New Year’s Resolution:

Resist U.S. War Crimes!

The Nuremberg Tribunal of 1945-46 which passed judgment on Nazi war criminals declared that soldiers and citizens have a duty to resist the crimes of their government.  The Tribunal said following orders is no excuse.

One of the most well known U.S. war crimes of the Vietnam war was the My Lai massacre on March 16, 1968 where over 500 unarmed civilians, a majority of whom were women, children (including babies) and elderly people, were slaughtered by U.S. troops at the village of My Lai under orders from Lt. William Calley, Captain Ernest Medina, and other high ranking officers.

Hugh Thompson, a Warrant Officer helicopter pilot, put his helicopter down between U.S. troops and fleeing Vietnamese civilians.  Through a bull horn, he boldly said, “You would not shoot at a US helicopter, would you?”  Thompson  risked his life and reputation by ordering a higher ranking officer to stop the killing of civilians at My Lai.  For his bravery, Thompson remained under a military cloud for over thirty years. He could have been convicted of treason and not respecting a senior officer.  However, justice ultimately prevailed.  Thompson and his two helicopter crew members were eventually given high honors by the Pentagon.  Calley, the only person convicted of murder in the massacre, served four and one-half months in prison.

Today, as we start the New Year of 2011,  PFC Bradley Manning sits in a solitary confinement U.S. Marine Corps prison cell in Quantico, Virginia.  He has been in custody 5 months and faces a possible life sentence. He is enduring conditions that are cruel, inhumane, and bordering on torture. He has not been convicted of any crime, but is alleged to have released audio/video footage to Julian Assange of WIKILEAKS of a US helicopter attack killing innocent civilians, including two Reuters journalists, in Iraq.

The killing of innocent civilians (in Nazi Germany, Vietnam, Iraq, or anywhere) is a war crime.  It appears that Bradley Manning had no power to stop the killing shown in the released video, but by exposing that war crime, perhaps he believed that people would be held accountable and other innocent civilian lives could be saved.

Recently, the U.S. Department of Justice formally decided it would not prosecute the government officials who destroyed dozens of video tapes of water-boarding and torture by US officials.  So, the destruction of evidence of war crimes is OK but revealing the evidence of war crimes is not?   Perhaps we need a Nuremberg reminder: Committing war crimes is the crime.  Exposing war crimes and trying to stop war crimes is a soldier’s and citizen’s high moral and legal duty.  Bradley Manning and Julian Assange are true modern day heroes!  Urge the military to stop its “inhumane” treatment of Bradley Manning. You can add your name at http://action.firedoglake.com/page/s/bradleymanning.  Also see http://www.standwithbrad.org

Defend Wikileaks and Julian Assange!

Support Bradley Manning!

1. Mourn all victims of violence. 2. Reject war as a solution. 3. Defend civil liberties. 4. Oppose all discrimination, anti-Islamic, anti-Semitic, etc. 5. Seek peace through justice in Hawai`i and around the world.
Contact: Malu `Aina Center for Non-violent Education & Action

P.O. Box AB Kurtistown, Hawai`i 96760.
Phone (808) 966-7622.  Email ja@interpac.net   http://www.malu-aina.org
Hilo Peace Vigil leaflet (Dec. 31, 2010 – 485th week) – Friday 3:30-5PM downtown Post Office

Aloha Peace Ohana,
I hope you had a good Christmas with family and friends.  This is a reminder.   There will be a peace organizing meeting on Monday, Dec. 27th from 7-9PM at the Keaau Community Center.
Among items for discussion are:
1.  Pohakuloa training expansion plans and EIS hearing coming up: Jan. 11 in Hilo and Jan. 12 in Kamuela.  Written comments will be accepted until Feb. 7.
2.  Ann Wright willing to speak on the Hilo and Kona side of Hawaii Island during 3rd week in January on Afghanistan and Palestine
3.  Overall anti-war plans.
4.  Support for Wikileaks Julian Assange, and Bradley Manning.
Bring your ideas and friends.  We need to broaden the movement for justice, peace, and the earth.
Mahalo.
Jim

Jim Albertini

Malu ‘Aina Center for Non-violent Education & Action

P.O.Box AB

Kurtistown, Hawai’i 96760

phone: 808-966-7622

email: JA@interpac.net

Visit us on the web at: www.malu-aina.org

Peace on Earth, Goodwill to All!

Words for reflection this Christmas eve:

“The first casualty when war comes is truth.”
U.S. Senator Hiram Johnson

“The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy…. Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars.  Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that.  Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.”
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

“There is nothing that we can do but love, and dear God –please enlarge our hearts to love each other, to love our neighbor, to love our enemy as well as our friend.”
Dorothy Day

“Never doubt that a small group of committed citizens can change the world.  Indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.”
Margaret Mead

“There may be times when we are powerless to prevent injustice, but there must never be a time when we fail to protest.”
Elie Wiesel

“Blessed are the peacemakers… love your enemies….”

Jesus

1. Mourn all victims of violence. 2. Reject war as a solution. 3. Defend civil liberties. 4. Oppose all discrimination, anti-Islamic, anti-Semitic, etc. 5. Seek peace through justice in Hawai`i and around the world.
Contact: Malu `Aina Center for Non-violent Education & Action

P.O. Box AB Kurtistown, Hawai`i 96760.
Phone (808) 966-7622.  Email ja@interpac.net   http://www.malu-aina.org
Hilo Peace Vigil leaflet (Dec. 24, 2010 – 484th week) – Friday 3:30-5PM downtown Post Office

Veterans for Peace Protest War at White House

A veteran is dragged away while being arrested during an anti-war protest in front of the White House December 16, 2010 in Washington, DC. Getty Images.  Up to 134 people were arrested at the White House fence.  Dozens more arrested in San Francisco and New York.  Below are excerpts of a “Call to Action” issued prior to the protest.

