Ten Million Rally for Peace Worldwide

by Mark Dunlea, Hudson-Mohawk IMC (http://www.nycap.indymedia.org)

Hundreds of thousands of peace activists came to NYC to rally for peace 
despite the efforts by Mayor Bloomberg, President Bush and the federal courts 
to restrict the rights of the American people to protests. Even the headlines 
of the Albany Times Union acknowledged that millions participated in 
worldwide protests, with several million each in Italy and Spain. The Blair 
government in England is reeling following a protest that even the police 
admitted was the largest in its long history, with more than a million 
residents - a sizeable portion of the entire country - saying no to war.

The police in New York City came under widespread criticism for their 
mishandling of the huge crowd, creating a chaotic situation. In their effort 
to prevent the hundreds of thousands of people from having an unpermitted 
march, the police throughout the day allowed cars and trucks to travel the 
same streets as the protestors, shamefully jeopardizing public safety in the 
effort to "assert control." Many protestors complained of being locked up in 
pens by the police, with most of the protestors unable to see or hear the 
speakers. The NYC Indymedia web site is reporting many incidents of police 
violence. More than 300 protestors have been arrested, including students who 
refused orders to walk in a single file..

As many of thirty blocks along three of the City's main avenues bordering the 
United Nations were filled with protestors. 

The worldwide protests came the day after a very public rebuke of the Bush 
administration at the United Nations, with most of the world governments 
united against the U.S. drive for war. The Security Council and audience for 
one of its few times in history erupted into applause after the French 
government spoke in favor of peace and giving more time to the arms 
inspectors to complete their work. The arms inspector reported general 
compliance by Iraq. Secretary of State Powell was so shaken by the public 
rebuke by many of its allies that he abandoned his prepared speech and 
fumbled his way through a defense of America's position.

Among the many speakers lending their voices to call for peace, Archbishop 
Desmond Tutu spoke with the strongest moral authority at the rally. Actors 
Harry Ballafonte and Danny Glover, among others, delivered passionate, fiery 
speeches that raised the spirits of the crowd. Many speakers and protestors 
spoke of the importance of the demonstration as a sign of resistance to the 
efforts of the city and national government to deny their first amendment 
rights to protest.

"Bush, Bloomberg and Pataki want to deny the rights of Americans to protest a 
war that they claim is needed in order to protect our so-called democracy. 
Only the courts and the mainstream media are fooled by this blatant 
hypocrisy" was a common observation.

Below is one person's report on the February 15th rally in NYC.

I started off with the Green Party contingent that marched from Bryant Park 
at 40th and 6th at 11 A.M.. I had come down the day before for a Green Party 
press conference at the United Nations outlining the Green worldwide in 
opposing the war with Iraq. 200 hundred Capital District residents had left 
by bus from Albany on Saturday morning; more buses had left from Rensselaer 
and dozens of buses had come down from the greater Capital region area, 
including a peace train from the Rensselaer station. Many others traveled by 
vans and cars.

With Green Parties in more than 90 countries, including several dozen where 
the party is in the national parliament, the Greens have played a key role in 
building opposition to the war, especially in the various European 
Parliaments. Joschka Fischer, the Green Party official who is the Foreign 
Minister of Germany, in fact presided over the contentious meeting of the 
United Nations Security Council on Friday where the U.S. was rebuked by much 
of the rest of the world. We then have an evening forum of war and building a 
world based and peace and justice up at St. Mary's Church in Harlem. (More on 
that at the end)

At Bryant Park were joined there by another Green Party group that had 
marched up with a police escort from the party office at E. 1st St. By the 
time they reached the Park the march along the sidewalk was about three 
blocks long, probably 500 to 1000 people. They met up with about 100 Greens 
from other states, such as Pennsylvania, New Hampshire, Ohio, New Jersey, DC 
and from upstate New York. We briefly heard from Elizabeth Horton Sheff, the 
Green Party member who is Majority Leader of the Hartford (Conn.) City 
Council, and who was speaking at the larger rally later in the day as the 
Green spokesperson.

As the march proceeded up 6th Avenue, I interviewed a number of the marchers 
for my radio show on WRPI (4:30, Wednesday, 91.5). Several of the green 
groups had helped organized Peace Trains. Kimberly Wilder of the Suffolk 
County Greens said there were Peace Trains from all over the Island. Fred 
Nagel of the Dutchess County Greens said that the Peace Train he helped 
organized had more than 800 people on it - and the regular train which left a 
few minutes later from Poughkeepsie had even more people on it. A number of 
the greens from upstate, such as former Green Party attorney general 
candidate Mary Jo Long of Afton, said that local activists who had been 
unable to travel to NYC had organized support rallies in their local 
community (e.g., Binghamton) for Saturday.

