Canada denies refuge for American paratrooper, his wife and son

Canada denies refuge for American paratrooper, his wife and son

TORONTO -- A U.S. Army paratrooper who refused to fight in Iraq has found no refuge north of the border.

Jeremy Hinzman was denied political asylum in Canada on Thursday, a ruling that dealt a blow to other deserters here who argue such duty would force them to commit atrocities against civilians.

An immigration board ruled that Hinzman had not convinced its members he would face persecution or cruel and unusual punishment if returned to the United States.

Seven other American military personnel have applied for refugee status, and Hinzman's lawyer estimated dozens of others are in hiding in Canada waiting to see how the government ruled. The attorney, Jeffry House, said Hinzman would appeal the ruling.

House said at a news conference that the Immigration and Refugee Board had not allowed him to argue that the war in Iraq is illegal and would make that complaint before a federal appeals court.

He said there were many problems with the ruling, describing it as filled with "deference" to the United States.

Immigration and Refugee Board member Brian Goodman, who wrote the ruling, said Hinzman might face some employment and social discrimination. But "the treatment does not amount to a violation of a fundamental human right, and the harm is not serious," he wrote.

Canada has long opposed American wars; former Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau declared his homeland "a refuge from militarism" during the Vietnam War and allowed the 30,000 to 50,000 American draft dodgers to settle here. Ottawa also opposed the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq but is also seeking to ease badly strained relations between the two governments.

Hinzman could face charges of desertion if sent home and would face up to five years in prison. He and seven other U.S. military deserters are being represented by House, a Wisconsin native who came to Canada in 1970 to avoid the draft during the Vietnam War.

The Pentagon has urged the deserters to return to the United States and take up their concerns at their respective military bases.

"We are an Army serving a nation at war," the Army said in a statement after Thursday's ruling. "Each of us volunteered to serve, and the vast majority serve honorably. AWOL and desertion are crimes that go against Army values, degrade unit readiness and, in a time of war, may put the lives of other soldiers at risk."

Hinzman, 26, lives with his wife and young son in Toronto, where Quakers and the War Resisters coalition of anti-war groups have taken on his cause and provided some shelter.

Currently a bicycle messenger, Hinzman told an anti-war rally after the announcement that he would continue to fight for his right to remain in Canada, as well as the seven other young men seeking refugee status.

"Canada has a history for being a haven for people of conscience," he said. "Hopefully that legacy will continue."

He fled from Fort Bragg, N.C., in January 2004, weeks before his 82nd Airborne Division was due to go to Iraq. He had served three years in the Army, but had applied for conscientious objector status before his unit was sent to Afghanistan in 2002.

Hinzman argued before the board in December that he would have had to take part in war crimes if he went to Iraq, saying the war there is illegal. He said he would be persecuted if forced to return to the United States.

Hinzman's lawyer estimated as many as 100 American war resisters are hiding in Canada, waiting to see how Hinzman's case is played out before coming forward.

During the Vietnam era, young American men could be drafted into military service, but now enlistment in U.S. military is voluntary. The military attracts many young recruits with job skills training and programs that help pay for university.

BETH DUFF-BROWN
©The Olympian
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NO TROOPS ::: NO WARS

How Do We Resist This Ruinous War?

No Troops; No Wars

By YOSHIE FURUHASHI

Since the beginning of the invasion of Iraq, 1,524 US soldiers have died (as of March 22, 2005), and 11,220 US soldiers have been wounded in action (as of February 26, 2005).¹ Iraqi casualties are even larger. A study published in The Lancet last November estimated at least "100000 excess deaths" in Iraq since March 20, 2003.²

Who is killing Iraqis? The White House would have us believe, through the "Good News" propaganda planted in the media by the Pentagon and the State Department,³ that the US military is only protecting Iraqis and reconstructing Iraq. Nothing is further from the truth. According to the Iraqi Ministry of Health's statistics, "operations by U.S. and multinational forces and Iraqi police are killing twice as many Iraqis -- most of them civilians -- as attacks by insurgents."⁴ The Lancet study confirms the ministry's findings: "Violent deaths were widespread . . . and were mainly attributed to coalition forces. Most individuals reportedly killed by coalition forces were women and children."⁵

The Iraqi elections in January, through which Washington hoped to divide and conquer Shiites and Sunnis and to gain a fresh start to present itself as the selfless protector of an elected Iraqi government, have not changed the reality of unequal power between the occupier and the occupied. Many refused to participate in the undemocratic "demonstration elections" organized by the occupier, and the Shiites who did vote for the United Iraqi Alliance, in the hope that the UIA would fulfill its electoral promise of "[a] timetable for the withdrawal of the multinational forces from Iraq,"⁶ were disappointed. George W. Bush reiterated his rejection of a timetable for US exit: "Our troops will come home when Iraq is capable of defending herself."⁷ The Shiite notables and clerics who head the UIA, including Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, could not defy Bush's intransigence without risking Washington's wrath, which had already reduced Falluja to utter ruins, making an example of it to demonstrate the costs of resistance to Iraqis.

