Long Time Passing

Susan Galleymore

Description

Susan Galleymore, the mother of a US soldier, chose not to wait at home for her son to return, or to die. Instead she left for Iraq to visit him at the base where he was stationed. This is a remarkable portrait of what it means to be a mother in a time of war.



She tells of her continuing journey through the Middle East, interviewing mothers in war zones including Iraq, Israel and the West Bank, Lebanon, Syria, Afghanistan and the United States.



In exploring how mothers cope with war, Galleymore confronts many issues, including the treatment of veterans, alarming US military recruitment techniques, conscientious objection and AWOL, courts martial and the failures of military leadership. She explores cultural differences and examines common assumptions civilians hold about war and why troops themselves are hesitant to share their own stories for fear of psychological breakdown.



Long Time Passing gets to the heart of war and warriors, mothers and children, and explores the limits of courage and fear.
Foreword

Acknowledgments

Prologue

Introduction

The Voices

1. Your glass has destroyed their stones - IRAQ

2. A king sitting on the ashes of this throne - ISRAEL

3. Promises of a relief…gifts and parcels - WEST BANK/PALESTINE

4. They caress their children's hair in the dusk - LEBANON

5. Walled in from mankind's cause and voice - SYRIA

6. You were never hidden from my eyes - AFGHANISTAN

7. Broken-heartedness is the beginning - UNITED STATES

8. Where Do We Go From Here?

9. Just the Facts

Notes

Index

Sujets

• HISTORY
• Histoire
• General officer
• Military
• International relations
• General

Informations

• Publié par: Pluto Press
• Date de parution: 20 février 2009
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781849644129
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 2 Mo

Extrait

Long Time Passing: Mothers Speak about War and Terror

SUSAN GALLEYMORE

PLUTO PRESS www.plutobooks.com

First published 2009 by Pluto Press 345 Archway Road, London N6 5AA and 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010

www.plutobooks.com

Distributed in the United States of America exclusively by Palgrave Macmillan, a division of St. Martin’s Press LLC, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010

Copyright © Susan Galleymore 2009

The right of Susan Galleymore to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN

978 0 7453 2829 4 Hardback

Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data applied for

This book is printed on paper suitable for recycling and made from fully managed and sustained forest sources. Logging, pulping and manufacturing processes are expected to conform to the environmental standards of the country of origin. The paper may contain up to 70% post consumer waste.

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Designed and produced for Pluto Press by Chase Publishing Services Ltd, Sidmouth, EX10 9QG, England Typeset from disk by Stanford DTP Services, Northampton Printed and bound in the European Union by TJ International Ltd, Padstow, England

Where have all the soldiers gone? Long time passing … Where have all the soldiers gone? They’ve gone to graveyards every one. Oh, when will they ever learn?

—Pete Seeger, “Where Have All the Flowers Gone?”

Dedicated to my son: may your experiences of war open your heart to all that is graceful and true. And to my daughter, know that your presence is the blessing of hope.

Contents

Acknowledgements

Introduction 1Your glass has destroyed their stones  I RAQ 2Like a king sitting on the ashes of his throne  I SRAEL

3Promises of a relief … gifts and parcels  W B /P EST ANK ALESTINE 4They would caress their children’s hair in the dusk  L EBANON 5Walled in from mankind’s cause and voice  S YRIA

6You were never hidden from my eyes  A FGHANISTAN 7Brokenheartedness is the beginning  U S NITED TATES 8Where do we go from here? 9Just the facts

Notes Index

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231 251

257 268

Acknowledgements

In recognition of Anwar whose story broke my heart and started the journey to all that follows. Dr. Ali Rasheed Hamid and Harb Muktar— and more than 2 million other Iraqis—may you return from exile to the land you love. In Israel, Nurit PeledElhanan convinced me that sons don’t disapprove of mothers forever, and that working for peace may make us mutants in a militaristic world, but it is mutation that will change the world. Amina in the West Bank proves that no mere mountain can stop a mother. Dorothy Naor at the checkpoints is the mother of all persistence. And thank you to all the mothers and families who, in courageously sharing your stories, honor our common humanity. May peace reign in indomitable Lebanon and for Mary Abu Saba who paved the way to Sara Osseiran who made things happen; Antun and Judith Harik who shared Byblos; Dr. Mary Mikhael and the Near East School of Theology who gave me a home away from home; Josef and Amal who generously offered hospitality in Mieh Mieh; for Karen Button who introduced me to Ra’fat who braved Lebanon’s roads. In Beirut Maurice renewed my faith in taxi drivers and Carlos encouraged me to outwait the Syrian border officials in Jdeideh…and he was right! Kathryn Winogura introduced voices of Afghan women who had immigrated to the United States after the Russian occupation of their country. Jennifer Heath and Marsha MacColl introduced me to voices from Afghanistan. In San Francisco Bay Area, Elizabeth Bell shared editorial skill and fast turnaround so far beyond the call of duty that I know she respects these courageous mothers as much as I do. (Any errors and omissions here are mine alone.) Joe Woodard always assists when needed. The poets, artists, writers, and readers at Spec’s offer encouragement. The folks on the GI Rights Hotline share lifeaffirming counsel to our youth waking up to the horrors of war and the inevitable conclusions that derive from the logic of capitalism.

