of solidarity and in support of Cindy’s question — What is the noble cause that my son died for?By the time we arrived on Saturday, the camp was in full swing and counter-protesters were showing up by the truckload. Armed with American flags and “Cut and run traitors” signs and many “Casey died for me” banners. Gathered in Camp Casey were veterans and activists from across the country. Peace prevailed through early afternoon under the hot Texas sun and sweltering humidity until about 3 p.m. The counter-demonstrators moved closer, shouting “Freedom isn’t free.” The Texas cops stood 30 strong and the folks at Camp Casey stood relatively silent.I watched through Woody’s binoculars as a police helicopter circled the camp. As the chopper drew closer and closer to the ground, storm clouds gathered. The shouting increased now on both sides and a Vietnam vet kept insisting, “You don’t know. You haven’t been there. You just don’t know.” He stood chest to chest with the “Freedom isn’t free” guy, each man clinging to his beliefs.At the height of the confrontation, the Vietnam vet looked to the sky and his face contorted into horror. He saw the chopper and suddenly it wasn’t Crawford, Texas. It was Vietnam. He collapsed in a heap and wept uncontrollably. Five Vietnam vets rushed to his side and carried him under a tent. They shielded him from view, putting their bodies between the sobbing man and the media. I watched the press as they politely waited for him to have his “moment” and for the human wall to move so their lenses could peek into the anguish of this grown man.But this wasn’t a “moment.” This was part of posttraumatic stress disorder. I simply couldn’t understand because I was never in combat, having served in the U.S. Air Force during the Cold War. And so I watched this group of men as they spoke to him gently in the language of war and peace. They hugged him and brought a warm washcloth to his forehead. They told him jokes. They gave him ice and water. They never looked away, not once.The man wept for almost an hour. One vet, Tim Origer, a former Marine, leaned into his grieving buddy and wiped his brow. As Tim pulled away to dip the cloth again into the bucket, his hand brushed away his pant leg and I saw his prosthetic leg. A gray mechanical knee and a stiff piece of metal where his right calf used to be. Tim lost his leg to an artillery round on March 15, 1968, during the Tet offensive. He was 19.The man on the other side of Tim was David Cline, president of Veterans For Peace. This was the anti-war statue that you’ll never see in Washington. Banded together with the knowledge that they had been duped by their government, these men now needed to heal one other.Fitzsimmons is a writer/actor who lives in Los Angeles. See more stories about Arlington West’s trip to Camp Casey at http://www.veteransforpeacela.org/.

Cindy Sheehan — ending the Iraq war where it began

Arlinton Crawford

Green Left Weekly

Charlie Jackson

The prequel to the war in Iraq began in the northern summer of 2002 when neo-conservatives within US President George Bush’s administration met at his ranch outside Crawford, Texas. The neo-cons argued that Saddam Hussein was like the terrorists who had attacked New York on 9/11 and that the president should eliminate this threat by invading Iraq. The rest, shall we say, is history.
In the small town of Vacaville, California, a family worried about the possible effects of the war in Iraq on their son, Casey Sheehan.
A year after the US invaded Iraq in 2003 and captured Hussein, it looked as if Casey would be sent there. The US Army’s 1st Cavalry Division was due to ship out in March 2004. Its task was to take over command of the Baghdad metropolitan area and focus on reconstruction and economic development projects.
The army team was full of enthusiasm that they might have a chance to contribute to rebuilding Iraq. Casey and his comrades had been in Iraq less than one month and were still adjusting to the strange new sights and smells. Iraq was already deteriorating from the aftermath of the invasion and the breakdown in civil infrastructure. Raw sewage flowed through many streets, while even the wealthy were having difficulty finding petrol for their cars or fuel for their generators.
Casey’s company received a call to check out activity near the Sadr City suburb north of Baghdad. This area, home to many of the poorest residents, teemed with anti-US insurgents. Casey was killed on April 4 when his company was attacked by Iraqi fighters with rocket-propelled grenades and small arms. His parents were notified that same day, Palm Sunday.