Essentially, the linchpin of the White House's program remains the same as before the Iraqi elections: to win over a select few Iraqis who would cut lucrative deals with Western oil companies and remake Iraq in Washington's neoliberal image⁸; and, taking a page from the failed "Vietnamization," to build up Iraqi security forces to protect the aforementioned deals. That is a vain hope. Only "[f]ewer than 30 percent of the 136,000 Iraqi security forces" are capable of counter-insurgency, and Iraqi Army units have "absentee rates of up to 40 percent at any given time," according to General Richard Myers and Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz.⁹ Buried deep in Bush's supplemental budget request is a direr diagnosis: "All but one of these 90 battalions, however, are lightly equipped and armed, and have very limited mobility and sustainment capabilities."¹⁰

Meanwhile, the "coalition of the willing" has shrunken further. Italy, joining 14 other countries that have already pulled out from Iraq and two that have set down their exit plans, announced that it will withdraw its troops from Iraq by September.¹¹

Washington is unable to cajole or coerce Iraqis or others to fight for its self-serving goals. Therefore, it has and will be US soldiers who bear the burden of fighting the deadly war and US workers who shoulder the costs of financing it. The costs of the Iraqi War are $157.8 billion and counting -- the money that could have been spent, for instance, to insure 94.5 million children for one year or provide four-year scholarships at public universities for 7.7 million students.¹² On March 16, 2005, the House approved $81.4 billion to fund the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, which threatens to bring emergency war spending since March 2003 to a whopping $300 billion. That's a sum that the United States can ill afford, when its economy is made more fragile than ever by the widening budget and trade deficits as well as the housing bubble that masks mounting personal debts (made worse by the bankruptcy "reform" that transforms courts into collection agencies), liable to trigger a run on the dollar any time.¹³

How do we resist the ruinous war in a way that makes the difference? Washington can't fight any war without troops. Support the soldiers who refuse to serve and working-class youths who say no to military recruitment. Here are examples of working-class refusal. Reservists of the 343rd Quartermaster Company defied orders to go on a "suicide mission" delivering fuel without armor last October.¹⁴ Then, eight soldiers filed a federal lawsuit on December 6, 2004 challenging the "stop-loss" policy, i.e. the backdoor draft.¹⁵ The Army National Guard fell "30 percent below recruiting goals" at the end of last year,¹⁶ and recruitment is "just 75 percent of the target for the first quarter of fiscal 2005'"¹⁷ Black volunteers for the Army have fallen 41 % (from 22.7% to 13.9%) since 2000¹⁸ -- a severe blow to the Army that depends upon Black men and women to supply nearly a quarter of its active-duty troops. Seattle Central Community College students threw out military recruiters from campus.¹⁹ Military Families Speak Out, Veterans for Peace, Iraq Veterans Against the War, the American Friends Service Committee, and others began a campaign to question the use of the National Guard in Iraq -- the campaign that already succeeded in having 50 town meetings in Vermont pass resolutions to study its impact and urge Bush to bring the troops home.²⁰ Among the largest anti-war rallies on March 19, 2005, the second anniversary of the invasion of Iraq, was one organized by veterans and military families in Fayetteville, North Carolina, near Ft. Bragg.

Keep in mind that the anti-war movement today has many strengths that the movement against the Vietnam War did not enjoy. According to MFSO, their "membership currently includes over 2,000 military families, with new families joining daily." That is a historically unprecedented success. IVAW was established in August 2004,²¹ whereas Vietnam Veterans Against the War was not founded until 1967. In other words, Iraq veterans, even though they were all volunteers rather than draftees, managed to organize an anti-war veterans' group faster than Vietnam Veterans, because they had the benefit of a strong foundation built by VfP, VVAW, and other activist veterans' organizations. We also possess another priceless legacy of the movement against the Vietnam War: the power elite's fear of political costs of the draft. The power elite are afraid of backlashes against the draft inside and outside the military,²² so they have hesitated to reinstate it, but they have no recent experience of using a volunteer military in a brutal counter-insurgency war, and it is not clear if they really can for long. The stop-loss policy and other administrative changes -- signs that true volunteers alone do not suffice for a deadly and protracted colonial war -- turned many volunteers into reluctant volunteers, which should fuel the growth of MFSO, IVAW, and like organizations and decrease military recruitment further.

