On December 19, when U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell announced that Iraq was in "material breach" of its weapons disclosure requirements, he officially put the U.S. on the path to war. International observers predict President Bush could launch his war with Iraq on or soon after January 27, the date U.N. weapons inspectors file their progress report on weapons in Iraq.
In Seattle, antiwar activists are getting ready for the day the war starts. Several antiwar coalitions have put together a joint "Emergency Response" plan aimed at drawing attention to antiwar sentiment in Seattle. The plan kicks in as soon as Bush declares war, begins bombing, or deploys troops. On the day any one of these three things happens (or all three), activists plan to gather at the Federal Building at Second Avenue and Marion Street at 5:00 p.m., and then march to Westlake Center for a rally at 7:00 p.m. A weeklong vigil in front of the Federal Building will also commence that night. The following day, students from high schools and colleges are planning to walk out of their classes at noon and join other protesters downtown for another rally at Westlake Center.
Activists predict that tens of thousands of people will take to Seattle's streets, bringing the center of the city to a standstill. They predict that the number of people in the streets will easily eclipse the thousands that turned out for an antiwar march on October 6, a time when war seemed less imminent than it does today. Another reason antiwar activists expect huge numbers of people to take to the streets is that a majority of Seattle residents are against a war. According to a Seattle Post-Intelligencer survey published on December 24, 52 percent of Seattle residents oppose using military force against Iraq.
"I think there's going to be a huge, spontaneous anger that erupts," says Greg Deiter, a member of the Seattle Central Community College Student Anti-War Coalition on Capitol Hill. That's what happened in January 1991, when over 10,000 people marched in Seattle against the first Gulf War. (It's worth noting that despite the huge demonstrations in Seattle--and in other cities--in 1991, we still made war on Iraq. We may have left Saddam in power, but there was a war, and we won easily.)
Seattle residents are more opposed to war than most other Americans--especially compared to other residents of Washington State. Over in Eastern Washington, 61 percent are in favor of war. Nationally, 59 percent of Americans, according to an NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll, think the U.S. should take military action to remove Saddam Hussein. (The pro-war poll numbers are strongest when the United States is backed by the U.N., and the numbers get weaker when Americans are asked about sending ground troops into Iraq.)
For locals who want to get involved in the antiwar effort, Seattle does not lack for groups to join. The numerous umbrella organizations that have been taking the lead--planning everything from marches to sit-ins at the Federal Building, from neighborhood vigils to citywide potluck dinners--are actively recruiting volunteers. But while it's easy to find groups to link up with, no single leader has emerged as a spokesperson for the antiwar movement in Seattle. Most of the groups in Seattle meet regularly, and agree on things by consensus, making them essentially leaderless. It's reminiscent of the anti-WTO movement, where groups met for weeks before the November 30, 1999, ministerial meeting in order to plan direct actions. In fact, many of the WTO activists--along with other people with activism experience, either from the Vietnam era or the first Gulf War--lend their advice and are loosely leading the antiwar activists. But overall, the movement has truly been carried by the masses of people who show up.
Sound Nonviolent Opponents of War, or SNOW, is the largest of Seattle's antiwar coalitions. Born at the North Seattle headquarters of Western Washington Fellowship of Reconciliation, SNOW came together in September when its first 60 members met to agree on a mission of nonviolence. The group now counts several hundred individual members and 43 member organizations, with more joining every week. Everything from religious organizations like the Church Council of Greater Seattle to social-justice groups like Washington Physicians for Social Responsibility have signed up.
SNOW's first newsworthy demonstration was the group's September 25 sit-ins at the offices of Senators Patty Murray and Maria Cantwell in the Federal Building downtown. Timed with the Senate vote on a resolution authorizing the use of force against Iraq, over a dozen activists occupied the senators' offices, demanding that Murray and Cantwell vote against the resolution. (Murray eventually voted against the resolution, Cantwell voted for it.) Twelve SNOW protesters were ultimately arrested and charged with misdemeanors for not leaving the building when it closed that night.
SNOW went on to host a December 8 rally at the Central District's Garfield High School with the goal of organizing smaller neighborhood groups. After the rally, antiwar activists in neighborhoods from Lake City in the northern tip of Seattle to West Seattle on the other end began staging ongoing small-scale, street-level protests to make local antiwar sentiment more visible. Every Saturday since December 14, residents from North Seattle to Bellingham have posted themselves on I-5 overpasses to wave antiwar signs at drivers below. In mid-December in West Seattle, 35 neighborhood activists gathered at the busy intersection of California Avenue SW and Alaska Street. Toting signs decrying a war in Iraq (like the red, white, and blue, locally designed "No Iraq War" sign that's hanging in windows all over town), the group marched around the intersection whenever the light changed, prompting many drivers to honk and wave.
