Youth and the US anti-war movement

People may be wondering where the American anti-war movement is especially when over 60% of the US public disapprove of the way the Iraqi War is being handled, 72% of American troops think the military should leave Iraq in the next year and sectarian violence continues to spiral out of control.

Well it happens to be poking up beneath the surface in local counter-recruitment campaigns: "Mass national protests didn't sway the Bush administration, so young organizers have focused on local counter-recruitment campaigns."

The US Military has become increasingly desperate for new recruits since "the Air National Guard missed its recruiting target by 14 percent last year, and the Army missed its goal by 8 percent, its largest recruitment failure since 1979." As a result, they have eased restrictions on military recruits by "allowing young men and women with criminal records to enlist, recruiting members of hate groups, easing restrictions on recruiting high school dropouts and raising the maximum recruitment age from 35 to 42." The US Military enlistment push has shot their recruitment costs up to $3 billion.

Organizations like Not Your Soldier and STORY Collaborative are trying to counter US military enlistment initiatives targeted at economically disadvantaged youths through education training camps about the brutal reality of military life. They bring youths together with Iraqi veterans to discuss The aims of these groups can be summed up in this poignant quote from Ruckus Society founder John Sellers:
" 'During Vietnam, we had the draft. Now we have the poverty draft. But we think that, by making all of the military recruiters miss their quotas, that's going to impact how Bush and Rumsfeld and Cheney are going to view this war -- if they have less cannon fodder at their disposal.' "

Yet the weakness in these counter-recruitment education campaigns is exactly what makes the military recruiter's message so powerful to many individuals: economic opportunity. So an organization called smartMeme is trying to make an alternative for those who would be forced into military service as a result of economic necessity. They are building a network of organizations -- nonprofits, for-profits, institutions, businesses, farms and more -- that are willing to provide another option to young people who feel that they have no choice but to enlist.

If our politicians continue to waver on the military involvement in the Iraqi War, ordinary people will work to resist the military-industrial complex.

Even Iraqi veterans and military servicepeople are turning on the war. Lt. Ehren Watada refused to be deployed in Iraq and as a result is now the first officer in the war to face court martial charges. He calls on other soldiers to resist fighting in this war:
"The idea is this: that to stop an illegal and unjust war, the soldiers can choose to stop fighting it. They must remember duty to the Constitution and the people supersede the ideologies of their leadership. The soldier must be willing to face ostracism by their peers, worry over the survival of their families, and of course the loss of personal freedom. They must know that resisting an authoritarian government at home is equally important to fighting a foreign aggressor on the battlefield."

Only when the American public actively protest the Iraqi war will we achieve full troop withdrawal. This is already a good sign of things to come.