It’s impossible for capitalists to fight a war without soldiers and the hidden history of the working class has shown some great examples of resistance to war within militaries. Even the man at the centre of the warmongers icon 'Simpson and his donkey' was in reality a militant worker and conscientious objector. The most spectacular example of this hidden history is the movement against the Vietnam War that grew within the US military. By 1970, the US Army had 65,643 deserters — roughly the equivalent of four infantry divisions. In 1971 Marine Colonel Robert D. Heinl Jr., a veteran combat commander wrote: “By every conceivable indicator, our army that remains in Vietnam is in a state approaching collapse, with individual units avoiding or having refused combat, murdering their officers and non-commissioned officers, drug-ridden, and dispirited where not near mutinous. Elsewhere than Vietnam, the situation is nearly as serious … Sedition, coupled with disaffection from within the ranks, and externally fomented with an audacity and intensity previously inconceivable, infest the Armed Services ...”Hamish was an infantry soldier in the Australian army for 12 years and is a veteran of the East Timor campaign in 1999-2000. In 2007, he helped found Stand Fast - an organisation of veterans and service people that oppose the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Hamish is an active campaigner in solidarity with the Palestinian people and with the Cuban and Vietnamese revolutions. He also actively supports the struggle for Aboriginal rights, the campaign for abortion rights, solidarity with the Venezuelan revolution and many other social justice struggles. Hamish is a bus driver and a member of the Rail Tram Bus Union in Brisbane.
for workshop times: click here to download agenda
No comments:
Post a Comment