New Mobilization Committee to End the War in Vietnam
March on Washington -
* "Nov. 15, 1969 Anti-Vietnam War Demonstration Held" (2017-11-15, learning.blogs.nytimes.com) [archive.is/3NdaU]
* "1969 Second moratorium against the war held" (retrieved 2017-12-18, history.com) [archive.is/2k6iR]: Following a symbolic three-day “March Against Death,” the second national “moratorium” opens with mass demonstrations in San Francisco and Washington, D.C.
Organized by the New Mobilization Committee to End the War in Vietnam (“New Mobe”), an estimated 500,000 demonstrators rallied in Washington as part of the largest such rally to date. It began with a march down Pennsylvania Avenue to the Washington Monument, where a mass rally and speeches were held. Pete Seeger, Arlo Guthrie, Peter, Paul, and Mary, and four different touring casts of the musical “Hair” entertained the demonstrators.
Later, violence erupted when police used tear gas on radicals who had split off from the main rally to march on the Justice Department. The crowd of about 6,000, led by members of the Youth International Party (“Yippies”), threw rocks and bottles and burned U.S. flags. Almost 100 demonstrators were arrested.
The largest protest outside Washington was held in San Francisco, where an estimated 250,000 people demonstrated. Antiwar demonstrations were also held in a number of major European cities, including Frankfurt, Stuttgart, West Berlin, and London. The largest overseas demonstration occurred in Paris, where 2,651 people were arrested.
Picasso, Pablo, 1881-1973, artist
- [archive.is/Pkqmm]: ANTI VIETNAM WAR PROTEST MARCH POSTER by Wes Wilson. San Francisco, 11/15/1969
from [archive.is/dlo5p]
"Weatherman" (1970, edited by Harold Jacobs), bookcover [archive.is/iVjHh], backcover [archive.is/HvY5W], spine [archive.is/hSEGA]; pg. 275 [archive.is/OvS6r], pg. 276 [archive.is/1kyi7], pg. 277 [archive.is/Pyx68], pg. 278 [archive.is/2ndjO], pg. 279 [archive.is/gexxb], pg. 280 [archive.is/FRRWx], pg. 281 [archive.is/SGw9d], pg. 282 [archive.is/TJb9U].
Washington, November 15, 1969
(pgs. 275 to 282) (Originally published in Fire, November 21, 1969)
The most important tension in the March on Washington last week wasn't over the war. Washington was really all about the question of violence. The people who organized the demonstration, and the pigs, from Nixon on down to the Mobilization pig marshals, built their whole thing on having a peaceful and "reasonable" protest march. Even when the thing was happening, when the richest parts of Washington, D.C., were trashed three days in a row, they fell off their chairs trying to isolate, denounce, and finally ignore what was coming down. A lot of people were saying how important it was that a lot of people stood in the cold all day and that 45,000 kids marched in the Parade of Death. "l'hey said it was "America's Finest flour." But what we dug about Wash-ington was the violence.
A lot of the kids who were into the pacifist thing said that they couldn't get into violence because it was morally wrong, that war itself is a bad thing, and that "fighting fire_ with fire" would make us just as fucked-up as the Man. They said that people have to show how well-meaning they are by doing "legitimate" moral acts. But that's a whole utopian trip. It's crazy to think that because we 'walked in front of their houses with a peace sign, the rich fuckers in power would somehow see how they rip people off, and that the people whose power is staked on imperialist wars and forces like teachers and pigs would destroy their own positions to give it all back.
So 45,000 kids walked five miles single file, not rapping, for 36 hours. Each one dropped the name of a dead CI into a coffin. All between two rows of pigs. That was the Parade of Death.
But there were a couple thousand kids who couldn't dig it. We were the people our parents warned us about. We moved through the streets in groups, marching, dancing, running, chanting, singing, downing jugs of wine. Running together with the people we knew well and trusted a lot. We carried VC flags and used the flagpoles as weapons. Trashing windows and pig cars. Setting fires at street corners.
THE VIETNAM WAR ISN'T THE ISSUE ANY MORE. Mainly because the war is over. The Vietnamese people have won a military victory over the most powerful empire in the history of the world. They have regained control of the entire countryside and most of the cities, while the American troops have retreated to a few of their most highly defensible bases (40 per cent of the U.S. troops are now stationed in Saigon). The only thing left is for Nixon to find the American ruling class a diplomatic way of admitting defeat. The Vietnamese didn't defeat the Americans by staging peaceful demonstrations. They won when their entire population mobilized and fought a People's War for their freedom. They fought, like we are beginning to, for power. And they won power through armed, violent struggle.
What we say when we demonstrate about the war isn't that the U.S. should end the suffering or brutality. We tell people about how the VC have won. It's not so much that we're against the war; we're for the Vietnamese people and their victory. And their struggle has shown us and people all over the world that it can be done, the monster can be smashed, the people can win.
Violence by itself is neither good, bad, right nor wrong. The thing is to get a handle on what's necessary to build a revolution in the world. We've got to start looking at things in terms of winning, seeing our actions as part of a strategy for the struggle. We've got to see the connection between the sabotage of the imperialists' office buildings in New York, the SDS riot in Chicago, and the violent motion that came off of Washington. We know that the only way the fat cats who run the country are going to give up anything—the Vietnam war or their power to suck off everyone else—is when people take it back from them. The VC dig that; that's why they're doing it. Dig it? Do it!
- [Panel 1]: There were those who come to Washington to protest the war, in the tradition of the past 10 years of peace demonstration. [Description]: Rocky, Nixon and Laird look on as peaceful protesters demonstrate against the war, whose signs read, "No More War", "Give Peace a Chance", and "Peace, No More War".
- [Panel 3]: Friday night we rallied at Dupont Circle, for a few short speeches.
- [Panel 4]: Then we moved out on the Saigon and other pig embassies. It was a great feeling, moving out. Our people were chanting, singing and laughing with the thought of what was to come. The pace was fast. Every body was anxious for what was to happen.
- [Panel 5]: The pigs were in position when we got there. We started trashing windows in the embassies and the pigs attacked with tear gas. We moved up Massachusetts Ave. on the way burning a pig motorcycle, trashing pig cars and a pig van.
- [Panel 6]: We moved on to Connecticut Avenue trashing pig Washington.
- [Panel 7]: Later we did all those things the pig says are bad.
- [Panel 8]: After a relaxing sleep, we moved on the injustice department.
- [Panel 9]: We trashed windows, exploded smoke, and stoned mobe marshal pigs. The pigs attacked with gas. We dispersed, regrouped and launched another attack. This time along with the trashing we lowered the Amerikan flag and raised the N.L.F. flag. The pigs attacked again with gas. We moved out into the city trashing, barricading and setting fires as we went.