The Greens were one of several dozen feeder marches that had been organized 
by support groups due to the problems in obtaining the permits from the City. 
These marches however were on the sidewalks rather than the street. Since 
they were sanctioned by the City, who provided police escorts for the various 
marches (at least half a dozen police cars for the Green march), it seemed 
the City was more interested in preventing photo opportunities of half a 
million people marching than they were in stopping marches.

After walking up 6th Avenue for ten blocks, we turned down 50th St. At this 
point the march was about five blocks long. The rally itself was taking place 
at 49th and 1st Ave. However, when we reached 3rd Ave., we were diverted up 
3rd ave (north) rather than being able to continue directly toward the rally. 

At this point, the Greens blended into several other feeder marchers and 
other peace activists trying to get to the rally. From this point on, the 
police became more heavy handed and disorganized. Of the hundreds of protests 
that I have attended over the last thirty years, I can't remember one where 
the police were so clueless about what to do. The march quickly spilled out 
onto the street, maybe 40 to 50 protesters wide. The police concentrated on 
not allowing people to cross over to first Avenue, having erected barricades 
along the side streets at each intersection with dozens of cops. As the march 
moved up 3rd Avenue, the police incredibly allowed cars to travel up 3rd 
Avenue as well. They were clearly more concerned about maintaining the 
fiction that there would not be a march than they were in protecting the 
public safety. A huge cement dump track was surrounded by protestors as it 
crawled up along 3rd Ave. The driver got caught up in the spirit of the 
protest and began honking his horn.

We caught up with Joe Lombardo at this point, a local labor and peace 
activist who was marching with the Greens. Joe had spoken and performed at 
the Green party forum the previous evening. Joe was listening to WBAI on his 
radio, which reported that there were at least 500,000 people protesting in 
London and a million in Italy. Student activists had also been arrested down 
at Union Square apparently for refusing to follow a police order to march in 
a single file.

At this point, around noon, the march had turned into a crawl. The police 
were doing their best to hinder the event and show who was in control. Every 
other block or so they would force the marchers into a few lanes of the road 
in order to allow vehicles to continue to move up 3rd Ave. More and more 
people were trying to go up the side streets to go to the rally, since it was 
clear that the march up Third Avenue would take hours before being allowed to 
cross over to first Avenue where the rally was taken place and that you 
probably would not hear any of the speakers. The cops just pushed everyone 
back. The cops appeared to have instructed not to provide any information. Of 
the dozens I talked to, not one knew where the stage was and professed to 
have no idea where we would be allowed to cross over - "I don't know" was the 
standard response to every question. 

The police were also vigorously enforcing the rule against sticks on signs. 
Several of them had surrounded sa middle aged woman who had made a beautiful, 
elaborate peace symbol out of colored crepe paper. They were insisting that 
she remove the three-foot pole that was the center pole of the peace sign, 
even though it extended no more than six inches outside of the symbol.

There were a huge number of signs and banners in the crowd: "Peace now", "war 
is not an option", "converge on the White House March 1", "Fear is our only 
enemy", "war is not an energy policy", "UN and the world says no to war", "No 
to Bush's chickenhawk war", "Greens Say No to war", "work for peace 
peacefully", "no to war for oil", "the world says no to war. There were also 
many chants highlighting the fact the streets belonged to the people, we're 
marching now, we're not turning back.

I ran into some of a hundred or so Saratoga residents who had come down on 
two buses. Barbara Thomas from Ballston Spa said that peace activists gather 
every Saturday in front of the Post Office in Saratoga at noon "We want 
peace. We are tired of spending our money on war which accomplishes 
absolutely nothing"

At this point, I decided to use my media credentials to get to the stage area 
to cover the speakers. This as always proved a challenge with the NYC police, 
and it took me about half an hour to make my way over to the stage. The 
United for Peace and Justice staff also had rather peculiar ideas about how 
to deal with the media.

Jamie Vasquez spoke on behalf of Veterans for Peace, which represents 
veterans who have  fought in every American war since WWII. "We oppose Bush's 
drive for war. We must protect the constitution and the American people. We 
must not place in harm's way our military forces for political or frivolous 
reasons. This would be an immoral and unjust war. We have a great respect for 
Colin Powell but he should resign as Secretary of State rather than rubber 
stamp the war policies of George Bush." 