Last not the least, the Iraq War cannot be separated from Washington's larger goal of maintaining its spheres of influence from Asia to Africa, Europe to Latin America to the Middle East, to make the world safe for domination of multinational corporations. To take the most obvious example, the invasion of Iraq and pressures on Syria and Iran are both motivated by the same goal of supporting the Israeli power elite, who are in turn expected to use the strongest military in the Middle East at their disposal as deterrence to Arab aspirations.²³ By the same token, Israeli refusers, now numbering 1,396,²⁴ and American refusers (among whom are Camilo Mejia, Jeremy Hinzman, Brandon Hughey, Abdul R. Henderson, and Kevin Benderman)²⁵ can grow stronger and more numerous in solidarity with each other. No troops, no wars -- in Iraq and Israel/Palestine. The struggle to end the Iraq War, one link in Washington's imperial chain of power projection, is tied up with struggles to break other links of the chain. The more we understand where the Iraq War fits in Washington's empire, the better chance we have of making allies to attack its base from many different directions.

Yoshie Furuhashi is an activist in Columbus, Ohio and author of the blog Critical Montages.

Notes

1. Iraq Coalition Casualty Count, icasualties.org/oif.
2. Les Roberts, Riyadh Lafta, Richard Garfield, Jamal Khudhairi, and Gilbert Burnham, "Mortality before and after the 2003 Invasion of Iraq: Cluster Sample Survey," The Lancet 364.9448 (November 20, 2004).
3. David Barstow and Robin Stein, "Under Bush, a New Age of Prepackaged Television News," New York Times 13 Mar. 2005.
4. Nancy A. Youssef, "More Iraqis Killed by U.S. than by Terror," Detroit Free Press 25 Sep. 2004.
5. Roberts, et al.
6. Juan Cole, "Platform of the United Iraqi Alliance," Informed Comment 31 Dec. 2004.
7. "Transcript: Bush News Conference," Washington Post 16 Mar. 2005.
8. Antonia Juhasz, "Of Oil And Elections," AlterNet 27 Jan. 2005; and Laurence Frost, "Oil Companies Hopeful on Iraqi Politics," Associated Press 14 Mar. 2005.
9. Eric Schmitt, "Iraq Security Forces Only 30% Trained," New York Times/International Herald Tribune 4 Feb. 2005.
10. Qtd. in Fred Kaplan, "Supplemental Insecurity," Slate 15 Feb. 2005.
11. Yoshie Furuhashi, "Italy: Troop Withdrawal and Electoral Fortune," Critical Montages 16 Mar. 2005.
12. Cost of War, costofwar.com.
13. Yoshie Furuhashi, "Deficits, the Dollar, and IEDs," Critical Montages 30 Jan. 2005; and Yoshie Furuhashi, "Wolfowitz at the World Bank: An Empire without a Global Economic Policy?" Critical Montages 17 Mar. 2005.
14. Yoshie Furuhashi, "Losing the Hearts and Minds," Critical Montages 4 Jan. 2005.
15. Center for Constitutional Rights, "Eight Soldiers Sue U.S. over 'Stop Loss' Policy," December 2004; and Center for Constitutional Rights, "Judge Rules on 'Stop Loss' Policy that Soldiers Cannot be Held in Active Duty Without Notification," December 2004
16. Eric Schmitt, "Guard Reports Serious Drop in Enlistment," New York Times 17 Dec. 2004.
17. Ann Scott Tyson, "Two Years Later, Iraq War Drains Military: Heavy Demands Offset Combat Experience," Washington Post 19 Mar. 2005.
18. Tom Philpott, "Military Update: Black Army Recruits Down 41 Percent since 2000," The Daily Press 6 Mar. 2005; Yoshie Furuhashi, "Black Army Recruits Down 41% since 2000," Critical Montages 8 Mar. 2005.
19. Yoshie Furuhashi, "Seattle Central Community College: A Crucible of Organic Intellectuals?" Critical Montages 22 Jan. 2005.
20. Vermont Network on Iraq War Resolutions, IraqResolution.org; and Pam Belluck, "Vermonters Vote on Study of National Guard's Role," New York Times 2 Mar. 2005.
21. Derrick O'Keefe, "Amadee Braxton" [an interview], Seven Oaks Magazine, 16 Feb. 2005 .
22. Joel Geier, "Vietnam: The Soldier's Revolt," International Socialist Review 9 (August-September 2000).
23. Yoshie Furuhashi, "Why the Anti-War Movement Must Confront Bipartisan Support for the Twin Occupations," Critical Montages 10 Mar. 2005.
24. Refuser Solidarity Network, refusersolidarity.net.
25. Monica Davey, "Un-Volunteering: Troops Improvise to Find Way Out," New York Times 18 Mar. 2005; Citizen Soldier, citizen-soldier.org; and "U.S. War Heroes of the Iraq War: War Resisters from within the Military,"Tom's Place. See, also, Kathy Dobie, "AWOL in America: When Desertion is the Only Option," Harper's Magazine 310.1858 (1 Mar. 2005).

