New England Antiwar Conference Report
ANTI-WAR
Important New England Regional Peace & Justice Conference Held December 7 & 8 -
Informal Report
An Informal Report
After September 11: Paths to Peace, Justice & Security
Initiated by the American Friends Service Committee, New England Regional
Office
Co-sponsored by Tufts University's Peace & Justice Studies Program and Tufts
Coalition for Peace
On Friday evening and Saturday, December 7 & 8, more than 500 leading activists
from across New England, and from as far away as New York, Pennsylvania, Japan
and France, gathered for the "After September 11..." conference. It was an
exceptional conference, and we have been encouraged by
the many participants (and speakers) who have told or written us that it was
the best, or among the best, conference they had ever attended. The conference
was designed to help lay the intellectual foundations for
community-based peace and justice organizing related to what the Bush
Administration has termed WW III, and which is likely to have a great an impact
in (brutally) restructuring the global disorder and U.S. polity as
did the Cold War, with the possibility that it could exact a much greater human
toll. We were overwhelmed by the response to our conference call, and in the
weeks preceding the conference, ceased promoting it and had the unhappy
responsibility of turning away several hundred people who wanted to
participate.
The conference was organized in essentially five plenary sessions, with 22
workshops. It was a demanding schedule, but people were committed and held with
us throughout. We are now working to build on the opportunities that have been
created and resources developed by the conference. (Transcripts, video tapes
($25), and audio tapes ($5) of plenary talks will be available beginning early
next week, and corrected transcripts will be posted on the Peace & Economic
Security Program's web page: www.afsc.org/pes.htm.
This will be an informal and hastily written summary of conference high points,
content-wise. It doesn't begin to communicate the energy of the conference or
the way that is has left people - beyond those who participated in the
conference - in Western Massachusetts, Cape Cod and
other places "buzzing" . (A copy of the press release for the conference, which
communicates some of this energy is appended.) As the lead conference
organizer, I had to be outside the meeting hall from time to time, and missed
portions of some of the presentations. So, apologies to those speakers who are
short-changed in what follows:
Media: The good news is that CSPAN came to film Amber and Ryan Amundson,
respectively the wife and brother of Craig Amundson who was killed in the
September 11 attack on the Pentagon, and Noam Chomsky's keynote speech. We also
had a number of independent documentary video-makers there. The tough news is
that we were completely iced out by the mainstream media. People in other U.S.
cities are experiencing similar marginalization, and the question arises to
what extent this is a function of the current patriotic hysteria, concerns for
market share, and fear of finding themselves attacked for giving coverage to
those targeted by Ashcroft and Lynn Cheney or of losing access, or to what
extent it is a function of more direct Administration intervention with the
news media.
Friday Evening:
Joseph Gerson: (Director of Programs, American Friends Service Committee, New
England Regional Office) I opened the conference with a 15 minute talk designed
to provide an overview and framing for the conference. I laid out for essential
points related to our responses to September 11: 10 that the attacks were
terrible and inexcusable crimes whose perpetrators must be brought to justice,
2) that war is not the answer, 3) the need to protect communities at risk and
constitutionally guaranteed civil liberties here in the U.S., and 4) the need
to address root causes of the 9-11 attacks and the U.S. military attacks that
have followed. I described some futility and dangers of the current war and of
it being spread into Central and Southeast Asia and the Middle East, and the
assault on democracy here in the U.S. I concluded by being clear that we are in
hard times, indeed, but I stressed that fundamental struggles like that against
Jim Crow segregation, to end the Vietnam War, to stop the Reagan era nuclear
war threats, the women's and GLBT movements, and people resisting dictatorships
and fascism all came out of hard times, and I pointed to a number of policy
alternatives and steps that peace and justice movements can take.
Doug Hostetter, who recently returned from northern Afghanistan, where he
represented AFSC on an aid mission, gave a moving, sometimes funny, and at
times heartbreaking description of some of what he saw and learned there.
Setting us up for what he would later describe, Doug, quite humorously, showed
us the contents of the food packets the U.S. military has been dropping from
30,000 feet and explained how Afghans attempted to deal with burst packets of
baked beans, peanut butter (a substance unknown to Afghans) that came in
containers with instructions in English, Spanish, and French, and scented face
wipes that many thought were to be eaten. He explained the astronomical costs
of air-dropping these foods, and how much more AFSC and the agencies with which
we are working are able to deliver for the same cost. Doug also described the
effects of U.S. bombing, the civilian tolls it is taking. Drawing on a
conversation he had with a wounded Afghan civilian he met, he explained how the
victimization of innocent Afghans is creating a new generation of people who
"hate America."
Panel on Was War Necessary? Does It Increase our Security? What are the
Alternatives?":
David McReynolds, emeritus staff of the War Resisters League started the panel
off brilliantly, drawing on the experiences of the struggle to overcome Jim
Crow, conscientious objectors during WW II, and the early Vietnam era anti-war
movement, David explained that it often takes time for what are initially seen
as "irrelevant" moral positions to become meaningful and defining political
action. He provided important background information about the 20-year war in
Afghanistan, the return to power of the war lords under the deluge of U.S.
bombs. David spoke at some length about International Law, how the Bush
Administration has refused to abide by it, and policy alternatives that were
possible, in the U.S. interest and that of world peace, consistent with
international law.