Vasquez added that "Congress should reconsider their war resolution in light 
of the fact that tens of millions around the world are opposed to this war. 
We should spend the hundreds of billions of dollars for better education, 
housing medical care."

Angela Davis was the next person I was able to catch before she spoke. The 
longtime political activist, college professor and former political professor 
stated that "we have to conquer the intentional fear generated by the Bush 
administration. Some people may have marched in fear to the hardware store to 
buy their duct tape and plastic sheeting at the Bush administration's urging, 
 but many more people are marching today for justice, racial equality, for 
peace, an end to poverty. We need to build transnational, global movement to 
say no to the warmongering."

In her speech later that afternoon to the rally, Davis spoke of the need to 
assert our democratic right to march, and the opposition to the US Patriot 
Act and other legislation targeting the immigrant community. 

"We link our protest today against the war in Iraq to the historic 1980 march 
to the UN of a million people demanding nuclear disarmament. 22 years we are 
still calling for nuclear disarmament. Have we forgotten which country claims 
the largest nuclear arsenal in the world? Our goal must deal to ensure that 
noo weapons of mass destruction should be in the hands of any country, 
starting with the U.S." David added.

"We are here because we are concerned about rising poverty in our own 
country, about attacks on single mothers, about structural racism, about 
homophobia, about incarceration of what our government considers disposable 
individuals. We are concerned about the symbiotic relationship between the 
prison industrial complex and the military-industrial complex. We are 
heartened that key members of the Security Council are resisting the verbal 
tricks of Colin Powell. We stand in solidarity with the Families of the Sept. 
11 victims for Peaceful Tomorrow. We are heartened that our bodies,  voices, 
our hearts, do make a difference when we unite for peace and justice," Davis 
concluded.

Congressman Dennis Kucinich, Democrat from Ohio, discussed his proposal to 
create a Department of Peace. "War is a throwback to another era. The 
Department of Peace envisions the possibility that we can evolve beyond 
that." He also noted that "Iraq did not cause Sept. 11, did not support Al 
Queda, did not provide the anthrax that came from Fort Dicker Maryland, it 
does not have the ability to strike us with missiles."

Kucinich also spoke of his lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of Bush 
launching a war with Iraq."Art 1 Sec 8 provides the power to make resides in 
Congress, not in power. Bush does not have the power to unilaterally decide 
when to go to war. The founders of the nation wanted to divide the war 
powers. They did not want to give the President, as Commander of Chief, the 
right to also declare war."

Unfortunately, Kucinich said he would wait for the Court case to resolve 
itself rather than pushing for a vote in Congress to stop the war. However, 
virtually every American war and military escapade over the last few decades 
have been challenged in the courts as violating the constitution, none of 
which have been successful, and none have been decided until long after the 
military attack took place.

Martin Luther King III, representing the Southern Christian Leadership 
Council, spoke of the legacy of his father in opposing war and in supporting 
civil protest and disobedience. "In 1967, he was here at Riverside Church. He 
always stated his moral opposition to war, and the use of nonviolent protest 
 to bring about civil, human rights, and social change. Perhaps the greatest 
impact he made was when he came out against the war in Vietnam. As the only 
superpower,  we certainly should be leading in relation to diplomacy and not 
militarism. You are never going to stop fanaticism but you can stop terrorism 
by treating people with decency and by learning to respect their cultures" 
said King.

One of the highlights of the event was Archbishop Desmond Tutu of South 
Africa, a Nobel Prize peace winner. Tutu had noted that only in NYC were 
people preventing from marching in support of peace. Tutu peppered his 
remarks with much humor and laughter. He was certainly a far more jolly 
person than I had expected.

"I am gratified that as human beings people from so many miles away from Iraq 
have come out to demonstrate for peace in Iraq, for peace in the world, so we 
don't spend so much money for death destruction. It is wonderful," Tutu said.

When asked if the protests would do any good, Tutu responded with a chuckle. 
"Politicians are smart.  They listen. We hope they will listen. There will be 
people who will say give people a chance. Goodness prevails."

Tutu also spoke of the need for peace in the Middle East. "We don't get 
security from a barrel of a gun. We believe that until Israel has secure 
borders and a viable Palestinian state exists, we are not going to have 
peace.  They are all wonderful people," he added. 

