FSRN Veterans Return Medals at Anti NATO Protests
Channel: Reddebrek
Date: 26/05/2012

Iraq Veterans Against the War collaborated with Afghans for Peace in planning Sunday's actions. At the end of the main march, participants gathered for a ceremony in which Iraq and Afghanistan War veterans symbolically returned their military service medals:

"My name is Jason Hurd. I spent 10 years in the United States Army as a combat medic. I deployed to Baghdad in 2004. I'm here to return my Global War on Terrorism Service Medal in solidarity with the people of Iraq and the people of Afghanistan. I am deeply sorry for the destruction that we have caused in those countries and around the globe. I am proud to stand on this stage with my fellow veterans and my Afghan sisters. These were lies. I'm giving them back."

One by one, dozens of veterans took the stage, delivering personal speeches to a captivated and supportive audience. Some expressed anger at the lies and distortions of US government and military leaders:

"My name is Shawna, and I was a nuclear biological chemical specialist for a war that didn't have any weapons of mass destruction. So I deserted. I'm one of 40,000 people that left the United States Armed Forces because this is a lie!"

Other vets spoke about the impact of the US-led wars on civilians, including Afghan and Iraqi children. One veteran challenged the crowd to rethink how the powerful typically define both leaders and enemies:

"My name is Vince Emanuele, and I served with the United States Marine Corps. First and foremost, this is for the people of Iraq and Afghanistan. Second of all, this is for our real forefathers. I'm talking about the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee. I'm talking about the Black Panthers. I'm talking about the civil rights movement. I'm talking about unions. I'm talking about our socialist brothers and sisters, our communist brothers and sisters, our anarchist brothers and sisters, and our ecology brothers and sisters. That's who our real forefathers are. And lastly—and lastly and most importantly, our enemies are not 7,000 miles from home. They sit in boardrooms. They are CEOs. They are bankers. They are hedge fund managers. They do not live 7,000 miles from home. Our enemies are right here, and we look at them every day. They are not the men and women who are standing on this police line. They are the millionaires and billionaires who control this planet, and we've had enough of it. So they can take their medals back."

Some veterans paid tribute to Bradley Manning, the army solider under military trial for distributing classified information to Wikileaks. Many people, including other veterans, consider him a whistleblower who exposed US war crimes. These speeches were recorded by Democracy Now. To view more of the veterans' statements in Chicago, go to democracynow.org.

More at http://fsrn.org/