Hard work

Hundreds of mourners attended a service that week to honour this 24-year-old gentle young man who had been a boy scout and altar boy and had dreamed of one day serving the church. When he joined the army in 2000, the recruiter said that he would be able to finish college (Casey earned an associates of arts degree in drama) and that he would never see combat.
His mother, Cindy, had been anxiously following the progress of the war. Suddenly she was faced with the death of her eldest son. Have you ever heard the scream of a mother who has lost her child? Has your child been murdered?
“Murder” is the word Cindy Sheehan uses to describe how her son was sent to Iraq to fight in an unjust war and then killed by Iraqi fighters. She was incensed by the president’s debate before reelection the following September when he kept repeating the phrase “hard work” to describe the war in Iraq. “In Iraq, no doubt about it, it’s tough. It’s hard work. It’s incredibly hard”, Bush said.
Cindy established a group, Gold Star Mothers for Peace, to work to bring troops home from Iraq and prevent other families from experiencing the pain she was feeling.
“Hard work is seeing your son’s murder on CNN one Sunday evening while you’re enjoying the last supper you’ll ever truly enjoy again. Hard work is having three military officers come to your house a few hours later to confirm the aforementioned murder of your son, your first-born, your kind and gentle sweet baby. Hard work is burying your child 46 days before his 25th birthday. Hard work is holding your other three children as they lower the body of their big [brother] into the ground. Hard work is not jumping in the grave with him and having the earth cover you both”, she said.
Cindy then made opposition to the administration’s policies her full-time job.
In early August this year, Cindy travelled to the Veterans for Peace (VFP) annual conference in Dallas. There she met with Iraq War veterans. Cindy wept as she listened to their stories. In her speech she spoke about other mothers whose sons have died in Iraq and their families’ struggles. She spoke about the “lying bastard, George Bush” who was taking a five-week vacation during a time of war just down the road in Crawford.
Cindy decided to head to Crawford, camp out as close as she could get to the president’s ranch, and stay until either the president came out to talk with her or he finished his vacation.
And so the story of “Camp Casey” began on August 7.

Camp Casey

With a motley group of 50, including friends from the Veterans for Peace convention and Texas peace activists, Cindy rode into the town where — symbolically — the war in Iraq had begun.
Bored journalists were alerted that an angry mother of a soldier killed in Iraq was coming to town. White House staff had also been notified in advance and soon an armoured SUV rolled up. National security adviser Steve Hadley and deputy White House chief of staff Joe Hagin emerged, along with their bodyguards. Cindy thanked them for coming out, but demanded to speak to the president so she could ask, “What did my son die for?”
Cindy looked around for somewhere she could stay. The local sheriff told the group that they couldn’t trespass on the properties that bordered the road behind barbed-wire fences, but that they were free to camp out in the drainage ditches on either side of the two-lane road.
The country road that leads to the president’s ranch is surrounded by fields of summer weeds baking in the sun. As temperatures rise to around 38oC, residents flee indoors to escape the heat and humidity. The only sound is of horseflies buzzing in the afternoon and the cry of the occasional mockingbird. When not worrying about heatstroke, local residents keep an eye out for a quick turn of the weather that can bring severe thunderstorms and tornados.
Cindy decided to spend the night camping out in the ditch rather than return to the city of Waco to find a motel.
With a small supply of battery-operated flashlights, bottled water, sunscreen lotion, and a large floppy hat, Cindy prepared to camp out. The one thing that caused the greatest discomfort was the constant battle with “fire” ants, which bite with a sharp sting wherever they find flesh.
With only a handful of supporters, the temporary campsite began under the star-filled Texas sky. Around the world, tens of thousands of emails were exchanged by peace organisers sympathetic to Cindy’s cause. A whirlwind of activity ensued the following week as, first in small numbers and then a flood, the media and Cindy’s supporters flocked to Camp Casey.
First to respond were the volunteers at the nearby Crawford Peace House, which was purchased by farsighted peace activists from Dallas in the spring of 2003 and has become a focal point for anti-war groups going to Crawford. The Peace House helped to take messages, coordinate logistics and find volunteers to shuttle people out to Camp Casey.

Support floods in

Flowers, letters of support and other help started to arrive for Cindy. Wooden crosses, commemorating the soldiers who died in Iraq, arrived from the Arlington West “cemetery” site in California, which was established by Fernando Suarez del Solar to honour his son Jesus, the first US marine killed in Iraq.

The president, speaking from his home just up the road, continued to claim that the US was succeeding in its mission in Iraq, “which was to help the Iraqis”.

“I sympathise with Mrs Sheehan”, Bush said in response to a reporter’s questions. “She has every right in the world to say what she believes. This is America. She has a right to her position. And I’ve thought long and hard about her position. I’ve heard her position from others, which is, get out of Iraq now. And it would be — it would be a mistake for the security of this country and the ability to lay the foundations for peace in the long-run, if we were to do so.”
As news travelled, citizens were moved to support Cindy. Religious groups began praying for Cindy. Vigils were organised in solidarity throughout the world. Camp Casey grew and was threatened with being shut down by local officials. A nearby farmer stepped in and offered a parcel of land near the president’s ranch upon which to camp. National groups got involved. The ranks swelled.

Now, near the end of the second week, Camp Casey has become an even greater focus of attention than when it began, so much so that Cindy worries that her message may become lost: A mother honouring her son’s death by questioning those responsible.

[Charlie Jackson is an international business specialist temporarily working in Australia. He has visited Iraq twice as a delegate with the Christian Peacemaker Teams and was asked, in early 2004, to recommend economic development solutions for Baghdad. As the founder of Texans for Peace, he attended the August VFP convention in Dallas and helped organise grassroots publicity for Cindy Sheehan. For updates visit:

http://www.texansforpeace.org/SpecialCindySheehan.htm

From Green Left Weekly, August 24, 2005.

Visit the Green Left Weekly home page.