Speaking yesterday at an all-day conference called "Anti-War Patriotism," Providence Journal columnist Bob Kerr said the Iraq war has an "awful lot of similarities with Vietnam" and claimed the U.S. government uses embedded journalists to "control the coverage" of the war. Kerr, who was joined on a discussion panel by two veterans of the Iraq war and two family members of military men killed in Iraq, also urged audience members to support returning veterans.
The panel was the closing event of the conference, which was held in the List Art Building.
After five panel members related personal stories for 90 minutes, an hour-long debate developed that pitted the panel and several audience members against future Marine Evan Pettyjohn '06, who expressed adamantly pro-war views.
All the panel members called for the return of American troops and withdrawal from Iraq as well as laid out their reasons for opposing the war.
Andrew Sapp, a 49-year-old veteran and high school English teacher from Massachusetts, originally left the military to attend community college and Yale and Harvard universities on the GI Bill. After he ran into financial difficulty, he rejoined just before the Iraq war began.
"When (the government) started making a case for war and pretending to play diplomacy to try to avoid it, I knew they were already drawing up battle plans. They were already amassing troops to get overseas for the invasion," he said.
Upon his return from Iraq, Sapp said he was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder. Since then, he said his family has had its "life really taken away from us."
Sapp emphasized that his story is not unique, saying many returning veterans will experience dependency on drugs and alcohol and deal with depression.
He added, however, that he hopes the sacrifice he made was "worth it" and that Americans will take back their country from the "petty little men" who "mortgaged our grandchildren" to pay for the war.
Patrick Resta, another veteran who served as a medic in Iraq for just under a year, expressed similar anti-Bush administration sentiments, calling the handling of the war a "gross negligence and criminal incompetence."
He described permanent military bases he saw in Iraq, which he said had Pizza Huts, indoor swimming pools, million-dollar gyms and outlets selling iPods and televisions. Resta cited this as evidence that the United States has no immediate plans to leave Iraq.
"There is no exit strategy because leaving was never a part of the plan," he said. "Once I got there, I realized quickly that we had no real mission."
He added he was ordered "not to treat Iraqi people unless they were about to die" and only if an injury was caused by U.S. troops.
Dante Zappala, whose bro-ther died in an explosion in Iraq, agreed with the view of Resta and Sapp that the Bush administration has been lying to the American public.
"The thing that is still missing to me right now is truth," he said. "We all have to be invested in what's happening. It is vital as a country that we are."
Stephanie Kern, who lost a son to an improvised explosive device in Iraq, called for journalists to report the truth.
"We need real journalists; we need to teach the young journalists who are getting their education now not to be afraid," she said.
Resta added he had not spoken to a journalist while in Iraq because journalists were only allowed to speak to "pre-picked soldiers."
Kerr echoed the sentiment, saying that embedding journalists was "genius on the part of the government" because it allowed governmental control of the media.
Although the audience largely expressed support for the panelists, at least one member of the audience - Pettyjohn - disagreed. Pettyjohn, who is president of the College Republicans and will receive his Marine Corps commission at Commencement in May, challenged the panelists to explain why so many people in the military believes in the war.
He told The Herald that although he appreciated the panelists' appearance on campus, he said he believed "they paint a one-sided picture."
Carl Sheeler, a Marine veteran who is running for U.S. Senate, spoke at the conference earlier in the day and stayed to attend the panel discussion. During the question-and-answer session, Sheeler and several other veterans in the audience encouraged Pettyjohn to rethink his positions on the war and debated with him about his views.
Sheeler told The Herald he believes Pettyjohn was displaying "naiveté" but added, "Twenty-five years ago, I probably would have felt he same way."
Catherine Lutz, professor of anthropology and moderator of the panel, ended the lengthy discussion by praising the panelists for speaking out at a time when many Americans display "violent" opposition to their views.
