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 Over 200 people signed the STWC Troops Out of Afghanistan! petition in Manchester on Armed Forces Day last Saturday. Activists from Military Families Against the War helped lead the petitioning.
Many from military backgrounds stopped and signed, others stopped to discuss the issues at the Stop the War stall.
'My son is on his third tour now, after Iraq, now he is in Afghanistan. If he knew we had signed this petition he would go mad, but it is all wrong. We should get out. Afghanistan has got nothing to do with us.', explained one mother with her friend.
'I served over 15 years in the army, the first Gulf War, Bosnia, Iraq. When I got out I got no help with finding a job, a place to live. Once you leave they forget you. We should definitely get out of Afghanistan.'
'My husband did 20 years in the forces. There were special hospitals for soldiers then, but now they have closed them all. Iraq was not our war, nor is Afghanistan'.
One former soldier from the military police told how he had lost seven of his fiends in Iraq. ''The Iraq war was wrong, everyone knows that. But in Afghanistan I am not so sure. We are there to stop the heroin which is hurting people at home.' This was the most common reason given for continuing the war in Afghanistan.
There was disappointment in what was put on for the Armed Forces Day. 'It was a poor showing from the Council' said Lily Walker from MFAW. 'A police band, and few military vehicles that's all there was in Piccadily Gardens They had an ambulance there. Says it all really. No sight of the free cinema tickets promised, as if that is what we need. They got lots of recruitment people out but there though. Is that what it really was all about?'
The local MP's were nowhere to be seen. Karla Ellis, whose brother was killed in Iraq in 2003 said, 'Our family got less money after losing our Lee than our MP got fiddling his expense.
Karla will be speaking out at a public meeting in Manchester next week. 'My mum says that when my granddad got out of serving in the forces there was no help from the Army, only the British Legion did anything to help. After serving they just abandon you'.
Rather than build support for the Afghan war, Gordon Brown's Armed Forces Day put a spotlight on the disdain politicians have for those risking there lives conducting a futile, brutal war in Afghanistan. 'Why don't they send the MP's out there to fight?', said Ron Senchak, who served in the US Navy before turning against the war in Vietnam forty years ago.
Polls show over two thirds of people believe the British troops should be brought back from Afghanistan. No wonder taking the Troops Out of Afghanistan! petition onto the streets gets such a good response. |
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