The Peace Movement

As the military moves into the next century, eager to step up the already alarming rate of military intervention, activists must reevaluate old strategies and develop new ones to effectively challenge the War Machine. Previous peace movement tactics have become antiquated as military planners design their strategies around the lessons of the past.

Emphasis on high U.S. casualties (as in Vietnam) or on specific weapons systems (the anti-nuclear movement of the 80s) will not suffice in the present political and economic climate. The military has spent millions of dollars developing "smart" and automated weapons to avoid the disasters that befell U.S. troops in Vietnam. Also, the Future Combat System is designed to allow interventions like Vietnam to take place without the same pitfalls. Continuous air strikes against Iraq and the recent actions against Kosovo are more characteristic of the military's approach than Vietnam-style combat. And, although the movements of the 80s were very successful in galvanizing opposition to nuclear weapons, the anti-nuclear movement has all but disappeared since the end of the Cold War.

Furthermore, in today's climate peace activists must prepare themselves to deal with the cooption of their anti-nuclear rhetoric by the Pentagon hawks themselves. Even Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld and President Bush have proposed "deep cuts" in U.S. nuclear arsenals. Of course, these cuts are enabled by the development of space-based and other futuristic weapons, and the Pentagon has no intention of cutting its strategic stockpiles. But, who's counting?

The point is, any peace movement that hopes to be successful must have a holistic critique of the Military Industrial Academic Complex: to focus only on specific manifestations of the complex, like specific instances of military intervention or particular weapons systems is doomed to fail. This is not to say that should the U.S. deploy forces to entrench the war with Iraq or Columbia that specific critique will not be helpful. Instead, activists should buttress country specific critique with analysis far-reaching enough to call all the industry, government and university players into question.

University communities must lead the advance guard of the opposition to the Military Industrial Academic Complex. Of the three primary parties involved in enabling U.S. war-making, (Universities, the Pentagon, and Defense contractors,) Universities are the only institutions with any public accountability. The Pentagon is worthy of protest but is too isolated to be a realistic site for regular expression of opposition. Likewise, defense contractors are not vulnerable to traditional protest tactics. Boycotts are out of the question because they don't have a public customer base, while sit-ins and pickets aren't likely to be effective because most of the firms don't exist in any accessible location. That leaves the Universities as the best target for activists.

University research is the backbone of the 21st Century military. The new systems of waging war cannot be developed or deployed without the aid of campus research programs. The early research and development stages of the defense projects are too costly for industry to develop by themselves and would have to be abandoned without the subsidies allotted to Universities. Obstructing University involvement in defense work or withholding cooperation would literally stop the War Machine in its tracks.

As stultified and reactionary as most Universities are, changing them or taking charge of them is possible. Ultimately the institution is accountable to the students and there are many options for students and professors of conscience. The best and brightest engineering students and professors should refuse the blood-money offered by defense contractors and their lackeys in the Department of Defense. Students and professors outside the applied sciences should call their classmates and colleagues into question and hold them accountable for the work they do. Students should organize teach-ins on the grounds of the J.J. Pickle Research Campus to discuss U.S. imperialism and the damage done by U.S. military interventions. Students should organize call-in days from the West Mall to the offices of the scientists, the Vice President for Research, and the President of the University expressing their opposition to the UT/Department of Defense relationship. Students should demand that all military research grants given to the University be collected, published and made available to the public. Students should demand an end to secret and classified research of all kinds. Students should demand the closing of Department of Defense laboratories at the University of Texas.

Most importantly, students and professors should force their classmates and colleagues to wrestle in every way possible with the full scope of the serious ethical dilemmas raised by the presence of military research on the campus and the overall mission of the U.S. military. Researchers and administrators are likely to object that students are not qualified to make judgments about University policy or about the ethics of research institutions. They will also likely protest that it is too late to terminate these relationships or that doing so is "unrealistic." Members of the University community must insist that it is too late to wait any longer for the War Machine to be dismantled.

If it is true that the University is too intertwined with military money to undo the ties, then the University isn't worth preserving and the entire educational system is suspect. Hiding behind a veil of expertise is no excuse for avoiding debate over the serious ethical issues raised by the weapons research underway. Those who engage in military research should be made to feel uneasy, know that they have been exposed and know that they are expected to justify themselves scientifically, academically, and ethically.

It is up to us to make sure that happens by building a strong and clear movement for peace.

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