“During the Vietnam War, Martin Luther King called our government “the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today.” True then—and even more so today…

“There are children being orphaned, maimed or killed every day, in our name, with our tax dollars; there are soldiers and civilians dying or being maimed for life, in order to generate profits for the most odious imperialistic corporate war machine ever, again in our name. How long are we going to let this go on? Until it is too late, until this destructive machine destroys all of us and the planet to boot?

“It’s time veterans and others express our resistance directly and powerfully by putting ourselves on the line, once again—honestly, courageously and without one drop of apology for doing so…

“Join activist veterans marching in solidarity to the White House, refusing to move, demanding the end of U.S. wars…  We believe that the power of courageous, committed people is greater than that of corporate warmongers…  With courage, persistence, boldness and numbers, we can eventually make this monstrous war machine grind to a halt, so that our children and all children everywhere can grow up in a peaceful world.”

The “Call to Action” was endorsed by Veterans For Peace and more than 30 other organizations.
Visit the website at www.stopthesewars.org or on facebook join: “Take A Stand for Peace”!

Support Veterans For Peace!

1. Mourn all victims of violence. 2. Reject war as a solution. 3. Defend civil liberties. 4. Oppose all discrimination, anti-Islamic, anti-Semitic, etc.
5. Seek peace through justice in Hawai`i and around the world.
Contact: Malu `Aina Center for Non-violent Education & Action

P.O. Box AB Kurtistown, Hawai`i 96760.
Phone (808) 966-7622.  Email ja@interpac.net   http://www.malu-aina.org
Hilo Peace Vigil leaflet (Dec. 17, 2010 – 483rd week) – Friday 3:30-5PM downtown Post Office

Please vote (link below) in the Big Island Weekly poll on the TMT on Mauna Kea.  The poll is on the right hand side of the page.  Scroll down.  See my testimony below against the TMT.
Mahalo Jim Albertini

The Big Island Weekly is running a poll on whether the TMT should be built or not.  Mauna Kea could use your kokua!

Please forward to all your friends and contacts.

ku
______________

****   http://bigislandweekly.com/

>
>      From: Malu `Aina Center For Non-violent Education & Action
>      P.O. Box AB Kurtistown, Hawaii 96760
>      Phone 808-966-7622
>      ja@interpac.net  Visit us on the web at www.malu-aina.org
>
>     To: Office of Conservation and Coastal Management
>     Department of Land and Natural Resources
>     P.O. Box 621
>     Honolulu, Hawaii 96809
>
>     December 2, 2010
>
>      Re: CDUA HA 3568  for the Thirty Meter Telescope
>
>     The TMT project has the same smell as the fast track DLNR plan years back to put geothermal development in the Natural Area Reserve Conservation district known as the Wao kele O Puna Rainforest –the last remaining intact lowland rainforest in Hawaii.   That misguided effort resulted in hundreds of arrests for non-violent civil resistance and was stopped over the failure to do a Federal EIS.  The same may be required for the TMT.  Federal funds are involved and no Federal EIS has been done.
>
>     Our non-profit organization grows food to share with people in need and to support the work of justice, peace, and preserving the environment.  We stand in strong opposition to the Conservation District Use Permit requested for the Thirty Meter Telescope on sacred Mauna Kea.  We recommend that the Board deny the permit request for the following reasons.
>
>     The current state of Mauna Kea represents a microcosm of our planet heading off the cliff of Global Warming due to over-development.
>
>     For our planet, the evidence is crystal clear that the present course of industrial development is heading for unprecedented catastrophe.  But are we willing to seriously change the way we live, and the decisions we make day to day.  Are we willing to put conservation before development?
>
>      On Mauna Kea —
>     1.  We know that the cumulative impacts on Mauna Kea according to the 2005 EIS done by NASA are “substantial, adverse and significant” yet we still go forward with more building: 5 meter telescopes, 10  meters, now 30 meters, with no end in sight.  The “bigger is better” logic will eventually put a mirror over the entire summit.
>      2.  We know that No study has been done to assess the carrying capacity of the mountain for development.
>      3.  We know that the University of Hawaii and its self appointed Mauna Kea Management Board  are in a position of conflict of interest.  The University benefits financially from telescope development yet it is suppose to be a management entity for conservation on the mountain.  The record is clear: development trumps conservation.  When will we learn?  When will we reverse course and put conservation before development?
>
>      For our organization the bottom line is this.  The host culture of Hawaii tells us that the summit of Mauna Kea is the most sacred temple in all Hawaii.  In fact, Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa are two of the most sacred sites in all the Pacific.  Do we simply hear those words but have no understanding of their meaning?  Or do we understand but disregard the meaning out of other concerns –science, prestige, development money and jobs?  In any case, to proceed with further development in the summit area of Mauna Kea is desecration of the most sacred temple in Hawaii.  It is disrespectful.  It is shameful.  In the Judeo/Christian sense, it is sacrilegious.  It is sinful.  The irony is that looking into the heavens will be our downfall because we have not shown respect.  We look into space but not listen to the native people of this place.  If we want to be pono, the means we use must be in line with the end that we seek.  It is time to live aloha — live the principles of non-violence in Hawaii and around the world.  Aloha demands justice. The conflict over expanding construction on Mauna Kea, like the expansion of militarism and warfare training at Pohakuloa represent sores/infections on the ‘aina.  They are symptoms of a deeper problem.  What is truly needed to heal is to end the ongoing illegal U.S. Occupation of Hawaii.  I am confident that a reinstated independent nation of Hawaii would never permit the desecration of its most sacred temple.
>
>      Deny this permit request.  Mahalo.
>
>     James V. Albertini
>     President