G.I. Resistance Pacific NW - Meet Four GI Resisters
Channel: Ed Mays
Date: 2022-10-08

It’s rare in human history for soldiers to choose humanity over uniform and through their resistance, to change the course of a war. That’s what American soldiers during the US war in Viet Nam did--in staggering numbers. Meet four GI Resisters from Ft. Lewis-McChord (now JBLM) who were part of the GI movement opposing the war.

Panel: 

Dave Henry became active in the antiwar movement as a student in the late 1960s. He became editor-in-chief of his campus’ newspaper and immediately turned it into an antiwar newspaper.  After being drafted by the Army in 1970 he freaked out and joined the Air Force.  While looking for a way out of the Air Force, he connected with the GI Alliance whose members challenged him to remain in service andhelp organize among active-duty Airmen and GIs. He later joined the staff of the Lewis McChord Free Press.

Terry Irvin was drafted into the Army. He helped write, produce, and distribute the underground GI newspaper, Lewis McChord Free Press. In a challenge to military censorship rules, he was busted for distribution of the Declaration of Independence at Ft. Lewis on July 4th, 1971. Terry’s portrait, of him holding an issue of the Lewis McChord Free Press, appears in the Waging Peace exhibit.

Jim Klimaski is a former Army lieutenant and member of the Concerned Officers Movement who worked on multiple GI newspapers.  Jim was already publicly against the war when he was ordered to report to infantry officers’ school at Ft Benning, Georgia. Stationed Ft Bragg in Fayetteville, NC, he began working with a group of soldiers at the nearby Quaker House, an anti-war center that published a newspaper called Bragg Briefs.  He was soon reassigned to Ft Lewis in an effort by the military to break up the movement.  There, he started the Lewis McChord Free Press to spread the word that soldiers were opposed to the war too.

Mike Royce went to Mississippi to register voters with SNCC, and then was a member of SDS in college.was already against the war in Viet Nam when he received his draft notice. Active in the GI Alliance, Mike organized from within and served on staff of Lewis McChord Free Press. He ran into trouble passing out copies of the Declaration of Independence at Ft. Lewis along with Terry Irvin.

Moderator: Randy Rowland

Presented by Seattle Veterans For Peace Chapter 92 and the University of Washington’s Southeast Asia Center at the Jackson School of International Studies.
Recorded 10/5/22 at the University of Washington.

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