Antiwar veterans look for a place in holiday parades
Of the thousands of veterans who plan to join parades next weekend, only a few expect to upset some of their fellow marchers.
They are the veterans who oppose the war in Iraq. And they pose a dilemma for Veterans Day parade organizers: How to accommodate activist veterans who object to the war at events where all veterans are welcome, but political protests are not.
The controversy over protests at parades intensified last month, during which more than 100 US troops died in Iraq.
Members of Veterans for Peace in Portland, Maine, were told in October that they could not participate in next weekend's Veterans Day parade. They later struck a compromise with city officials: They can march, but without the trailer of crosses they normally tow in parades. Instead, they can carry a single sign bearing their name.
In Manchester, N.H., marchers from Veterans for Peace plan to bring trained legal observers with them to the parade, six months after police removed them from the Memorial Day parade. Parade organizers say their removal was a mistake, but members of the group, who received an apology from police, wonder if the city was trying to silence them.
"We're people who dare to question things, so I guess we're dangerous," said group leader Will Thomas of Auburn, N.H.
Veterans in Boston canceled their parade last year for the first time in decades and replaced it with a ceremony at City Hall Plaza. Organizers blamed poor turnout for the change, but some activist veterans said parade organizers told them they were the cause of the cancellation.
This year, the city's veterans plan a short parade around Boston Common, followed by a ceremony. As in the past, Veterans for Peace will not be invited to the parade or recognized if they show up because the group has no federal charter, and because of its tactics.
"They come down and disrupt everything, and scream and yell," said Jake Comer of Quincy, a former national commander of the American Legion. "War is hell -- who wants it? -- but the point is honoring the men and women getting shot at."
Members of antiwar groups for veterans, which include Veterans for Peace, Vietnam Veterans Against the War, and Iraq Veterans Against the War, say their numbers are small but growing. Veterans for Peace has doubled in size, to almost 5,000 members, in three years, and chapters are planning more public events.
On Cape Cod last month, members helped plant 2,700 crosses on Coast Guard Beach in a tribute to the Iraq war dead.
Leaders say their goal is to help people grasp the reality of war.
"War is not just flags flying and people in uniform," said Doug Rawlings, one of the founders of Veterans for Peace and a leader of the southern Maine chapter. "The reality is, death and destruction go along with it. We're tired of the pageantry glorifying war."
To make their point, activist veterans bring their own kind of pageantry: Flag-draped coffins, floats covered with white memorial crosses, banners listing casualties, and signs criticizing the White House.
In Boston, members of Veterans for Peace say they may bring a flag-draped coffin to next week's parade.
To veterans who organize parades -- many of them members of the country's largest veterans organization, the American Legion -- such demonstrations can be hard to take.
The American Legion, which counts 2.7 million veterans as members, recently renewed a resolution in support of the Iraq war, first passed last year, which resolves not to "separate the war from the warrior."
Groups including Veterans for Peace say they support the soldiers in Iraq while condemning the war.
"There are veterans of all political persuasions, and all should be honored for their service, but if a group has an agenda that goes beyond honoring veterans, the local post has the right to exclude them," said Ramona Joyce, a spokeswoman for the American Legion in Washington.
On Cape Cod, members of Veterans for Peace complied with a request from other veterans last year that they stop carrying their "Honor Veterans; Abolish War" banner in parades in Hyannis, said coordinator Duke Ellis.
Organizers of Boston's privately run St. Patrick's Day parade sued the city in 2003 after police allowed members of Veterans for Peace to walk at the end of the parade.
A judge ruled that uninvited groups must walk at least a mile behind recognized participants.
Jenna Russell can be reached at jrussell@globe.com.
(Correction: Because of a reporting error, a story in yesterday's City & Region section about veterans who oppose the war in Iraq incorrectly stated that Veterans for Peace would not be invited to participate in the Boston Veterans Day parade. The group has been invited by parade organizers to participate in the Nov. 11 event.)