Harry Belafonte, speaking in a booming, majestic voice, was next, stating 
that "We stand for peace. We stand for the truth that is at the heart of the 
American people. This is not the first time that we as a people have been 
misled by the leadership.  We have been misled by those that created the 
falseness of the Gulf of Tonkin, which falsely lead us into war with Vietnam, 
a war that we could not win. We lied to the American people about Grenada, 
that small island, about Nicaragua, El Salvador, Cuba, and many places in the 
world. We stand here today to let the people of the world know that America 
is a vast and diverse country and we are part of the greater truth of what 
makes our nation. Dr. King once said that if mankind does not put an end to 
war, then war will put an end to mankind."

Belafonte was one of many who spoke of the need to resist the efforts to 
impede dissent. "It was also said by one a great president than when the 
state, the leaders of our government, move to a place of tyranny and becomes 
a society of  secrecy, that it is incumbent upon the citizens not only to 
raise their voices, but that they must understand that they are doing the 
right, the patriotic thing, and that those who fail to raise their voices 
with us today are the traitors of patriotism."

Belafonte also spoke of the success of nonviolence in the overthrow of the 
apartheid system in South Africa and the tyranny of the Soviet Union. "It was 
moral truth that prevailed. The same thing can happen here. Going to war is 
obscene. If Dr. Martin Luther King were alive today, he would smile because 
we will make a difference. We stand in solidarity with all the people in the 
world who are marching with us today to put an end of war. Some say that 
people in America have gone to sleep. Today's demonstration shows that the 
American people are awake," Belafonte concluded.

Leslie Cagan was one of the main organizers of the rally for United for Peace 
and Justice. She had also been the lead organizer of the rally for nuclear 
disarmament in 1980 that drew nearly a million people, a rally that 
unfortunately  the mainstream media turned into a Nuclear Freeze rally, which 
had a far different agenda. Cagan said that it was hard to estimate the size 
of the crowd since it had been divided into so many different streets, she 
said that as many as half million people had attended.

"Our  next step is to keep pressure on our own individual government. We need 
to light a fire under our Congress to jump in and demand the Bush not lead us 
to war. We need to do the lobbying, be in the streets, be in the mainstream 
media, do community forums. We need to take every opportunity to make our 
voices heard," Cagan stated.

Danny Glover had been a strong presence back stage throughout the event, 
greeting protestors and fellow speakers, dressed in a black leather 
motorcycle jacket. He is a taller, stronger presence that one sees on the 
movie screen. He delivered a powerful speech. "We must stop their efforts to 
manufacture a climate of fear, stop their lies, and heed the will of the 
people and the nation and the rest of the world and say no to war. We have 
overcome many obstacles to stand here today on this cold February day.  But 
Mother Earth has smiled on us because she understands that our voice must be 
heard. She knows that she is sick and that only we the people can heal her," 
Glover roared. 

"We stand here because our right to dissent and our right to participate in a 
true democracy have been hijacked by an administration of liars and murderers 
who curse us because we stand in their way of tryany, of their unholy and 
brutal agenda, an administration whose greed and villainy are insatiable. We 
stand today to tell  them No War in Our names. Inevitably in the future we 
will have to challenge US Policy in the gulf, to challenge US policy as they 
attempt the potential recolonization of Africa for oil. We stand upon the 
shoulders upon those who come before us to call for peace and justice, men 
and women like Fannie Lou Hammer, Harriet Tubman, Martin and Malcolm. We 
stand here because Paul Robeson would be proud of us for standing here. He 
would say that we are climbing Jacob's Ladder," Glover stated.

The President of NOW brought her young daughters out on stage with her to 
stand for peace. "George Bush wants people to believe that we are united for 
war but we are united peace. Where are the brave opponents of tyranny when 
the threat is here at home. Our tyranny is poverty and hunger and 
homelessness and violence," she stated.

Going back stage again, I caught up with Jeff McKenzie, co-founder of 
Military Families Speak Out. Jeff's son is a captain stationed in Kuwait; his 
daughter-in-law is in the National Guard. "This is not a just war. President 
Bush is abusing his powers. I am part of a lawsuit against the President 
because he doesn't have the power to declare war. A lot of this is about oil 
and settling old grudges and benefit of major corporations."

At this point, I jumped on the subway to get back to Yankee Stadium where the 
buses from Albany were departing. The police were once again uniformally 
unhelfpul in finding a subway stop, with many subway stops closed down and 
huge crowds in many of them. 

One of the disappointing things about the rally was the lack of diversity 
among the participants in terms of people of color, espeically in a city as 
diverse in NY. Many people noted that it was far less diverse than the recent 
DC rally. It would seem that organizers needs to spend less time on the 
diversity of speakers and far more time actually directly working to mobilize 
communities of color, especially in light on the strong level of opposition.

