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Iraq vet works against war
Rocky Mountain News ^ | 10/31/05 | Deborah Frazier

Posted on 10/31/2005 6:37:20 AM PST by Millee

Sgt. Kelly Dougherty went to Iraq in 2003, doubting that the war was just.

She returned in 2004, certain it was wrong, and co-founded Iraq Veterans Against the War. "People say you are a traitor. People say you are unpatriotic," said Dougherty, 27, about her anti-war work. "We are doing this because we feel strongly about America.

"I really appreciate America, but we are capable of doing some very bad things."

Dougherty was stationed near Nazaria in southern Iraq for 10 months with the Colorado National Guard's 220th Military Police Co. She saw action but never fired her weapon.

Dougherty said the thousands of innocent civilians who have been killed and the broken American promises about repairing water, electricity and sewage systems convinced her the troops should come home.

The faces of Iraqi civilians mirrored her growing doubts.

"At first, the Iraqis smiled and waved, but at the end of my 10 months there, they'd turn away or make rude gestures," Dougherty said.

After she came home in February 2004, and left the Guard after eight years with an honorable discharge, Dougherty embarked on a new mission.

She put her life and income on hold to talk to college students, high school classes and community groups across the country.

"The war in Iraq is not about protecting this country. The war is about aggression," said Dougherty, who doesn't receive a salary for her work against the war.

At Regis College in Denver last week with the Wheels of Justice Tour, Dougherty said her unit was often ordered to burn broken-down civilian contractor trucks loaded with supplies rather than allow the impoverished Iraqis to loot them for the water, food, fuel and vehicle parts that could be sold.

"Most of us wanted to help the Iraqi people, but the only good we could do was give kids candy," she told six Regis students who gathered on a warm fall afternoon to listen to her. "That's not what they need. They need clean water and security."

The worst events she experienced involved civilians, including children, hit by contractor convoys that thundered along rural roads under orders to never stop.

"I wasn't protecting America. I was protecting Halliburton trucks going to military bases," she said.

Dougherty said her MP unit provided security for investigators at rural crash scenes, including a fatality where a military convoy killed a boy.

"The family was there. An older relative fell to his knees and collapsed on the ground. There was nothing they could do," she said.

Dougherty said she had hoped that American troops would help rebuild power plants, water systems and schools, but the only construction she saw was at military bases.

"From what I saw, we just created more chaos and violence," she said. "I became less and less convinced that we were there for a good purpose."

The rebuilding effort is the subject of a new report by the special inspector general for Iraq. While noting problems in the $30 billion U.S.-financed effort, the report also cited "steady progress" in parts of the program, despite what was described as "the hazardous security environment, the fluid political situation and the harsh realities of working in a war zone," according to a story in Sunday's New York Times.

Unlikely soldier

Dougherty, whose parents divorced when she was a child, grew up in a working-class neighborhood in Cañon City. She was a good student who asked questions.

When she graduated from high school in 1996, she knew two things: that she wanted to go to college and that her parents couldn't afford to send her.

Her stepfather, Army veteran Jim Brenner, suggested she sign up for the National Guard for the college benefits.

Her father, Sean Dougherty, a Vietnam veteran, argued against it.

Nevertheless, Dougherty enlisted, along with her best friend, Elizabeth Spradlin, in the Colorado National Guard in Pueblo.

Her once-a-month service as a medic meshed with her classes at the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs. A biology major, she wants to work in health services.

She was deployed to Hungary for eight months in 1999 as an MP to escort troops to Bosnia. She was activated again as an MP in January 2003 for duty in Iraq.

"Before I went, I told an officer that I had reservations because Iraq wasn't behind the 9/11 attack," she said. "The officer said he had reservations, too."

That night, however, the officer told the platoon that Iraq was behind the 9/11 attack and that the country needed to strike back, Dougherty said.

"Our leader was misleading us," she said.

Her unit first went to Kuwait, where they huddled in a bunker for two days as alarms signaled incoming Scud missiles fired by the Iraqis.

"We were in full protective gear because we were told the missiles had chemical and biological weapons," Dougherty said.