Vic Opperman created the Ballard Activists group with Tere Carranza before SNOW launched its neighborhood effort, but they quickly hooked up with SNOW to take advantage of its organizing resources. "We wanted to see the faces of our neighbors who were equally concerned," Opperman says. "There are many passionate, interesting, and articulate people who have joined us." Every Wednesday night, the group meets in front of the Tully's on Market Street at 5:00 p.m. for an hour-long vigil.
In downtown Seattle, Belltown residents are trying to get as many "No Iraq War" signs into apartment and condo windows as possible, and running an informational table at the Pike Place Market. The Green Lake neighborhood has one of the longest running local antiwar events, one that sprang up organically 18 weeks ago. Since September, residents meet at the corner of 63rd Avenue and Green Lake Way for an hour-long peace vigil at 2:00 p.m. every Sunday.
SNOW hopes to encourage more of these community-based actions with a citywide "Potlucks for Peace" event on January 18, the "National Day of Action" against war in Iraq. While activists in other cities--like Washington, D.C.--are planning marches and protests, SNOW hopes at least 100 local antiwar individuals and groups will invite people who haven't joined the antiwar movement to share an evening of food and political discussion with their neighbors. "We don't want to preach to the choir. We want to help people find their voice and express their concern," SNOW's potluck website explains. SNOW leaders plan to sprinkle a map with pushpins to show all of the potluck dinners around town, tally up how many people participated, and drop President Bush a note.
Not all of Seattle's activists are content to potluck with their neighbors or send notes to the White House.
Not in Our Name (NION) Seattle has been meeting for months on Capitol Hill. NION's credits so far include putting together the 10,000-strong October 6 march from Volunteer Park to Westlake, and the October 26 march from Denny Park to Westlake and back that drew about 4,000 people. Lately, NION has hunkered down to organize the war-day "Emergency Response" (along with SNOW, the Church Council of Greater Seattle, the Green Party of Washington State, and the No War Against Iraq Coalition of Washington). Opperman, in Ballard, says he originally got involved with antiwar activities through NION.
"NION is well organized, and very creative," Opperman says.
NION's organization helped the group gather signatures from nearly 1,000 local people on a "Statement of Consciousness" opposing the war in Iraq. (Over 30,000 people, including celebrities and politicians, have signed throughout the U.S.) Congressman Jim McDermott, state representatives Adam Kline and Marilyn Chase, religious and labor leaders, students and professors have all signed Seattle's statement. It reads: "The signers of this statement call on the people of the U.S. to resist the policies and overall political direction that have emerged since September 11, 2001, and which pose grave dangers to the people of the world."
In addition to SNOW and NION, various individual students and student groups are planning demonstrations. There are antiwar groups at Seattle University, SCCC, and the University of Washington. High-school students at Nova Alternative High School, the Center School, Seattle Academy, Hazel Wolf, Roosevelt, and Garfield have all been active in walkouts. Most of the student groups have come together to form the citywide Student Anti-War Coalition. Brady McGarry, a 20-year-old anthropology student at SCCC, has been heavily involved in the citywide group. "We did the walkout a few weeks ago [from SCCC to the Federal Building and back]. That brought out more people than we thought originally, and it was really great," McGarry says. "One of the things we're learning about the antiwar movement is there's more support [out there] than we think."
The December 5 student walkout was a huge success. Students marched out of Garfield High School, joined up with kids from Nova, and made their way to SCCC. There, they pulled some SCCC students out of class, and made a loop up and down Broadway. Back at SCCC, the group waited for other students: Hazel Wolf and Roosevelt students hopped a bus from the North End, UW students marched from the U-District, and Center School students walked all the way up from Seattle Center. Together, they marched downtown, chanting loudly all the way. The march got a lot of attention from holiday shoppers and business folks.
Though the students plan to walk out again the day after the war starts, they have other actions up their sleeves too. Early next year, the citywide student coalition--which meets weekly when school is in session--plans to lobby the Seattle City Council to pass antiwar and anti-PATRIOT Act resolutions. The council already wrote and signed a letter to Senators Murray and Cantwell opposing the earlier Bush resolution, McGarry points out. "Doing a resolution against the war is one more easy step," he says. "We can take text from their letter." Students have also discussed doing civil disobedience, protesting military recruitment actions, and educating people about the links between a war on the other side of the world and problems in the U.S.
"I think it's really important that students are independent from the rest of the movement," says McGarry. "Just like people of color have a different stake in stopping the war, students have a different stake than older peace activists do. Older people aren't going to get recruited, or have their tuition increased to pay for the war."
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