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LONG TIME PASSING: MOTHERS SPEAK ABOUT WAR AND TERROR

In South Africa, thank you to Mike and to my own mother, who give the trees, birds, and other living critters a home amidst the encroaching devastation of industry.

Join in and learn more

View photographs and other collateral related to the stories shared in this book at http://www.mothersspeakaboutwarandterror.org/.

Make your voice heard and challenge the underlying assumptions fueling the leaders and worldviews that bring countries to war at http:// mothersspeakaboutwarandterror.blogspot.com.

Stay in touch with likeminded people at MotherSpeak, http://www. motherspeak.org, and Raising Sand Radio, http://www.raisingsan dradio.org.

Introduction

I tried to fathom whether human feelings were able to withstand such a vast power machine…. Perhaps the only option was to forget, to not see. To listen to the official version of things, to halflisten, distractedly, and respond with nothing more than a sigh…or to turn my life into a battlefield where you don’t hope to survive but merely to go down after a good fight. —Roberto Saviano,Gomorrah

“I’M BACK! I GOT BACK LAST NIGHT.” My son sounded buoyant over the phone—our first conversation since he’d deployed to Afghanistan. “Welcome home! Are you doing okay? Will you get some time off? When can we see you?” “I’ll get a week off soon and come home.” After I put down the phone I remembered the conversation when my son announced he’d enlisted in the U.S. Army. It had been a lovely summer day in 1999 and we’d sat in the garden awaiting the “important announcement,” as he put it. After the shock—my kid joining the U.S. military? How could this happen?—my response was unequivocal. “Oh no, you’re not! You could be sent to war!” “Oh, there won’t be a war. Anyway, I already signed up.”

A year later I dropped him off at the recruiting office in my California town. After months of trying to dissuade him, I’d finally given up. Having immigrated to the States from South Africa in my early 20s, I was naïve about the U.S. military’s recruitment and retention processes—I honestly believed that basic training would cure him and he would quickly get out, wiser for the experience. Little did I know that recruits can’t simply change their minds. A much deeper understanding lay ahead for me. After 9/11, I knew President Bush would soon identify perpetrators and send the military after them. Would it have been a different decision with a different president? I doubt it. People all over the world expect their leaders to keep them safe, and Bush capitalized upon—then politicized—this expectation.

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LONG TIME PASSING: MOTHERS SPEAK ABOUT WAR AND TERROR

But now, as I experienced its meaning from the perspective of a mother with an enlisted child, I felt a sudden rush of astonishment and energy: How could we mothers allow this to happen—how could we have allowed it throughout history? How did mothers in other lands—especially those lands ravaged by ongoing conflict—react to their children’s deployment? And did Americans really believe that this socalled War on Terror was about spreading freedom and democracy?

While my son was deployed to Afghanistan in 2003 I awoke from nightmares almost every night: the knock on the door, uniformed military personnel on the doorstep, “We’re sorry to inform you…,” images of my son disabled like the soldier inJohnny Got His Gun, bombs raining on a family’s home while a mother screamed out her children’s names…. My first real encounter with the vast horror that is war was meeting Holocaust survivors when I was a child. Then I had reacted by imagining how I would steel myself for hearing the worst news. But now, try as I might, I couldn’t hold for more than a few seconds the thought of my own child’s direct involvement: the pain was overwhelming. I couldn’t imagine how mothers could—howImight have to—adjust to the unthinkable: the death or maiming of a beloved child, the nightmare vision of that child killing or maiming others.

The long way home

Before the War on Terror, I knew nothing about the variety of tactics U.S. military recruiters use to enlist young people into the volunteer military. I’d immigrated to the U.S. after the Vietnam War and the protests against it. Other than an awareness of draftee David Harris’s conscientious objection, for which he spent two years in jail, I knew nothing about GI resistance to that war and next to nothing about GI underground networks and newspapers. I had no idea that anti militarism activists offer free, confidential counseling to military personnel and their families…or that I would train and volunteer as a counselor myself.