This Is Where We Take Our Stand, Episode 3: Why We Fight

This is a very interesting and candid film of Iraq Veterans Against the War discussing their various motivations for organizing G.I. resistance against the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. And they all come from different perspectives. Some have become radicalized in their opposition to U.S. imperialism and militarism, and are motivated by the immorality of what these wars have done to the Iraqi and Afghani peoples. Others are motivated by more patriotic issues and are most concerned with how these wars are killing and maiming their fellow soldiers and hurting the interests of the country. Of course these various perspectives and concerns need not be mutually exclusive. But it is very interesting how these war veterans debate these issues amongst themselves. I have a lot of respect for these people. I hope we never forget that in the 2000s the veterans were the vanguard of the anti-war movement. Can we have a "hoorah for peace"?

Here is a synopsis from the website:

Flashback to January, three months before Winter Soldier. How do you bring hundreds of veterans to Washington DC, to tell their stories? An IVAW national planning meeting reveals sharp differences among the members. Is the point of Winter Soldier to show how these wars are hurting America, or the destruction America is bringing to the people of Iraq and Afghanistan? Is the goal to strengthen the military, or weaken it? Despite the differences, a deep unity is built because, as Geoff Millard declares, the bottom line is “No one can hear our stories and still support this shit.”

Why We Fight 7/21 from Displaced Films on Vimeo.

A Militant and Inspiring Song from Len Chandler (with Pete Seeger)

Wow! What a militant and inspiring song this is from Len Chandler.

I had never heard of Len Chandler before I saw the film "FTA" (Free/Fuck the Army), about Jane Fonda, Donald Sutherland and other entertainer's Vietnam era anti-war show for GIs. Its a good film, available on Netflix, released into theatres for a week in the early 1970s and then buried, and Louis Proyect reviews it here along with the classic documentary about Vietnam, "Hearts and Minds".

Anyway, within "FTA" is Len Chandler singing another great song, "My Ass is Mine" which I take to be a play on an army officer's phrase "your ass is mine". I have looked for a You Tube clip of that part of "FTA", and haven't found one. (FYI, the You Tube clip of Rita Martinson that I posted for Memorial Day also from the file "FTA".) Whatever happened to these great resistance artists?

Anyway, here are some of the lyrics from Len Chandler singing "Move on Over (John Brown's Body)" Enjoy the video below.

"Your jails are filled with black men, and your courts are white with hate,
And with every bid for freedom, someone whispers to us "wait".................,
Move on over, or we will move on over you............
It is you who are subversive, you are the killers of the dream......
In a savage world of bandits, it is you who are extreme........"

Memorial Day II, Rita Martinson from the Vietnam Era FTA Tour

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Memorial Day I, Remembering What War Does to Families

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