Activists need to press Congress to pull war funding, author says.
LEWISTON – Vietnam veteran Stan Goff called on anti-war activists to increase their efforts Thursday by asking young people to avoid military service.
He called it “counter-recruiting.”
“We’ve got to break the back of the military’s ability to make war,” Goff said. “We need to deny them new, warm bodies.”
The 54-year-old author, who has a son in the Army preparing for service in Iraq, spent two hours talking Thursday evening at Bates College.
He talked briefly of his own service – in Vietnam, Haiti, El Salvador and elsewhere – and his deep resentment for many U.S. policies.
Goff believes the current war is being fought for control of Middle East oil. Arguments such as the existence of weapons of mass destruction and the global spread of terrorism were convenient excuses for the long-term power grab, he said.
“It’s all about getting your hands on the spigot,” he said.
It’s a message that Goff has been spreading across Maine for the past several days, speaking at schools in Biddeford, Portland, Farmington, Augusta and Orono before coming to Lewiston.
By the time he began his comments – wearing a red Veterans for Peace T-shirt – his voice was ragged and circles darkened his eyes.
The tour is part of a larger anti-war campaign for Goff. A retired Special Forces master sergeant, he has authored two books on the U.S. military, a memoir of his experiences in Haiti and an analysis of modern warfare.
During his talk, Goff painted a picture of anti-democratic U.S. policies, excused with lies and deception and of a media too apathetic to act.
“It’s not conspiratorial,” he said. “It’s just the way the system works.”
It may not be working that well, though. People are becoming less and less convinced of United States success. They’re not buying the president’s declarations of supremacy, he said.
“It’s like telling me Mike Tyson just knocked out a paraplegic in the third round, and that’s a great victory,” he said.
Besides interrupting recruitment, activists need to push members of Congress to oppose the war, he said.
Meanwhile, the U.S military will continue to be overworked and, increasingly, spread thin, he said.
Will they win? Goff doesn’t know.
“I’m not anybody’s Buddha,” he said.
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