Join Courage to Resist at a rally outside of the Canadian Consulate in San Francisco. Kimberly Rivera, mother of three, wife, and soldier of conscience is now living in Canada, but that could all change on July 8th.

Wednesday, July 8, 2009 from noon to 1:30pm
SF Canadian Consulate, 580 California Street, San Francisco

We will bring signed petitions to the Consulate General, urging the Canadian politicians to respect the will of the Canadian people, the Canadian parliament--whom have twice voted recommendations to allow war resisters to stay--and the basic moral imperative that does not separate children from their loving mother.

By Sarah Lazare, Courage to Resist for Truthout. June 16, 2009

Free Dustin Stevens and all war resisters!

• Donate to Dustin's defense fund: couragetoresist.org/dustin
• Write: Dustin Stevens, 82nd Replacement Detachment Bldg., C-8750 Lae Street Stop-A., Fort Bragg NC 28310

At Fort Bragg, North Carolina, AWOL soldiers find themselves detained for months under difficult conditions in an extended legal limbo they cannot escape.

Dustin Stevens is one of about 50 soldiers being held at Fort Bragg awaiting likely AWOL and desertion charges that seem like they will never arrive, he says. A former soldier who refused to continue military service seven years ago because he did not want to fight a war, Stevens says that he and his colleagues are being held in legal limbo - a no man's land of poor living standards and arbitrary punishments - while awaiting charges and possible court-martial.

GI outreach PDF leaflet

GI outreach leaflet by Courage to Resist. June 17, 2009

"GI resistance against war is anything that gives service members and veterans a voice and makes it harder for the military to function like a well-oiled machine. It ranges from reading anti-war literature to refusing an order to refusing deployment to a war zone. GI resistance is not dishonorable, and it will not put the lives of your buddies in jeopardy. Rather, it is a concrete way to end war and bring the troops home. GI resistance played a central role in ending the war in Vietnam. Having a fighting force that was difficult to control was a key factor in forcing the U.S. government to pull out..."

The back side of leaflet lists contact information for various organizations that support GI resistance.

View, save, and print outreach leaflet

Army GI resisters Travis Bishop, Victor Agosto, and Dustin Stevens

Help provide civilian legal defense funds for military GI resisters with a house party, music show, poetry night, film showing, or by simply passing the hat at your next community/social/union meeting.

By Courage to Resist. May 29, 2009

Service members are courageously taking a stand against our nation’s endless occupation wars. Will you or your community organization step up to support them? These three Army soldiers are likely to face court martials—and a year or more in the stockade—possibly as early as July.

By Sarah Lazare, Courage to Resist. May 21, 2009

“There is no way I will deploy to Afghanistan. The occupation is immoral and unjust. It does not make the American people any safer. It has the opposite effect.” The words were scrawled in black ink on the bottom of a military counseling statement, a routine piece of paperwork turned in May 1st to the commander of a Ft. Hood, Texas Army unit headed for Afghanistan. It was signed Victor Agosto, U.S. Army.

Help support Victor! Donate to his defense fund at couragetoresist.org/victor

As of June 18th, 23 supporters have donated $1,028 towards Victor's defense. Estimated need: $3,500

By Sgt. Travis Bishop, Ft. Hood Soldier Voices. Updated June 15, 2009

Like Afghanistan deployment refuser Spc. Victor Agosto, Sgt. Travis Bishop is also with Ft. Hood's 57th ESB.

Why am I doing what I’m doing? Why am I resisting? Refusing?

It wasn’t so long ago that I deployed to Iraq in support of the war on terror. I didn’t refuse then. Like a good Soldier, I did what I was told, and I spent 14 months stationed in Baghdad. It was a quiet enough deployment, I suppose. Mortars and rockets flew over the walls with unnerving frequency, but otherwise, it felt more like a move to a different duty station than a deployment to a warzone.

By Maggie Gilmour, Toronto Life. June 12, 2009

Phil McDowell, 29; Patrick Hart, 35; Chuck Wiley, 37; Dean Walcott, 27; Kimberly Rivera, 27

To avoid serving in Iraq, 300 American soldiers have left their homes and families and fled to Canada, 75 of them to Toronto. Many assumed they’d get a visa, settle down and live a normal life. But the federal government has rejected their refugee claims and ordered them deported. Some go into hiding; others wait for appeals and judicial reviews of their cases. In the meantime, they’ve put down roots, taking temp jobs and raising children, nostalgic for a time when Canada was a haven for conscientious objectors.

     Read more... (link to Toronto Life)

By Carl Davison. June 8, 2009

"As I expected, not long after presenting this to my whole chain of command and refusing to go on not just one but several flights going to Iraq, I was fined, demoted, incarcerated and then discharged."

The logic of direct GI resistance is simple; To withhold your labor from something you think is morally wrong, simply saying, I have chosen not participate in something that is at odds with my values and I will tell the military this face to face with pride and dignity so others can learn from my example.

By Steve Yoczk. June 5, 2009

I am a former military servicemember who went AWOL rather than deploy to Iraq. This is the story of why I refused to fight.

I joined the Coast Guard Reserve at age 17 in May 2002 and served uneventfully until June 2005. I decided to switch to the Regular Army for the handful of obvious and universal reasons: money, lack of education, desire for good working skill. More than that, though, I wanted to be a part of something I felt was just and right, with the spirit of the Second World War and the beginning months of the Vietnam conflict in my head. I believed the Army to be an institution that stressed “think before you shoot”. I was told I would be training for communications with the 25 Foxtrot program, or Network Switching Systems Operator/Maintainer.

Also: Audio interview by Courage to Resist. 23:19 min. June 5, 2009

Sarah Lazare, Courage to Resist Project Coordinator

By Sarah Lazare, Courage to Resist for Truthout. May 21, 2009

"I felt like I was being robbed of everything," Matthew Dobbs said over the phone from his home in Houston, Texas.

"I had visions of military police banging down my door and dragging me back to war." Dobbs, a 26-year-old former soldier who served a tour in Afghanistan from 2003-2004, was recounting a story that has become familiar in the ongoing Global War on Terror. It is the story of a soldier who, after serving a tour overseas and being discharged from active duty, received involuntary orders to redeploy to Iraq or Afghanistan years later.

By Sari Gelzer, Truthout. May 14, 2009

In a victory for Lt. Ehren Watada, the Justice Department decided last week that it would drop attempts to retry the officer for his refusal to deploy to Iraq. Watada's lawyer, James Lobsenz, believes the decision was a case of legal realism. "They were going to have a really difficult time explaining why double jeopardy wasn't violated," said Lobsenz in reference to Watada's first court-martial, which ended in mistrial and would have violated his Fifth Amendment right to not be charged for the same crime twice.

Also: The trials of Ehren Watada
By Jeremy Brecher & Brendan Smith, The Nation. May 19, 2009

By Courage to Resist. 20:12 min. May 14, 2009

After five months in the Army, Dustin Che Stevens sat down during Airborne graduation in order to refuse graduation. He was told to go home and wait for his discharge. Seven years later, he was arrested for desertion. "I started reading [literature on conscientious objection] and started thinking for myself. I knew that in my heart and in my mind that I could not kill anyone... I went back and told them that." Today Dustin awaits a court martial, unless he "volunteers" to deploy to Afghanistan.

Help support Dustin! Donate to his defense fund at www.couragetoresist.org/dustin