The soldiers again were misled, she said. The U.S. later admitted that the Iraqis didn't have biological or chemical agents or weapons of mass destruction.

On the anti-war trail

At high schools across the country and especially in Colorado Springs, Colorado's military hub, Dougherty tells students to look at grants and other sources of tuition help rather than the military.

"I tell them to take what the military recruiters say with a grain of salt," she said. "I tell them there are other options."

Dougherty, who wants to get a master's degree in public health, said most of the audiences she's talked to since July 2004 have been small and usually already agree with her stand.

But the Iraq Veterans Against the War itself has grown from Dougherty and her six-cofounders to 300 today. National polls confirm dwindling support for the war as well.

She's found she's a frequent target of pro-war tirades on blogs. Dougherty said she enjoys her discussions during speaking engagements with Iraq veterans who disagree with her.

"I say that I support them and my experience was different than theirs," she said.

Dougherty said she and her stepfather don't discuss her anti-war activities, but her father has become active in the movement.

At North Presbyterian Church in Denver on Tuesday, more than 75 people - the group's largest audience of the week - listened to Dougherty and two other Iraq veterans relate their experiences.

"There was a poll in Europe, rating the most dangerous countries. America was rated as the most dangerous," Dougherty told the gathering.

One of the audience members, Matt Walsh, 25, said he hadn't heard about the large civilian losses or the lack of water and food that had turned many of the Iraqi people against the U.S.

"I don't know anyone who's in Iraq," said Walsh, who graduated from college this year. "It could have been me that signed up to go to Iraq."

The audience gave Dougherty and the other vets a standing ovation.

"I came to find out from the ranks what has really gone on in Iraq," said John Addison, an Army veteran who was stationed in Germany during the Vietnam War.

"I was impressed with what these soldiers had to say," he said.

Not all agree

During her talk, Dougherty said her few encounters with Iraqis, especially with the women, confirmed her belief that Iraqis are good people.

"It made me wish all the more that I was there in a different capacity than being part of the military," she said.

Jeff Chapman, a deacon at the church who wore an American flag tie and an American flag pin on his jacket lapel, listened, but disagreed.

"I feel more people would die here, in this country, if we didn't fight the Iraqi terrorists there," said Chapman, an Air Force veteran.

"But what these people are doing is great," he said. "I fought for their right to say these things."


TOPICS: News/Current Events; War on Terror
KEYWORDS: oifveterans
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To: diverteach
People say you are unpatriotic

yeah, that sounds about right.
21 posted on 10/31/2005 7:23:29 AM PST by steel_resolve
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To: penowa
"Another one who truly deserves the "Weekend Warrior" label."

Nah--she took a video camera along, and will shortly be running for Congress, testifying before Senate committees, throwing her medals (if any) over a wall, and planning to run for president.

22 posted on 10/31/2005 7:41:19 AM PST by Wonder Warthog (The Hog of Steel)
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To: Millee

23 posted on 10/31/2005 7:51:54 AM PST by Airborne1986 (Well, you can do what you want to us. But we're not going to sit here while you badmouth the U.S.A.)
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To: Millee

Finally!!!

This war has its own John Kerry wannabee.


24 posted on 10/31/2005 8:03:16 AM PST by DustyMoment (FloriDUH - proud inventors of pregnant/hanging chads and judicide!!)
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To: DustyMoment

Let me guess, she tripped and fell in the PX for 3 purple hearts?


25 posted on 10/31/2005 8:16:28 AM PST by When do we get liberated? ((God save us from the whining, useless, irrelevent left...))
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To: When do we get liberated?

Actually I think she got one for a slice on her finger while she was preparing 'helal' meat.


26 posted on 10/31/2005 8:27:58 AM PST by BlueStateDepression
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To: When do we get liberated?

Well sweetheart, you'd better start looking for a job, because this is about over, and when troops start coming home, you will need something else to do. Save the aspen trees, for instance.


27 posted on 10/31/2005 8:28:13 AM PST by ClaireSolt (.)
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To: ClaireSolt

"when troops start coming home, you will need something else to do."

