A response by the United National
Antiwar Coalition (UNAC) to the attack on the antiwar movement from Terry Burke
published in "In These Times"
In the past 15 years,
the US military machine has attacked 17 countries. The many peace and justice
organizations and individuals attacked in Terry Burke’s article(1) have a long
history of opposition to ALL US wars, interventions, invasions, drone attacks, military coups,
blockades, and sanctions on numerous countries around the world. The
military aggression of the United States, the expansion of NATO, the efforts at
encirclement of Russia and China with weapons shields, CIA destabilizations in Latin America and the massively destructive US wars in Central
Asia, West Asia, Middle East and North Africa, along with the massive arms
deals with US allies like Israel and Saudi Arabia, have created terrible
destruction and millions of deaths and refugees.
UNAC, a peace and
justice coalition with organizations and individuals from different
perspectives, seeks to counter the corporate media propaganda and politicians’
justifications for each of these wars and for expanding US militarism.
These wars collectively,
and each of them individually, are for US economic and geopolitical domination.
None of these wars have resulted in increased security or stability for the
countries targeted or for the people of the US.
It is from this perspective that we oppose the
US war in Syria. We oppose the US bombing that has ruined so much of the vital
infrastructure, and we oppose the US-coordinated arming and financing of
numerous armed groups and the devastating sanctions that the US has imposed on
the people of Syria.
Terry Burke cites her
past work in the Nicaragua Solidarity Committee as the basis of her position on
Syria. However, this distorted reasoning would have led Terry and the antiwar
movement to support the US backed Contra forces in Nicaragua as “democratic and
progressive forces.”
The US role in Central
America was to covertly arm contra forces to impose regime change in Nicaragua
while funding and arming Salvadoran and Guatemalan death squads. This
destructive policy created millions of refugees from Central America in the
1980s, just as US policies of regime change in the past 12 years of war in
Iraq, Libya, Syria and elsewhere has created even more refugees.
The US is coordinating
Saudi, Israeli, Qatar, Turkish and EU efforts of bombing and of arming
opposition groups. The stated goal from the beginning has been regime
change in Syria. Regime change, as in Iraq and Libya, means the complete
destruction of every secular state institution, including the very structures
that provided full access to free education, free health care, electrification,
potable water, modern infrastructure, irrigation and communication.
Years of US sanctions
against Iraq, Iran, Syria and Libya did not succeed in carrying out regime
change, although they created great hardships and dislocations in each
economy. Up to 1.5 million people died due to US sanctions in Iraq alone.
Today, as we watch two candidates running for president who
threaten increased and terrible interventions in Syria, we are seeing a big
increase in US propaganda. Take, for example, the August 11th
article by Fair and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR) on the breakdown of the recent
ceasefire: http://fair.org/home/how-media-distorted-syrian-ceasefires-breakdown/. FAIR, a media watchdog
group, exposed the fact that it was groups supported by the US fighting
alongside the al Nusra Front, the al Qaida group in Syria, that actually broke
the ceasefire, yet the media blamed the Syrian government and the
Russians for the breakdown. Much of what we see in the US media related
to the situation in Syria is the same kind of propaganda with the goal of
building greater support for war.
Terry Burke claims we are “US-centric” for opposing our government’s attacks on Syria and attempts at regime change in that country. She claims that we have “ignored anti-Assad progressive Syrian voices.” But who has ignored what? Where in the US corporate media are the voices of Syrians (both pro and anti-Assad) who want an end to the ISIS/Al-Qaida/US/NATO intervention in their country and have rallied to the side of their government to end it? The US corporate media and some so-called progressives in the US have focused on vilifying Assad rather than the US-led war on Syria, which only leads to strengthening the forces who seek regime change and war. Should we add our voices to that chorus? Is that the best way to end US intervention in Syria, which the overwhelming majority of Syrians oppose? We think not.
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Syrians in Lebanon
line up to vote in Syrian election 2014 |
The March 13 UNAC protest, “A Day of Peace and Solidarity,” is the basis of Burke’s claims that “a dictator accused of monstrous war crimes is being given tacit support by major organizations in the peace movement.” Why? Because the “anti-war protest in New York City included people carrying the flag of the brutal Assad regime…” It is true that Syrians came to that demonstration and carried the flag of their country. Do Syrians not have the right to carry their flag? Is it the place of the US anti-war movement to tell people from any country that is under attack by the US that they do not have the right to carry their country’s flag? That is not the role of our movement; we oppose our government’s illegal and immoral aggression against all countries and do not lecture the people of that country on whom they should support or not support.
