Stop the War encampment puts Congress on notice

FIST youth march inside Rayburn building March 16. Photo: SDS Chapel Hill

Organizers and activists who participated in the Encampment to Stop the War from March 12 to 18 are calling the event an overwhelming success in the ongoing struggle to end imperialist wars at home and abroad. Proclaiming the need to move “from protest to resistance,” the encampment exposed the Democratic Party as another wing of the imperialist war machine, brought more activists into the anti-imperialist movement, and made a ruckus that the capitalist media could not ignore.

People traveled from across the United States to camp out directly in front of the Capitol in Washington, D.C., in an event organized by the Troops Out Now Coalition (TONC). The encampment was visited daily by hundreds of tourists, participants of conferences in the area, and D.C. locals who offered their support and enthusiasm for the action.

Memphis Rudder, 21, and Patrick Bigley, 20, panhandled and hitchhiked from Jonesboro, Ark., for 20 hours to arrive at the encampment in the middle of torrential rains and hail.

As the regional coordinator for World Can’t Wait in Arkansas, Rudder wheatpastes posters against the war around her town in the middle of the night with her 1- and 2-year-old children asleep in the back seat.

D.C. police arrest TONC leader Larry Holmes at March 15 anti-war- funding protest. WW photo: Cheryl LaBash

Rudder told WW: “It’s an emergency situation and it will take emergency steps to end the war. This encampment is the most important idea for action right now. Congress will end the war when they have to take an alternate route out of their building. It’s going to take a mobilization of millions. We must do something and not just talk—activists have to become organizers, and organizers become leaders.”

Bigley served in the Navy on an aircraft carrier, where he loaded bombs that were dropped on Iraq during the current U.S. war. He decided to leave the Navy after experiencing disrespectful and exploitative treatment of himself and other soldiers by military hierarchy, and seeing videotapes that officers would show to selected Navy personnel to motivate them against Iraq and Iraqis. Bigley noted: “The officers called them ‘terrorist havens’ but anyone could clearly see from the air what is a hospital or a school.”

He said of his decision to leave the Navy: “I loaded bombs on jets, and I got tired of killing people, of the bombs dropping on schools and hospitals. I’m glad I’m here to try to end the war.”

Using the encampment as a home base, activists participated in a number of militant activities to show that the people are opposed to the war and any new war funding.

On March 14, a delegation of women, organized by the Women’s Fightback Network and joined by Code Pink, went to the Iraqi Embassy to demand the release of three Iraqi women and their young children from prison. The three women were sentenced to death by hanging for resisting the U.S. occupation of their country. In response to international protest, the women—who were originally tried without a lawyer—were granted an appeals trial; however, they and their children still remain imprisoned.

Holding signs that read “U.S. democracy = criminal death penalty” and “Resistance is not a crime—stop the executions!” the women’s delegation also denounced the reinstatement of the death penalty in Iraq following the appointment of the puppet interim government there. Officials nervously peeked out of the building windows, and the assistant to the ambassador was sent out to receive petitions the women had collected, denying the women entrance inside.

The next day, activists woke up early to protest a meeting of the House Appropriations Committee. Although the November 2006 vote that gave the Democrats the upper hand in Congress was largely seen as an anti-war referendum, it has become abundantly clear that Congress intends to continue funding the war.

Three encampment participants—Gael Murphy of Code Pink, Ralph Loeffler and Mel Stevens of ACT UP (AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power) NY—were arrested after being denied entrance to the meeting and sitting down on the floor of the hallway. Six more—Lorie Blanding, Bob Nash and TONC organizers Sharon Black, Sara Flounders, Dustin Langley and Larry Holmes—were arrested for blocking the front doors of the Rayburn Building, where the meeting was being held. The nine were released at 7 p.m. that night after being held for several hours.

Later that afternoon, a press conference was held by the National May 1st Movement for Worker and Immigrant Rights to announce the next round of massive protests on May Day 2007. Speakers included representatives from the Food and Commercial Workers Union, which has been supporting workers who were raided in Smithfield hog processing plants in December 2006; day laborers from Freeport, Long Island, and Freehold, N.J.; a representative from the Troops Out Now Coalition, who stressed the links and unity between the anti-war and immigrant rights movements; a member of Queers for Economic Justice, who discussed the impact of anti-immigrant policies on the lesbian, gay, bi, and trans communities; and representatives of the Los Angeles-based March 25 Coalition for Immigrant Rights and the New York-based May 1 Coalition for Immigrant Rights.

On March 16, youth and students organized by FIST—Fight Imperialism, Stand Together—took their turn protesting at the Rayburn Building. Twenty youth surreptitiously passed through the security checkpoints and entered the building, then unraveled banners that spanned the width of the hallways. They marched through all three floors of the building, loudly disrupting the meetings going on inside. Demonstrators on the plaza outside could hear the FIST contingent well before they marched out of the building, as their chants echoed down the marble halls.

Alyssa Haight, a University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill student and member of Students for a Democratic Society, summarized the action at the Rayburn Building: “The only way to change is for people to come together—that’s what we just did. The police asked for the name of our leader and we wouldn’t give one, because we are representatives of all the people.”

Ricardo Prada, a Colombian student at the City University of New York, said, “Congress has the power to cut funds and stop the war—but Congress is part of the people—so the FIST action is a way of remembering who has the power in the nation.”

Haight noted that the response from many observers inside the building was positive, including an African-American staffer who gave the youth high fives as they chanted, “Money for jobs and education, not for war and occupation!” Workers smiled, nodded approval, gave the peace sign and thumbs-up.

Others were not so friendly. Two of the protesters were pushed by police, and military staffers in uniform cursed the contingent before slamming their office door. The youth narrowly avoided arrest as the police confusedly chased them through the building and out the door.

Caleb Maupin with the Baldwin-Wallace College FIST chapter in Cleveland said, “The spirit of rebellion is flowing through students.”

The next day at the March on the Pentagon, the encampment joined a vibrant “Stop the War at Home” contingent organized by the Jericho Movement, Troops Out Now Coalition, National May 1st Movement for Worker and Immigrant Rights, Katrina/Rita Survivors Network, BAYAN and the Million Worker March Movement.

Minnie Bruce Pratt contributed to this report.

E-mail: [email protected]