At the end of August, 19-year-old Private Jason Chelsea killed himself. It was widely reported that he took his own life because he could not cope with the possibility of killing children during his, then imminent, deployment to Iraq.
Motivations for suicide are usually quite complex. However, realising you don't want to shoot children - but may be expected to - could certainly become a powerful dynamic in an already vulnerable mind.
Lies and brutalisationDespite much being…
According to press reports, the MoD is refusing to comply with the Information Commissioner's ruling that they should release details of the 500 civil servants employed to promote British arms exports because “they could be harassed by pacifists”.
Well, it's no wonder really. Everyone must have noticed those marauding hordes of militant pacifists, flaunting their white poppies, giving out leaflets about Gandhi, even trying to sell copies of Peace News - they're so…
I couldn't quite believe it. Here I was at the army recruitment fair, having a discussion with one of the organisers about the punitive measures in the Armed Forces Bill currently going through parliament, measures which could mean conscientious objectors in the forces being sent to prison for life, and he was trying to sell it to me on the grounds that it's “better than the death penalty”.
What sort of an argument is that? It's like defending the maiming of children in Iraq on the…
Peace activists with the INNATE network held a picket of a British army recruitment day at the Kinnegar base, Holywood, County Down on 21 May. Information leaflets were distributed to potential army recruits and others attending the event.
“New recruits to the army are often unaware of the conditions they need to meet if they decide that army life isn't for them and they want to get out. The situation isn't helped by the lack of transparency in the army's rulebooks - the Queen's…
As Peace News goes to press, Military Families Against the War (MFAW) are preparing to descend on parliament to lobby their MPs. They are demanding an end to the war in Iraq and that the troops be withdrawn.
More than fifty family members will come to London and, for the first time, families of those servicemen killed in Iraq will be joined by families of soldiers serving in both Iraq and Afghanistan. Former MP and journalist Martin Bell will accompany them.
After the…
On Sunday 12 February, peace activists with the Irish Network for Nonviolent Action Training and Education Network (INNATE) lobbied a British Army recruitment fair at the Kinnegar base, in Co Down, N Ireland.
Flyers were distributed to potential new recruits and others attending the event, outlining both the negative consequences of army enlisting and the alternatives available to potential recruits. They also promoted the confidential advice service At Ease for those who do join…
Jarhead is yet another Sam Mendes tour de force. This time bringing the Anthony Swofford memoirs of a US marine scout/sniper in the first Gulf War in Iraq to the big screen, once again Mendes has brought the same intensity and throw-away realism that his previous Hollywood adventures have also had.
Just like his previous big-budget outings, Jarhead adds an abstract or almost surreal quality to the very real and mundane nature of one aspect of the US way of life -…
On 24 November, six members of Military Families Against the War applied at the High Court in London for permission for a full judicial review of the government's refusal, last May, to order an investigation into the legality of the 2003 attack on Iraq and the subsequent UK military action there.
At the hearing - for which they had had to appeal for donations because they were refused legal aid (see the front page story in the November PN) - Judge Collins reserved judgement…
Do you remember Mr Major's now infamous vision of British (English, surely) life? Spinsters on bicycles pedalling to evensong, warm beer and cricket matches. Claptrap of course; but if he'd gone the whole sentimental hog he'd surely have included county shows, annual carnivals and village fetes. He might even have mentioned their recruiting displays by pyramids of army dispatch riders on motorbikes or even fly-pasts by the Red Arrows. All indicators of a "nation at ease with itself".
…
The biggest bully I knew at school joined the police force. Even at age 16 I thought this entirely logical.
On the other hand, Roy, who was one of my circle of friends, joined the army as a boy entrant. I knew he was lonely and sensed he was unhappy. His mother died when he was eight and he was brought up after a fashion by a succession of “aunts” who lived with his (often absent) father. We were appalled, but the prospect of two years' National Service faced us all and his…
Well m'darlings, today's Easter love-your-enemy-bunny is Sir Jock Stirrup. I kid you not.
His formal title is Air Chief Marshal Sir Graham Eric Stirrup. But inexplicably he prefers to be known as Jock.
His CV is so acronym-heavy it makes you proud. He's been an “OC 2” a “PSO”, a “CO RAF”, an “AOC No1”, a “FIMgt”, a “FRAeS”, a “KCB” and an “AFC”. Know what they stand for? Suggestions on a postcard please.
So you see, he knows a thing or two about planes, and was director…
I live in a tiny, remote, impoverished, three-block-long town in the desert of north eastern New Mexico. Everyone in town - and the whole state - knows that I am against the occupation of Iraq, that I have called for the closing of [nuclear laboratories at] Los Alamos, and that, as a priest, I have been preaching, like the Pope, against the bombing of Baghdad.
One day in December, it was announced that the local National Guard unit for north-eastern New Mexico, based in the nearby…
San Diego County in California is home to not only one of the largest military installations in the world, but also the second-largest Iraqi population in the US. In autumn 2002, the San Diego Coalition for Peace and Justice began an outreach campaign to high school students to encourage them to question the US government's planned attack on Iraq.
Why the focus on high school students? The Vietnam War taught the Pentagon that conscription had limited effectiveness and could seriously…
Between 6,000 and 14,000 children are currently being used as soldiers by non-state armed groups, paramilitaries or militias.
Boys and girls play a variety of roles: combatants, spies, human shields, messengers, porters, kidnappers, guards, cooks, sexual companions or slaves, or placers of bombs. All child soldiers are virtual prisoners of their commanders; punishments for infractions are harsh, sometimes resulting in death. Girls are particularly at risk of sexual abuse. Since the…
The stark images of child soldiers in armed conflicts today are shocking: sometimes under 10, dressed in uniforms too large or sportsgear that belongs in a park, armed with high powered weapons that are often bigger than themselves.
Many of these children are often forcibly recruited at gunpoint, but often it is poverty, propaganda and alienation that drives them into armies, paramilitaries and militias. Many join armed groups because of their own experience of abuse at the hands of…
