Let Them Stay! – New Niagara Group Supports Iraq War Resisters

By Fiona McMurran

American war resisters resident in Canada now have a Niagara support group.

A recent gathering of war resisters and their families along the Canada/U.S. border in Fort Erie, Ontario.

On Thursday, Nov. 18, people from both sides of the border met at the Guild Hall to form the War Resisters Support Campaign of Niagara,  Ontario. Joining concerned local residents were members from the Toronto-based War Resisters Support Campaign, including war resister Kimberly Rivera, as well as three members of the Buffalo Chapter of Veterans for Peace. We met in the Guild Hall in Port Colborne,  Ontario as guests of Anglican Minister Rev. Rob Hurkmans, who,  along with Fort Erie minister Rev. Mark Gladding, has been offering help to Iraq resister Jeremy Brockway and his family,  now residents of Port Colborne.

The War Resisters Support Campaign has been providing help and support since 2004, when Jeremy Hinzman and his family crossed the border.  

The Support Campaign has fought tirelessly to help these men and women who, rather than continue to fight in what they regard as an illegal war in Iraq,  have left behind family, friends and country to seek asylum in Canada. As well as raising public awareness of the plight of the war resisters, the War Resisters Support Campaign raises funds for legal services to aid the resisters in their securing refugee status in Canada.  Their efforts resulted in the passing of a motion in Parliament calling for the government to allow the war resisters to stay in Canada.  When the federal government ignored the motion, Liberal MP Gerard Kennedy introduced a private member’s bill to that effect.

 On Sept. 29, 2010, Bill C-440 failed on second reading. Although the Bill had the support of the NDP, the Bloc and 59 members of the Liberal caucus,  it was defeated by a mere seven votes.  Obviously this was a set back for the war resisters themselves,  and for members and supporters of the War Resisters Support Campaign. It’s not been easy for any of them.

On Sunday, Oct. 16,  a forum co-sponsored by the War Resisters Support Campaign and the Buffalo Chapter of Veterans for Peace brought together a number of the war resisters to tell their stories and to respond to questions.  It was an unforgettable experience to hear these accounts,  and I left feeling that these are some of the finest people I’ve ever met,  and we should do all we can to keep them in Canada. Their individual stories are fascinating in and of themselves,  and they reveal a maturity and an inner strength that comes from hard struggles to live honestly in a world increasing in thrall to lies.

What struck me most is how honest they are, how clear-eyed about the country they once loved unquestioningly, and how little bitterness they hold, despite being misled and, some might say, betrayed by their own government. None made excuses for having signed up for the military. Their reasons for doing so made sense at the time: all come from towns and cities experiencing job loss and economic uncertainty. The U.S. military represented for them an opportunity to serve their country and to support themselves and their loved ones, as well as the chance of pursuing further their education after serving in the field.  The most compelling reason was patriotic: their country was involved in a war to prevent the tyrant ruling Iraq from using Weapons of Mass Destruction against the U.S. At least, that’s what they, like other Americans, were told by their government and almost all American media.  And then they found out that Saddam Hussein had nothing to do with the attacks of 9/11 and no links to Al Qaeda; that there were no weapons of mass destruction; that the invasion and subsequent war on and occupation of Iraq actually were illegal actions against a sovereign state.   Then they learned that the Iraq war was giving American companies the chance to make enormous profits from rebuilding the country they had destroyed, at the cost of thousands of American lives and the death of hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians.  As one war resister said, the wakeup call was not unique to those who,  like him, went AWOL.  Some dealt with their increasing disillusionment and distress by turning to drugs and alcohol in an attempt to dull the pain,  while they continued to inflict damage on a country and a people they now knew had done nothing to harm themselves or their country.  They would return home permanently damaged—if not in body, then certainly in mind.

The defeat of Bill 440 was a setback, but the War Resisters Support Campaign has not given up. Far from it.  They are renewing their efforts to give help to the resisters now resident in Canada,  some of whom are in the last stages of appeals before they are issued deportation orders. Campaign organizer Michelle Robidoux fears that the Parliamentary Christmas break may provide a convenient window of opportunity for the government to deport war resisters.  It has happened before. Unlike the U.S., Canada has no groups like Veterans for Peace, Courage to Resist, Iraq Veterans Against the War, or Military Families Speak Out.

What we Canadians know about our mission in Afghanistan comes from politicians and some upper-level military commanders and the media, not from our own combat veterans.  Especially in the context of the extension of the Canadian mission in Afghanistan, the experience of the Iraq war resisters should give us much to think about.

On December 3, Niagara residents will have an opportunity to learn more about the war resisters and the support campaign.  Let Them Stay!,  an evening sponsored by the War Resisters Support Campaign of Niagara,  will feature Welland MP Malcolm Allen and Ashlea Brockway, who will speak about her husband’s experience and the situation of war resisters and their families, living as they do in a legal limbo. Bruce Beyer, a member of Veterans for Peace, Buffalo Chapter, will share his experiences of seeking refuge in Canada thirty years ago during the Vietnam War, as well as his current efforts to support conscientious objectors.

Let Them Stay! takes place on Friday, Dec. 3, from 7:30 to 9:30 p.m. in St. Catharines, at the Niagara Artists Centre, 354 St. Paul St. We hope to see you there.

(Fiona McMurran is a resident of Welland, Ontario and member of the South Niagara chapter of the Council of Canadians.)

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