The day before, I had participated in a press conference with the Green Party 
at the United Nation Church outlining the Greens worldwide role in opposing 
war, followed by a Green Speakout against war at St. Mary's Church in Harlem. 
It turned out that I had met a number of the church parishioners when they 
had traveled toAlbany earlier in the week to participate in the anti-hunger 
lobby day.

A copy of the press release from the news conference is below. Local speakers 
at the church include Joe Lombardo, who also sang; Franseco Camillo, 
Vice-Chair of the SUNY Albany Greens, and myself.

The first speakers was Ted Glick, who had to get back to his job as a 
fulltime organizer with United for Peace and Justice for the NYC rally. The 
former Green Party candidate for US Senate from NJ who is now a part-time 
staff person for the Greens noted that "this mad drive for war by the Bush 
administration supported by and large by most Democrats. The Bush 
administration are bad guys from way down deep  but where are the voices from 
the Democratic Party? They are few and few between. That is why the Green 
Party is so important as the progressive alternative in the political arena. 
 And at the same time, we need to bring pressure on the Democratic Party. We 
have seen what grassroots pressure can do. It was this grassroots pressure 
that got 1/3 of the Senate and House to vote against the war resolution."

Glick added that "this movement which has been building is a people's 
movement in the best sense of the term. One of the most significant 
development is the involvement of labor. One third of the 14 million members 
of the AFL-CIO are in unions that have taken anti-war positions. That didn't 
happen during the Vietnam war. In Britain, the trade union Congress is 
talking seriously about just going out if they go to war, just shutting the 
country down. "

The next speaker was Medea Benjamin, the former Green Party candidate for US 
Senate in California and a founder of Global Exchange and United for Peace 
and Justice. Benjamin had just returned from Iraq, and has spent the morning 
at the United Nations listening to the .

"The last few weeks have been an emotional rollercoaster. I wake up and read 
the newspapers that say that war is inevitable, Then I have to tell myself 
that war is not inevitable. But today I think there was a cosmic shift. I was 
inside the United Nations as the Security Council met. The silence, the 
tension was there. But Hans Blix spoke and this this is working, give us more 
time. Then the French Foreign Minister did an absolutely fantastic job and 
got this huge applause, which never happens. He said that we must find ways 
to stop war. He turn Bush's comments around and said that yes, we are an old 
country and we are so old that we know about the horrors of war, the death 
and destruction."

Throughout all of this you could see Colin Powell shifting around in his 
seat. He usually is very articulate but when it was his time to speak, he was 
fumbling, mumbling, caught in a bind trying to defend this horrific policy of 
the U.S. The whole world was against us, other that Jack Straw from Britain 
and the terrible women from Spain. Everyone else didn't want war. The sense 
was that the US was on the wrong side of history and that the rest of the 
world is going to stop them," Medea added..

"I just returned from Bagdad on Sunday. I have traveled much of the world 
when I worked for the UN and since working with Global Exchange, and rarely 
have I met such a warm, loving, giving people. They come up to us in the 
streets and told us they hate George Bush but love Americans. They love 
American culture, they had Meryl Streep movies on TV every day. And you think 
how George Bush has labeled this whole country as evil. The American people 
don't get to see them out playing soccer, at poetry readings, at local 
theaters, you don't hear how this is the cradle of civilization. These people 
do not deserve to bear the brunt of the Bush adminsitration's attack for oil. 
Women would come up and ask where we will hide, how will we protect our 
children? Just realize that half the population of Iraq is under the age of 
16. This will be a war on children. I was there on the day that Bush said 
this is it, we're going to war. I saw men outside digging holes in the ground 
to try hide their families." Medea continued.

Medea said that when hte peace delegation returned from Iraq, "we desperately 
began to call American congressmen, because one of the things the Iraqi 
people said was to bring some Congress people here. That will at least delay 
war. In this entire time there have been all of three Democratic congress 
people that have gone to Baghdad. We can't get one more Democratic 
congressman to go. We have to get on their backs and make them to do more to 
stop war."

She concluded by observing that "Bush uwittingly has given us a chance of a 
lifetime, a chance to build a global revolution. Some of us just had the 
opportunity to go to Brazil where 100,000 people came together under the 
banner that anothe world is possible. The global movement that we are 
building under the banner of anti-corporate globalization is becoming the 
first global movement for peace and justice. We need to win so instead of 
having the Code Pink Women outside the White House they can be sitting warmly 
in the Oval office"