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Editorial: The Vet's Movement

By VVAW

The recent series of demonstrations organized by VVAW/WSO mark a major step forward in the history of the US veterans' movement. These actions came at a very crucial stage in the development of this movement. While many struggles around individual issues affecting vets are coming to a head today, it's clear that they cannot be won without the vigorous participation of thousands of veterans and non-veterans or without liking up this fight with vets' real allies: working people, the unemployed, and all people struggling against US imperialism. We feel that the Washington demo was a good example of how this process will unfold.

In D.C., veterans' demands were not put forward as the narrow interests of one group separated from everybody else. Instead, they were raised as part of the overall struggle against imperialism and for a better way of life. Similarly, the issues were not raised with a "hat-in-hand" pleading to the US Congress, the VA or anybody else. Rather, masses of veterans and non-veterans alike were mobilized in unified action to begin the process of forcing the implementation of our demands. Real victories in the vets' movement can only by won by fighting for them.

In the Bonus March of 1932, over 25,000 vets, families and friends went to Washington, DC, to demand that the government fulfill the promises made to them. As in 1932, the vets' struggle is plagued by a consortium of veteran's pimps, vets "specialists" and other self-proclaimed "gurus" of the veterans' movement who say that vets are a "special interest group" who should confine their struggle only to asking for a few more crumbs from the VA. "You shouldn't demand and end to the war in Indochina or demand amnesty. Just stick to vets' issues and you'll be better off!" They say the veterans' question is not a "political one." But it is, and these liars know it. The government also know it, as witnessed by the 1,100 federally funded veterans programs in the US; all set up to buy off the militance and anger of the vets' movement.

A prime example of such enemies of the veterans' movement is the recently emerged American Veterans Movement (AVM). A "group" with no real membership, AVM's only stated goals are for "increased rights for all vets" and for an "end to the disgraceful conditions in VA hospitals. Priding itself on being "non-political," the AVM has tried, like its big brothers, the VFW and the American Legion, to channel the vets' movement into a meaningless and harmless scrabbling for a few bennies here and there from the VA--a price the government can easily afford. AVM held a shoddy, so-called "Second American Bonus March" in DC on July 4th, consciously designed to coincide with the VVAW/WSO demonstrations. AVM openly set up a strategy of being a parasite on the spontaneous upsurge of vets' struggles, confusing people about who was really holding a demonstration in DC on July 4th, and generally leading vets into a dead-end movement of meaningless reformism. Consciously or not, AVM in fact acted in concert with the VA and the overall governmental strategy of subverting the real veterans' movement.

AVM was well-funded, had access to the highest reaches of government ( invitations to the White House and audiences with the head of the VA), and was incredibly hyped by the establishment media. It is clear that it was pushed by the government for all it was worth: to try and lead angry veterans into sterile struggles for a few more crumbs from the VA and ignore altogether the system that caused their problems in the first place. Yet AVM failed to draw anything but a meager 150 people to its July 4th rally. Why was this?

The answer is that the masses of vets are not to be fooled by the lies and reactionary politics of AVM and groups like them. While VVAW/WSO was literally being attacked by police for conducting its demonstrations in Washington, AVM led a "silent procession of 50 vets to the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, laid a silk rose on it and played taps on a harmonica!" Actions such as this must be viewed in context with AVM's repeated boasts of its red, white and blue "patriotism." When AVM speaks of "giving veterans the rights they fought to protect" and how they must do honor to the "flag we fought for, " it is in fact saying that the war in Indochina was right, that they are proud of their role in it and we should support the government on such future ventures. To Vietnam-era vets this is an intolerable position. The grand total of 150 people that showed up at the AM rally shows that vets aren't swallowing these lies.

Ho Chi Minh said the imperialism is a two-headed monster, sucking the blood of the people of the colonies with one head, while it sucks the blood of the working class of its own country with the other head. Vietnam-era veterans, like their brothers and sisters of the 1932 bonus March, have seen both sides of this monster and know that both sides must be fought at the same time. The struggle of veterans cannot be separated from the struggle of all working people here in the US or from the liberation struggles of the people around the world fighting to free themselves from the boot of US imperialism. Efforts to confined the struggle to vets' issues alone can only be to the advantage of our enemy. As was shown by our victory in DC, the key to future victories for the Vets' movement is unity and a commitment to militant, mass actions.

BUILD THE ANTI-IMPERIALIST VETERANS' MOVEMENT!
UNITY-STRUGGLE-VICTORY!