"My Duty as an Able-Bodied American Citizen to Say No"

On December 21, 2002, four sixteen- to seventeen-year-old girls from upstate New York were arrested for walking into a military recruiting office and refusing to leave. One of them, Oona Clare DeFlaun, when asked what if anything had influenced her, answered: -A couple of years ago I found a quote from the Nuremberg War Crimes Tribunal...It says, -Individuals have international duties which transcend the national obligations of obedience. Therefore [individual citizens] have the duty to violate domestic laws to prevent crimes against peace and humanity from occurring.- This quote made an impact on me and has resonated with me ever since. And I think it applies to this action. My purpose in being there was not to violate a local law but to uphold well-recognized international law.-1

OONA CLARE DEFLAUN

In protest of the impending war on Iraq, I, as well as twelve other people, -died in- at the local army recruiter-s office...our small group broke off, and we crossed the road to the other mall where the recruiter-s office is. We went into the lobby and took down army and marine posters and put up pictures and signs of our own. Two of our group, our -spokespeople,- went back into the recruiter-s office and introduced us. The recruiter, a young man, was shaken and upset by our presence and wanted us to leave, but we made it clear that we were there, not to protest him personally, but to protest the work he was doing. We wanted to educate him and all the recruitees about the horrors of war, not to mention -Gulf War Syndrome,- most likely caused by depleted uranium and/or anthrax vaccines. As we were lying on the floor, with red paint smeared on our faces, we read a fact sheet about depleted uranium and Martin Luther King Jr.-s Christmas sermon from 1967, given just months before he was killed. In it he tells us that we don-t have to like everybody, that would be very difficult, but we do have to love even our worst enemies. -Love is understanding, creative, redemptive good will toward all people.- After numerous warnings, we were arrested. We were taken to the state police office and processed, which took a couple of hours, and eventually we were released with court dates.

ANA FLORES

I am sixteen years old, and I am the youngest of four. I have three older brothers, two who registered for selective service and one who has not yet fallen into the trap of the military institution. I did this action for my brothers. I am currently a junior at Ithaca-s Alternative Community School and have many friends that are my age and older. I know that they could also be lured into the military, only because they are told that the military will pay for all their education, and instead be forced to fight in a war that is full of lies and deception. I did this action for them.

I took the liberty to speak for the voiceless people of Iraq, for all the innocent men, women, children, and babies that have been killed by U.S. bombs since the Gulf War and will continue to be killed in this next war. I did this action for them. I lay there in the recruitment office for the men and women who are currently in the military, so they don-t have to be sent off to war to kill and be killed in this war. [As] my uncle Peter DeMott said, -We-re here to recruit you into the peace movement!-

ANNA RITTER

Although I risked arrest and was prepared for it, I did not do the action to get arrested; I did it because I feel that it is my duty as an able-bodied American citizen to say no to the atrocities that my government is going to commit. Therefore I feel that by taking direct action my voice will be better heard. If there is a war it will affect the young people the most, because we would be among those sent to kill our brothers and sisters on foreign soil..

MARIE GRADY

As I was feeding my baby sister her dinner, I was thinking about what I should say about why I was a part of the action on Saturday. What it all boils down to is this: I know that there are big sisters in Iraq right now who are helping to feed their baby sisters, and I wonder what they are thinking. The U.S. government is hot to trot. They want to bomb Iraq as soon as possible. I hope that what I did will help to stop this war. I think of the big sisters here, whose little brothers are going to be sent to kill the babies of Iraq, and the sisters and brothers, and fathers and mothers too for that matter. And the Iraqi sisters and brothers who-ll be sent to fight the American sisters and brothers...

We went to the recruitment office on Saturday with pictures of children, some of whom are probably dead. We went and lay down on the floor as if we were dead. We went to bring that ugly, disgusting face of needless and premature death to the place where it all starts. You don-t see the kind of pictures we brought in the shiny brochures that they hand out there. So I went for all the Iraqi kids, especially the older sisters who must be worrying about what will happen if we bomb them even more than we already have. Will they get to watch their baby siblings grow up? Or will they all be dead in a couple of months? If I were in their position I would want somebody to try to stop the war, and so I have to do everything I can to stop it. For them, and for me.

http://www.warcrimeswatch.org/news_details.cfm?artid=91&cat=13