Patricia Mische is professor of Peace Studies at Antioch College. Unhappily, I
missed much of her speech. Patricia spoke very personally about how 9-11 had
impacted her daughter and her, about the costs of the war and International
Tribunal/International Law alternatives, and she detailed an extensive list of
both policy alternatives and popular peacebuilding alternatives for the longer
term.
Paul Watanabe, professor of Political Science at the University of
Massachusetts in Boston, focused on the domestic consequences of the war, how
the assaults on democratic freedoms and mutual respect are making us less
secure. His speech was inspired, grounded in the war-time experience of
Japanese-Americans, and focused on how the declaration of war creates a brutal
and destructive "us verses them" dynamic that plays out not only in the
government policies of popular mobilization, internment camps, and military
tribunals, but also people's day to day lives, from work place harassment and
discrimination to the violence children suffer in the school yard and
classrooms.
Amber & Ryan Amundson: We thought it would be important to bring forward the
voices, pain and perspectives of families who had lost loved ones in the
September 11 attacks and who have been clear that their grief should not be
used as a rational fore taking the lives of other innocent people. Amber, the
28 year old wife of Craig Amundson, who died in the Pentagon, was a thoughtful,
moving, and quite courageous speaker. When she finished, there was not dry eye
in the room. She and Ryan (Craig's brother) powerfully reinforced people's
understanding that we can be terribly hurt by the 9-11 attacks while remaining
clear in our opposition to violent responses. Amber and Ryan are organizing an
organization of the families of 9-11 victims who are opposed to a vengeful war.
(During their workshop later in the day) AFSC and others committed to do what
we can to help them build this group and to work with it. (If you know family
members of people lost or wounded in the September 11 attacks, please contact
us.)
Noam Chomsky: Noam's talk was quitisential Chomsky, and what follows are only a
tiny fraction of the points he made. He began with his critique of the
"mandarins of power", the vast majority of intellectuals who serve and protect
the state rather than explore truths with a willingness to question the states
in which they live. He described how the U.S. empire works, spending
considerable time on its cynical disregard for international law. Among the
examples he used is the fact that many in the Bush Administration who have
disregarded international law to launch and fight the war in Afghanistan were
found by the World Court to have violated international law during the
Reagan-era war against Nicaragua. Noam explained that we will probably never
know the number killed by the war, civilians or combatants. With an estimated
one third of Afghanistan's population having moved (in many cases becoming
refugees), in a situation where about 1/3 of the nation was already facing
starvation, and with international food shipments essentially halted for three
months (and now winter upon the Afghan people), the number could easily run
into the tens of thousands - mostly slow and isolated deaths. In terms of
direct hit "collateral damage", again we're unlikely ever to really know,
between the lack of press present, and Pentagon, Taliban, Northern Alliance and
other war lord control of the news flow.
Panel on Recent U.S. History in the Middle East, South and Central Asia:
Following Chomsky is no mean feat. This panel did wonderfully:
Lamis Andoni, a leading Palestinian journalist, placed the current
Israel-Palestine crisis in its historical and regional contexts, focusing on
U.S. dominance of the region, and its support for corrupt and oppressive
regimes since 1945 in order to maintain its dominance of the region's oil
supplies. Her description of the dynamics at play in the Middle East since the
1991 Gulf War (the U.S. re-conquest of the Middle East -with an amazing
quotation from James Baker's encounter with President Assad) and of the current
Palestinian-Israeli catastrophe were profound, insightful, and challenging. In
the Q&A session, Lamis made a powerful appeal for the audience to understand
the identity of the struggle for peace and freedom internationally with the
struggle for justice and economic security within the U.S.
Zia Mian: Zia is a physicist at the Woodrow Wilson Center at Princeton and a
leading nuclear disarmament and peace activist. I introduced him as a man with
remarkable and remarkably integrated intellectual insight and moral vision.
While my introduction was somewhat over the top, Zia lived up to the
expectations I created. In brief, Zia described the "reach for Empire", not so
much the U.S. use of the current crisis as an effort to expand and consolidate
its imperial reach (a given), but of the competition between India and Pakistan
to use the crisis to engage and become the principle South Asian ally of the
U.S. empire. Zia described pre-9/11 antecedents to this drive and its nuclear
dynamics and dangers
Michael Klare: Michael is Director of the Five Colleges Peace & World Security
Studies Program, based at Hampshire College. Michael gave a detailed and
compelling description of the staggering dimensions and possible consequences
of the current crisis. He explained that the moment may best understood as
comparable to the first years following World War II, when the U.S. created the
Cold War system internationally and the national security state internally. The
focus of his talk was more on the future than on the past. He described the
probability that the Bush Administration will lead the U.S. to war against Iraq
in the very near future. He described the potential costs of such a war and how
it would cement the creation of the as-yet unnamed new system and era of
increased U.S. global dominance. He said that time is of the essence if we are
to prevent a U.S. war against Iraq and the crystallization of the new disorder
analogous to the Cold War.
