Why I Oppose the War
by Kim Kranich

Dad,
I am against a U.S. war against Iraq. I support other countries standing up to the warmongering rhetoric of Bush. I am for a nonviolent solution that is international in scope. I support stopping violence whether its one lover beating up another or one country killing the citizens of another. I want it stopped, but not with violence unless others means are seriously exhausted first. Bush came out of the bullpen with fighting words. He wants a war. That's the difference between him and most of the American public.

I am aware of the U.S.'s economic power in the global economy and how it uses its power to bully other countries, such as Colombia, into supporting the U.S. position of a pre-emptive strike against Iraq.

My Congressional heroes with regard to Iraq are Conservative Republican Ron Paul from Texas, progressive Democrat Barbara Lee from California and Senator Robert Byrd.

I support the Lee Alternative to War Amendment. The Lee alternative amendment urges the U.S. to work through UN inspections and other diplomatic means to ensure that Iraq is not developing weapons of mass destruction. It would not authorize the President to use force against Iraq.

War is being sold to us like milk. War will suck billions of dollars from desperately needed programs in the U.S. I'm onto the President's propaganda machine.

With regard to your questions about Hitler and Stalin, I have questions back:

Did the U.S. ever support Hitler or Stalin in their country's wars against other countries by supplying them with weapons and other aid to fight those countries?

Are you not aware that in the mid-1980s the U.S. supported Saddam Hussein in
his war against Iran?

Hitler quashed dissent. That's how he started his murderous campaign. Political activists were the first to be rounded up and killed by Hitler. We must stop Bush and Rumsfeld from continuing down this path of quashing dissent.

Did you not know that, according to Senator Bryd's website (http://byrd.senate.gov/) the U.S. provided Iraq with its building blocks for biological weapons?

Don't you remember the Kuwaiti woman who testified before Congress before the Gulf War? She said that she saw Iraqi soldiers tear Kuwaiti babies from incubators. It was later learned that she was the daughter of the Kuwaiti Ambassador to the U.S. and that her story was a lie (prwatch.org).

Governments lie, especially during war.

I believe former UN weapons inspector Scott Ritter who says that Iraq has no nuclear, biological or chemical weapons that pose an imminent threat to the U.S. or Iraq's neighbors. Scott Ritter also told us how UN weapons inspectors were turned into spies. He quit the program after that.

Do you think Indonesian President Suharto is less evil than Saddam Hussein? Suharto is Bush's ally.

Osma Bin Laden was our ally, too. We gave him money and weapons to fight the Soviets. Then the bully turned on us. We reap what we sow.

Why is the U.S. not demanding that Israel comply with UN mandates?

Did you forget that the US dropped Agent Orange, a chemical weapon, in Vietnam? It didn't just defoliate trees, it eventually killed our own soldiers.

Have you forgotten that the U.S. is the only country that has used nuclear weapons, twice, against another nation?

What will Iraq look like after we bomb it and destabilize it? Who will we prop up as its leader and what will the consequences be?

Our foreign policy is filled with hypocrisy: "Do as I say, not as I do." Our president is a cowboy whose language of "You're either for us or against us" is divisive. He's not interested in building coalitions, not really. He wants other countries to do what we say because we are the world's only super power.

We have no right to be the world's police or to unilaterally change the world's policy from one of containment to one of pre-emptive strikes. We are the world's biggest bully and if Americans don't know this, then we've
got our heads in the sand. Any unilateral action by the US against any other country will create a new generation of haters of the U.S.

If we pre-meptively strike Iraq, what would prevent India from pre-emptively striking Pakistan and the other way around? If the US can do it, so can I.

This is a dangerous slope of aggressive thinking led by the U.S.

The only thing I can agree with you about, Dad, is that Saddam Hussein is evil. I do not agree with our attempted method of removal of the Iraqi dictator. The costs are too high. I am trying to prevent death and World War III. I am trying to prevent the U.S. from using another nuclear weapon. I am trying to expose the propaganda of the executive branch.

I am more afraid of our war mongering than I am of any external threat. I am more afraid of how our actions against Iraq might be catalysts for World War 3 than I am of terrorists from within or without.

If I am unfortunate enough one day to be killed, murdered or die in a chemical or biological attack or by some punk on the street, I do not want the perpetrator(s) to be killed in my name. Find my killers and lock them up, but do not kill in my name. I mean it. I will defend myself and my life and the lives of those I love against eminent danger, and if I lose, I do not want more violence to be done in my name. I want redemption not revenge, if such unfortunate circumstances were ever to occur.

I just got word from Danielle that she will be joining me the weekend I visit. I'll let you know more later as the date approaches. We will want to visit the grandparents, too.

Have fun in Wyoming.
Love,
Kim

Dear School Principal
by Jan Kruse

Dear School Principal:
In an attempt to balance the extremely patriotic event that had been planned for 9-11-02 for our students, my class worked on a unit about the people of Afghanistan and Iraq. We looked at library books and discussed the fact that the people were like us in many ways. A problem seemed to develop when I taught, as our social studies text lead me, that in order to be good community members we should discuss our problem and try to work out differences and that perhaps our government leaders might try to do this too. I was trying to put a human face on these countries and to suggest hope for a peaceful world. When we placed our banner about Afghanistan and Iraq in the hallway across from the huge US flag, I was only trying to offer balance to the world view that we were teaching our students. It seemed very important that as teachers we help the children move beyond thinking only of our sorrow and ourselves in current world events. I felt this was even more important when you approved the visit of the US marine into classrooms at our school to discuss his recent return from battle in Afghanistan and to share artifacts of battle with 8 year old children. After 20 years of teaching at this school I was filled with sorrow when asked to immediately remove our HOPE FOR A PEACEFUL WORLD banner from the hallway since it had been deemed "too political". I am no longer sure this is such a free society, since war has administrative approval, but peace is "too political" even in elementary school!

Is there hope for a peaceful world?...............This hope could begin with our children!
Jan Kruse,
1st grade teacher