Well not exactly. She will do just as the Hamas and IJ members do today, claim that her actions brought about the exit. She will indeed claim victory.


28 posted on 10/31/2005 8:31:25 AM PST by BlueStateDepression
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To: Millee

""There was a poll in Europe, rating the most dangerous countries. America was rated as the most dangerous," Dougherty told the gathering."

Yeah, I think she is coming ot understand that capitalism is the problem.


29 posted on 10/31/2005 7:21:01 PM PST by strategofr (The secret of happiness is freedom. And the secret of freedom is courage.---Thucydities)
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To: BlueStateDepression

"I offer that she is talking from an ideological anti war standpoint that she had prior to the invasion and her eventual deployment, hell even before her enlistment."

agreed.


30 posted on 10/31/2005 7:22:13 PM PST by strategofr (The secret of happiness is freedom. And the secret of freedom is courage.---Thucydities)
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To: strategofr

Come on this war is getting to the point where no one wants us over there, especially the people of Iraq.Its there country let them destroy it not us.


31 posted on 11/22/2005 11:54:56 AM PST by Drillerman
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To: Drillerman

"Come on this war is getting to the point where no one wants us over there, especially the people of Iraq.Its there country let them destroy it not us."

If we take our time and exit the right way, we can leave a democracy behind us.

Though I would prefer to keep a shell of strong US forces on the perimeter of the nation to prevent infiltration and invasion---without interacting with the Iraqi population at large.


32 posted on 11/22/2005 8:29:07 PM PST by strategofr (The secret of happiness is freedom. And the secret of freedom is courage.---Thucydities)
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To: pissant

Another good case for retroactive birth control.


33 posted on 11/22/2005 8:34:34 PM PST by DarthVader (Do something positive for your country today: Punch an America hating leftie in the mouth.)
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To: Drillerman; MikeinIraq; Darksheare
Come on this war is getting to the point where no one wants us over there, especially the people of Iraq.Its there country let them destroy it not us.

Geez! You've been a freeper since 2004 and have not read any good news about Iraqis wanting us there. There are several threads a day pointing out the real progress we're making that don't get reported in the MSM.

Bet you've never heard of an Iraqi constitution and the vote coming up in December.

I smell a troll. You like to use the word "fag" in your brief posting history, and you also like to point out that you're from Kentucky and a hillbilly.

You can stereotype conservatives all you want, but you will not even come near the truth in your own little brainwashed and twisted world.

34 posted on 11/22/2005 9:04:01 PM PST by mplsconservative
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To: Millee
"I don't know anyone who's in Iraq," said Walsh, who graduated from college this year. "It could have been me that signed up to go to Iraq."

This is the funniest damn statement I've ever read.

Is he trying to make this sound like the Vietnam era of the draft? "It could have been me that signed up to go to Iraq."

Yeah, you dumbass, and it could've been your mother that chose to have an abortion.

35 posted on 11/22/2005 9:54:22 PM PST by VeniVidiVici (What? Me worry?)
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To: Drillerman

BZZZTTTT!!

Wrong!!

Try again.


36 posted on 11/23/2005 7:11:25 AM PST by MikefromOhio
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To: Drillerman

"Come on this war is getting to the point where no one wants us over there, especially the people of Iraq."

The people of Iraq have asked that we stay.
The people of Iraq have held their first real elections.
You make an error in assuming the terrorists are all of Iraq.
They are not.

"Its there country let them destroy it not us."

Your premise is false, we are not destroying Iraq.
If you think that holding their first real elections is destruction, then you are deluded.
And yes, the country is there.
And it is 'theirs'.

*sniff sniff*

You smell funny.


37 posted on 11/23/2005 7:27:44 AM PST by Darksheare (I'm not suspicious & I hope it's nutritious but I think this sandwich is made of mime.)
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To: Drillerman

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1260323/posts?page=19#19

Where were you between 10/28/2004 and 10/16/2005?
Thought you might catch a zot?
Decided to lay low for a year?
Cat got your tongue?


38 posted on 11/23/2005 9:10:01 AM PST by Darksheare (I'm not suspicious & I hope it's nutritious but I think this sandwich is made of mime.)
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