Michael's movement strategy recommendation was controversial.. He urged that we
not speak about the roots of the current moment, but that we focus on the
dangers to the U.S. of expanding "war against terrorism." Zia and Lami
countered that we ignore the past at our peril and that even if the U.S. could
win "the war against terrorism" that it should be opposed as morally wrong.
Michael readily agreed to the latter point.
Panel on Islam and Islamic Fundamentalism:
Modhumita Roy, a member of the English Department at Tufts, began the panel by
reframing it. Shecontextualized "Islamic Fundamentalism" in the traditions of
Christian fundamentalism that had its roots in the U.S. Looking at the economic
and social roots of fundamentalisms, she explained that there are
fundamentalist movements in many parts of the world and in religions as diverse
as Hindu and Christianity. She then pressed the point that these movements have
been exploited by right-wing political movements in pursuit of greater
political power.
Ali Banuazizi, in the Psychology Department at Boston College, provided one of
the surprises of the conference, explaining that he would very respectfully
disagree with some of Dr. Roy's points. He argued that political Islam has its
roots in the last decade of the Prophet Mohammad's life, when he was both
Prophet and secular political ruler. It is this period of Mohammad's life and
teachings, he explained, that Islamist political movements seek to emulate.
Professor Banuazizi explored the roots of Islamic fundamentalism, naming many
of its specific movements and their beliefs/commitments, and he spoke of the
legitimate efforts to create an Islamic state in Iran. The surprise in his talk
came when he said that he had concluded that the Taliban and Al Queda could not
be removed except by force, i.e. war. In the Q & A period he was clear that he
opposed the widening of the war to Iraq.
Farzin Vahdat teaches Contemporary Religion at Tufts University. His talk was,
perhaps, the most intellectually and spiritually challenging of the day. He
began by describing the modernist project as rooted in the ability and
possibility of increasing individual empowerment. He described how technology
which has been central to modernism has come to threaten human existence
(global warming et. al.) and undermine community. He then turned to describe
the violence that has attended the move of different cultures and nations into
and through the modernist revolution, citing the terrible tolls of the French
Revolution, Japanese imperialism, etc. He explained that the Islamic Revolution
of Iran and other Islamic revolutions have attempted to mediate modernism with
an appreciation for an understanding of humanity as part of nature - not apart
from and against nature. Pointing, again to Iran, he explained that it may be
caught in this duality. He expressed the hope that because of Islam's
appreciation for humanity's being of nature and creation, not over it, that the
transition of the Islamic world into modernism may prove less bloody than that
of the West.
Panel on Domestic Blowback:
Nancy Murray is on the staff of the Civil Liberties Union of Massachusetts.
Nancy described how in times of war, civil liberties have been severely
repressed. She gave compelling instances of this from U.S. history and then
detailed provisions of the "Patriot Act" and its assault on people's lives and
freedom and on what remains of our democratic system of the Bush-war-related
assault on human liberties.
Merrie Najimy is a school teacher and head of the American-Arab
Anti-Discrimination Committee in Massachusetts. Merrie described the violence,
threats, harassment and fear being experienced by the Arab-American community.
She went into conservable detail about the "invitations" to be interrogated
that have been extended by the "Justice" Department to 5,000 Arab men, and the
questions they are being asked. Merrie drew on the discrimination and suffering
imposed on other ethnic communities over time, and stressed the importance of
transcending our divisions.
Chuck Turner is a member of the Boston City Council. Chuck placed the current
moment in the context of this country's original values: government and a
social system designed to protect the privilege of the few and the slavery of
the many. He described how this dynamic has shaped the U.S. experience
throughout the country's brief history down to the current moment: 2 million in
prison, growing unemployment, poor housing, etc. Chuck pressed for people to
transcend limited concerns and to be clear about which side they are on: that
of the privileged or that of people struggling to live with freedom and
dignity.
Frank Ackerman is an economist at Tufts University and a founder of Dollars and
Sense Magazine. The title of Frank's talk telegraphed his main point, "The High
Costs of a Cheap Little War." (We have the full text and will make it available
soon.) The talk provided an introduction to critical economics 101. He gave a
broad overview of how the system works, economic circumstances that provide
pressures for greater equality and those that reinforce enormous economic
disparities. He went into considerable detail about the comparatively cheap
costs of the war in Afghanistan (less than 1% of GNP,) explaining that this
will make it difficult to argue persuasively that ending the war could lead to
greater economic justice in the U.S..
I won't begin to described the 22 workshops. All of our speakers led workshops,
and we had workshops on the impacts of the war and new global disorder of the
movements resisting corporate globalization, about movement building, how to
make our points to others, etc. We added four additional workshops over and
above those originally planned (and posted on our web site): "Gender, Women,
War and Terrorism", "The Situation in Northern Afghanistan and Relief Efforts
There", a workshop with the Amundsons, and the showing the "Voices for Peace",
a video made by Robbie Leppzer about October anti-war protests in Washington
D.C. and New York.
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