everal experts in international and constitutional law from testifying Monday about the legality of the war," the Associated Press reported.

While the judge was hopping through the military's hoops at Fort Lewis in Washington State, an outpouring of support for Watada at the gates reflected just how broad and deep the opposition to this war has become.

The AP dispatch merely stated that "outside the base, a small group that included actor Sean Penn demonstrated in support of Watada." But several hundred people maintained an anti-war presence Monday at the gates, where a vigil and rally - led by Iraq War veterans and parents of those sent to kill and be killed in this horrific war - mirrored what is happening in communities across the United States.

Many of the most compelling voices against the Iraq War come from the men and women who were ordered into a conflagration that should never have begun. Opinions may be debatable, but experiences are irrefutable. And the devastating slaughter that the US war effort continues to inflict on Iraqi people has a counterpoint in the suffering of Americans who are left with unspeakable grief.

In direct resistance to the depravity of the Bush administration as it escalates this war, Lieutenant Watada is taking a clear and uplifting position. Citing international law and the US Constitution, he points out that the Iraq War is "manifestly illegal." And he adds: "As the order to take part in an illegal act is ultimately unlawful as well, I must as an officer of honor and integrity refuse that order. It is my duty not to follow unlawful orders and not to participate in things I find morally reprehensible."

Watada says: "My participation would make me party to war crimes."

Outside the fence at Fort Lewis - while the grim farce of Watada's court-martial proceeded with virtually all substance ruled out of order - the criminality of the war and the pain it has brought were heavy in the air.

Darrell Anderson was a US soldier in Iraq. He received a Purple Heart. Later, he refused orders to return for a second tour of duty. Now, he gives firsthand accounts of the routine killing of Iraqi civilians. He speaks as an eyewitness and a participant in a war that is one long war crime. And he makes a convincing case that "the GI resistance" is emerging and pivotal: "You can't call yourself anti-war if you're not supporting the resistance."

At Fort Lewis, outside the gates, I met Carlos Arredondo. He's traveling the country in a long black hearse-like station wagon, with big photos and letters from his son Alexander plastered on the sides of the vehicle. At age 20, more than two years ago, Alexander died in Iraq. Now, a conversation with Carlos Arredondo is likely to leave you in tears, feeling his grief and his rage against this war.

"When the Marines came to inform Arredondo of his son's death and stayed after he asked them to leave, he set their van on fire, burning over a quarter of his body in the process," the Boston Globe has reported. Carlos and his wife Melida Arredondo are now members of Military Families Speak Out.

Among the speakers at a nearby event the night before Watada's court-martial began was Helga Aguayo, whose husband Agustin Aguayo is a US Army medic now charged with desertion. After deployment to Iraq in 2004, he applied for recognition as a conscientious objector, without success. During a year in the war zone, he refused to put ammunition in his weapon. Today, he is looking at the prospect of up to seven years in prison.

Many others in uniform are struggling to extricate themselves from the war machine. Information about some of them is available at: www.couragetoresist.org.

Soldiers have to choose from options forced upon them by the commander in chief and Congress. Those who resist this war deserve our gratitude and our support. And our willingness to resist as well.

Ehren Watada faces four years in prison. Half of that potential sentence has to do with the fact that he made public statements against the war. The war-makers want such honest courage to stop. But it is growing every day.

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Norman Solomon's latest book, War Made Easy: How Presidents and Pundits Keep Spinning Us to Death, is out in paperback. He is executive director of the Institute for Public Accuracy.

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War Objector Pleads Not Guilty at Court - Martial

Monday 05 February 2007

Fort Lewis, Washington - A U.S. Army officer who refused an order to deploy to Iraq, pleaded not guilty on Monday to several charges at a court-martial that calls into question the right of officers to speak out against the war.

First Lt. Ehren Watada, 28, faces a charge of missing movements when he refused to ship out to Iraq with his brigade last summer, and two charges of conduct unbecoming an officer for statements criticizing the war as illegal and immoral.

Watada, whose supporters say he is the first Army officer to publicly refuse to deploy to Iraq, could face up to four years in prison and a dishonorable discharge if he is convicted on all charges.

He refused conscientious-objector status, saying he would fight in Afghanistan but not Iraq.

On the first day of the court-martial in Fort Lewis, an Army base near Seattle, Watada explained that he saw the order to go to Iraq and support combat operations as illegal because the war itself was illegal.

"I had no other choice but to refuse the order," he said.

Watada had hoped to make his case against the war in court, but Lt. Col. John Head, the military judge presiding over the case, denied the defense's request to argue the legality of the war, saying the question cannot be answered in a military court.

Head denied the entire list of possible defense witnesses including constitutional law experts as not relevant to the case. He also limited what the defense could ask potential members of the military panel - equivalent to a jury in civilian courts - that will determine Watada's fate.

"It's become almost clear now that there is nothing for us to say in this courtroom," said Watada's attorney, Eric Seitz, who called the decisions "comical" and "atrocious."

There were heated exchanges between the judge and Watada's defense team. After one of Seitz's repeated objections to the judge's rulings, the judge told the lawyer to "leave the theatrics outside the courtroom."

Watada's supporters - including actor and anti-war advocate Sean Penn - and opponents rallied outside the gates of the Army base, waving banners and shouting.

The two charges of conduct unbecoming an officer stem from public comments Watada made encouraging soldiers "to throw down their weapons" to resist an authoritarian government at home.

Defense lawyers had intended to argue that Watada's comments were free speech protected under the U.S. Constitution. But the military judge decided before the court-martial that there are limits to an officer's free-speech rights.

A military panel will now decide if Watada's criticism of the war amounted to officer misconduct - whether it posed a danger to the loyalty, discipline, mission and morale of the troops.

Watada, a native of Hawaii who served for a year in Korea, joined the Army in 2003 after the United States had already invaded Iraq. After returning to America, Watada began to question the reasons behind the U.S. involvement.