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<font class="columntext"><font class="sansmediumhead"><!---- END STORY TITLE -------->Without
draft as target, Iraq anti-war protests lack intensity of Vietnam era
</font></font></b></big></big></u><br>
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<div class="byline">By David Crary</div>
<div class="credit">ASSOCIATED PRESS</div>
<div class="date">2:44 p.m. March 20, 2007</div>
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NEW YORK – America's current anti-war movement is resourceful and
persistent, but often seems to lack the vibrancy of its counterpart in
the Vietnam era when protesters burned draft cards, occupied buildings
and even tried to levitate the Pentagon.
<p>The biggest difference, say activists and historians, is the lack of
a draft.
</p>
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Today's college-age youth face no threat of conscription to fight in
Iraq, and campuses are more tranquil than during Vietnam.
<p>“We're not as unified, not as hard-core, not as big,” said Frida
Berrigan, 32, a board member of the War Resisters League and daughter
of the late peace activist Philip Berrigan. “There's a reason there's
not a draft.”
</p>
<p>Since Saturday, protests marking the fourth anniversary of the
Iraq war have been held in hundreds of communities nationwide, ranging
from small-town vigils in Maine to a “die-in” in San Francisco.
Passions sometimes ran high and more than 100 protesters were arrested.
But attendance in many cities was modest, no national turnout figure
was announced, and at no point did the events come close to dominating
the national agenda.
</p>
<p>“There is tremendous anti-war sentiment in the country that has
not all found its way into activism,” said Leslie Cagan, a student
protest organizer during the Vietnam War and now national coordinator
of the anti-war coalition United for Peace and Justice.
</p>
<p>“Our challenge is to tap into that sentiment and help people
see legitimate, productive ways to express themselves,” Cagan said.
“Part of what we're up against is an attitude that you can't fight the
powers that be.”
</p>
<p>With both Iraq and Vietnam, public opinion gradually shifted
over the years until polls showed more opponents than supporters. In
each era, protesters railed against White House determination to pursue
the war regardless of widespread doubts.
</p>
<p>But there are several key differences now: far lower U.S.
casualties – roughly 3,200 vs. about 58,000 then; less of the
generational conflict that added fuel to the Vietnam protests; and, a
desire by many anti-war leaders not to demonize the military.
</p>
<p>“There's a lot of caution now,” said David Schmitz, a history
professor at Whitman College in Walla Walla, Wash. “Many people who
oppose the war in Iraq are very concerned that they not be seen as
being against the troops.”
</p>
<p>James Carafano, an Army veteran and defense policy expert at
the conservative Heritage Foundation, said the contrast in attitudes
toward the military is stark.
</p>
<p>“During Vietnam, the perception was that atrocities were
everywhere – the military was looked down on,” he said. “There is a
serious effort now not to stigmatize the military – a conscious effort
to say, 'This is not a bunch of baby-killers.'”
</p>
<p>For Vietnam protesters, the military served as a prime foil.
Students demanded the ouster of ROTC programs from their campuses and
protested at draft centers, chanting “Hell No, We Won't Go.” Four days
of demonstrations at Kent State University – that included the burning
of an ROTC building – ended disastrously when National Guard gunfire
killed four students in 1970.
</p>
<p>Now campuses are quieter, and some liberal baby-boomer
professors grumble that students are too detached. But 24-year-old
Miranda Wilson, national campus coordinator for Peace Action, says such
stereotyping is wrong and contends there is broad, though often
low-key, opposition to the war.
</p>
<p>“During Vietnam, people were questioning the government itself
– it got a lot more coverage,” she said. “What's happening now isn't so
dramatically visible from the outside.”
</p>
<p>Democratic Sen. John Kerry, who returned from Vietnam combat
duty to join the anti-war movement, said the lack of a draft “has
greatly affected the level of activism and the intensity” of today's
protest campaign.
</p>
<p>“Right now, it's not changing a lot of minds,” he said in a
telephone interview Tuesday. But the anti-war movement is “putting some
pressure on people as they run for public office. It will help change
the makeup of Congress – it already has.”
</p>
<p>The Vietnam era featured larger-than-life figures – Martin
Luther King Jr., John Lennon, Muhammad Ali – and colorful provocateurs
such as Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Rubin. Hoffman masterminded the attempt
to levitate the Pentagon in 1967; both were at the center of protests
that sparked clashes with police at the 1968 Democratic convention in
Chicago.
</p>
<p>For all their intensity, however, the Vietnam protests failed
to produce quick results, with U.S. troops pulling out six years after
the first huge anti-war rallies in 1967. The effectiveness of the
current movement remains to be judged; even some of its leaders sound
unsure.
</p>
<p>“The so-called normalcy of life allows people to go about their
business, even if they're against the war,” said Kevin Martin,
executive director of Peace Action. “Meanwhile, Bush and Cheney don't
care how low their popularity is – they're going to keep doing what
they're doing until someone stops them.”
</p>
<p>Barry Romo, who served with the Army in Vietnam, became an
anti-war activist after his return home and remains a national leader
of Vietnam Veterans Against the War.
</p>
<p>While proud of the Vietnam protest movement, he says the Iraq
anti-war campaign is even more impressive under the circumstances.
</p>
<p>“It cuts across class lines,” he said. “You see black churches
and trade unions involved. When I go to demonstrations, it really is a
rainbow.”
</p>
<p>Comparing the two movements, Frida Berrigan suggested today's
protesters perhaps have a broader sense of compassion and global
awareness.
</p>
<p>“A lot of the opposition to Vietnam was motivated by people's
fear of going to war – maybe it was pretty self-centered,” she said.
“With this movement, maybe it's not as big, but it comes from a deeper
place than 'Hell No, We Won't Go.'”
</p>
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