Dennis Schroeder © News An unidentified protester holds a sign Tuesday along Lake Springs. Demonstrators, who numbered roughly 150 at one point, stood near the Broadmoor Hotel as they waited for representatives from 19 NATO nations and eight guest countries to arrive.

'Aggressive' U.S. military target of demonstrators

Protesters greet arrival of defense ministers for Springs conference

By Dick Foster, Rocky Mountain News
October 8, 2003

COLORADO SPRINGS - Protesters mingled in front of mansions along Lake Avenue near the Broadmoor Hotel on Tuesday, waiting for defense ministers from all 19 NATO nations and eight other countries.

There was only one way to the Broadmoor for delegations that arrived for a two-day conference on security and anti-terrorism - up Lake Avenue and through two traffic roundabouts that slowed the big buses to a crawl.

There, banner-waving demonstrators staged their protest.

They came in small numbers from schools, churches and activist groups, mostly in Colorado Springs.

The demonstrators, who numbered roughly 150 at one point, were peaceful. Around them, imposing numbers of police officers on foot and horseback stood by.

Faces peered out the tinted bus windows at dozens of posters and cloth banners: "War Solves Nothing," "End Middle East Occupation," "Rummy Lied, People Died."

"This whole Mideast thing just feels so wrong," said Joyce Doyle, a bookseller. "What gives us the right to dictate to everybody else?"

Several protesters said they understood that the country needed to respond to the attacks of 9-11.

But Doyle said, "Iraq was not even in the picture at 9-11. The reason for going into Iraq was a fabrication."

A busload of about 50 students from Colorado College joined the protest.

"I just don't see how retaliation is supposed to make things end," said Mary Ann Holland, a journalism student.

"I don't see the need for our country's military to be so aggressive. We should be more defensive. We know we have the power, and we use it without being responsible about it," Holland said.

Bill Sulzman, head of Citizens for Peace in Space, said that military responses have not brought peace.

"The proof is in the pudding in Afghanistan. Certainly, there are criminals that need to be caught and dealt with, but the chief among them still haven't been," Sulzman said.

"(Former Gen.) Wesley Clark said that war is a blunt instrument" he said. "You kill the good and the bad and make a lot of people angry. Kill a terrorist, make a terrorist."

Sulzman questioned whether the alternative of diplomacy and nonviolent interventionist forces would create "more or less bloodshed" than outright military responses.

"The theory doesn't have enough believers to even get it tested," he said, "and I don't know when that paradigm is going to change."