Sharing Lessons from EDSA 2 
With the Global Anti-War Movement

The global anti-war and anti-terrorist mass movement must aim to compel the Bush-Cheney clique -- the narrow U.S. ruling class faction holding the world at sway and currently directing this boundless, oil-soaked war -- to step down from power, now. 

By Joel Garduce 
Center for Anti-Imperialist Studies (CAIS)

On the eve of the second anniversary of EDSA 2 here in the Philippines, People Power was mounted in 37 countries to protest the Bush-Cheney administration’s designs for war in Iraq, in the biggest internationally-coordinated anti-war protests in a worldwide movement that may come out larger than what was seen in the Vietnam War.

Most notable was that about a million Americans -- 500,000 in Washington D.C., 250,000 in San Francisco, and hundreds of thousands more in Tampa, Santa Barbara, Albuquerque, Mount Rushmore, Portland, Las Cruces, Springfield, Durham, Las Vegas, Reno, Honolulu, Tucson, Colorado, and many other cities across the United States -- took to the streets Jan. 18 to 19 and rebuffed their own warmongering government.

These U.S. mass actions were at the core of massive protests from Jan. 18 to 20 spanning seven continents: North America, South America, Europe, Asia, Australia, Africa and even Antarctica.

Unlike what transpired during the Vietnam War, these massive democratic actions are already taking place before any actual large-scale invasion by the U.S. government, though it must be emphasized that thousands of U.S. troops are already deployed in the countries and seas outlying Iraq.

Anticommunist hysteria

For the U.S. mass actions, the unprecedented protests signified as well the big-time rebuff of renewed anticommunist hysteria peculiarly coming from so-called Western left media that attacked ANSWER and Not In Our Name, the two leading broad formations organizing the anti-war demonstrations, as mere covers for communists. Far from being an exclusive crowd of leftists, demonstrators, mass leaders and organizers came from virtually all walks of U.S. social life.

The impact of this January political storm on world public opinion regarding the Bush-Cheney clique’s war of terrorism was not lost, even if Big Media vainly downplayed it. Buoyed by the global grassroots groundswell, France, Germany, Russia, China and Canada had recently fortified their opposition to any U.S. invasion of Iraq, rendering the U.S. and UK a minority in the UN Security Council. Also lending further to the crescendo of opposition are Hollywood’s Robert Redford and George Clooney and writer John Le Carre, joining dozens of their colleagues who already rejected the U.S.’ terrorist war earlier. Meanwhile, in a creative fashion of solidifying grassroots opposition that should be replicated elsewhere, city councils in 42 US cities in 24 states have passed or are likely to soon pass major resolutions opposing the U.S. war on Iraq.

Despite the overwhelming rejection of its terrorist designs, the Bush-Cheney government is hell-bent on invading Iraq, even without a UN endorsement, even without evidence of potential troublemaking by Saddam against the U.S.

Worse, the Bush-Cheney regime is elsewhere already pushing ahead with its war of terrorism. In the Philippines, U.S. armed occupation troops have recently reentered the country to teach new terrorist methods to an unsovereign local military and resecure as well newly-built U.S. military facilities despite a longstanding constitutional ban.

Exciting challenges

Clearly, the global anti-war movement has much more exciting challenges ahead even as it has made historic headway. As it is, the practical question thus remains: How can the super-terrorist war be actually stopped? To address this, the global anti-war and anti-terrorist mass movement must aim to compel the Bush-Cheney clique -- the narrow U.S. ruling class faction holding the world at sway and currently directing this boundless, oil-soaked war -- to step down from power, now.

Already, there are grassroots moves in the U.S. to push for the impeachment of Bush and Cheney. The biggest hurdle to this impeachment tack though is that the U.S. Congress is currently in the pockets of Bush’s corporate-sponsored Republican Party, as it is now in control of both Houses following the fraud-ridden U.S. midterm polls last year. Like what transpired here in our country in late 2000 and early 2001, the clique in power can easily emasculate this approach and frustrate the popular call for change.

The key then -- as we Filipinos know what pulled us through in defeating the Estrada clique -- is for the American democratic mass movement in particular to keep at it: organizing far more working and middle-class households and communities for bolder, more effective democratic action. It would be helpful to the people’s anti-terrorist cause to enlist far more American soldiers in opposing war, whether by publicly exposing orders by the warmongers for terrorist action, or outrightly refusing the execution of such antidemocratic orders, or in some other unexplored creative but productive ways.

And there is always the “Czechoslovakian solution,” from which Filipino revolutionary leader Jose Ma. Sison drew his late 2000 proposal to anti-Estrada forces: encircle the seat of undemocratic power with a million-strong democratic vigil until the tyrants are compelled to step down. Filipinos very well know the effectiveness of such democratic engagement, as the mere threat of its use, among others, finally forced Estrada to abandon Malacañang two years ago.

Now that’s one vital lesson in democratic struggle that, like a candle’s flame, ought to be shared everywhere, to bring light to a world ruled by dark forces. Bulatlat.com

We want to know what you think of this article.