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Syrians protest in DC to end US intervention in their country
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If antiwar activists and
organizations in the US condemn US bombings and aggression in Syria as our
primary concern, rather than denouncing “Assad’s crimes,” we are branded
“pro-Assad.” Burke attacks us for having signs like “US Hands Off Syria”
and “No US War on Syria.” These she says are “US-centric.” Were
similar slogans used during the Vietnam War, Afghan War, and Iraq War
also US-centric? The US is the most militarily aggressive country in the
world. It has around 20 times the number of foreign military bases as all
other countries in the world combined. We in the US have an obligation to
humanity to demand that our government stop the aggression and bring the troops
home from Syria and all of the more than 130 countries where there are US
troops.
Burke accuses the
antiwar movement of ignoring progressive Syrian voices but she is highly
selective in identifying the “Syrian perspective” as those who are anti-Assad.
We must ask her why she ignores the Syrian voices that seek to end the
US/NATO/ISIS/Al-Qaida attacks on their country.
Burke believes that the
primary feature of the Syrian conflict is fighting between two camps of
Syrians. However, this is not the case. Syria has been invaded by
extremists such as ISIS and al Nusra. Tens of thousands of mercenaries
have poured into this small country to overthrow the government, a goal which
the US and NATO share. They have been supported by bombings, logistics
and harsh sanctions against Syria from the US and NATO. Though the US has
claimed it is there to attack the extremists, there had not been much
damage to them until Russia entered the fighting-- and then, in a
matter of weeks, the tide turned. The oil that ISIS takes
from Syria and uses to help fund their operations has been left untouched by
the U.S and its allies until Russia started bombing their oil operations.
The antiwar movement can agree on
non-intervention and self-determination. Aligning with those anti-Assad
Syrians who support US intervention in Syria can only divide and weaken our
movement, which needs to be united today, perhaps more than ever.
We urge the antiwar
movement to reject the ideas that
Terry Burke presents in her article and demand that the US and NATO stop the
bombing, stop the sanctions, stop the flow of weapons and stop the
funding. This will stop the extremist groups. Then the people of
Syria can alone decide their fate.
(1) Organizations and people attacked by Terry Burke in her article in “In These
Times” include United National Antiwar Coalition (UNAC), US Peace Council,
Syrian American Forum, Veterans for Peace, Manhattan Green Party, WarIsACrime.org, Voices for Creative Nonviolence, Syrian
American Will Association, ANSWER Coalition, Anti-War Committee Chicago,
Minnesota Anti-War Committee, Women Against Military Madness, Workers World
Party, Freedom Road Socialist Organization, Mint Press News, AntiWar.com, Consortium News, Veteran Intelligence
Professionals for Sanity including members William Binney, Coleen Rowley and
Ray McGovern; dedicated
activists like David Swanson and Kathy Kelly, as well as journalists Seymour
Hersh, Robert Fisk, Patrick Cockburn, Robert Kennedy Jr., Gareth Porter and
Robert Parry.
The Administrative
Committee of the United National Antiwar Coalition (UNAC)
Marilyn Levin - UNAC co-coordinator
Joe Lombardo -
UNAC co-coordinator
Margaret Kimberley -
Senior columnist, Black Agenda Report
Joe Iosbaker - Chicago Anti-war
Committee
Sara Flounders - Co-director,
International Action Center
Bernadette Ellorin - Chairperson,
BAYAN, USA
Judy Bello - Upstate Coalition to
Ground the Drones and End the Wars
Abayomi Azikiwe - Michigan Emergency
Committee Against War and Injustice
Phil Wilayto - Editor, The Virginia
Defender
Jeff Mackler - Northern California UNAC
(additional endorsers: http://nepajac.org/syriaendorsers.htm)
(If you want to add your name to this statement, please email UNACpeace@gmail.com with your name and the name of your organization. If it is an organizational endorsement of the statement, please note that in your email or simply click here: https://www.unacpeace.org/support-syria-statement.html)
(to see the original article in "In these Times", go here: http://inthesetimes.com/