For Army Recruiters, a Hard Toll From a Hard Sell

he Army's recruiters are being challenged with one of the hardest selling jobs the military has asked of them in American history, and many say the demands are taking a toll.

A recruiter in New York said pressure from the Army to meet his recruiting goals during a time of war has given him stomach problems and searing back pain. Suffering from bouts of depression, he said he has considered suicide. Another, in Texas, said he had volunteered many times to go to Iraq rather than face ridicule, rejection and the Army's wrath.

An Army chaplain said he had counseled nearly a dozen recruiters in the past 18 months to help them cope with marital troubles and job-related stress.

"There were a couple of recruiters that felt they were having nervous breakdowns, literally," said Maj. Stephen Nagler, a chaplain who retired in March after serving at Fort Hamilton in Brooklyn, where the New York City recruiting battalion is based.

Two dozen recruiters nationwide were interviewed about their experiences over four months. Ten spoke with The New York Times even after an Army official sent an e-mail message advising all recruiters not to speak to this reporter, who was named. Most asked for anonymity to avoid being disciplined.

A handful who spoke said they were satisfied with their jobs. They said they took pride in seeing awkward, unfocused teenagers transform into confident soldiers and relished an opportunity to contribute to the Army effort.

But most told similar tales: of loving the military, of working hard to complete a seemingly impossible task, of struggling to carry the nation's burden at a time of anxiety and stress.

The careers and self-esteem of recruiters rise and fall on their ability to fulfill a mission, said current and former Army officials and military experts who were also interviewed.

Recruiters said falling short often generates a barrage of angry correspondence, formal reprimands, threats or even demotion.

"The recruiter is stuck in the situation where you're not going to make mission, it just won't happen," the New York recruiter said. "And you're getting chewed out every day for it. It's horrible." He said the assignment was more strenuous than the time he was shot at while deployed in Africa.

At least 37 members of the Army Recruiting Command, which oversees enlistment, have gone AWOL since October 2002, Army figures show. And, in what recruiters consider another sign of stress, the number of improprieties committed - signing up unqualified people to meet quotas or giving bonuses or other enlistment benefits to recruits not eligible for them - has increased, Army documents show.

"They don't necessarily have real bullets flying at them," said Major Nagler. "But there are different kind of bullets they need to contend with - the bullets of not producing numbers, of having a station commander shoot them down."

The Army is seeking 101,200 new active-duty Army and Reserve soldiers this year alone to replenish the ranks in Iraq and Afghanistan, elsewhere around the world and at home. That means each of the Army's 7,500 recruiters faces the grind of an unyielding human math, a quota of two new recruits a month, at a time of extended war without a draft.

The mission puts them in a different kind of cross-fire: On one side, the military's requirement that new soldiers be found. On the other, resistance by many parents to Army careers for their children in wartime.

Maj. Gen. Michael D. Rochelle, commander of the Army Recruiting Command, acknowledged it is a stressful time for recruiters, who face "the toughest challenge to the all-volunteer Army" since it began in 1973.

"I do not deny being demanding," said General Rochelle, leader of the command since 2002. "We have a vitally important mission in terms of providing volunteers for an army that is at war and that is growing."

He said the Army has already added recruiters and taken measures to expand the pool of potential soldiers, by accepting older recruits and more people without high school diplomas. Other changes are being considered, he said.

But many recruiters said the Army continues to minimize how difficult it has become to find qualified volunteers during a war and in a growing economy.

For the first time in nearly five years, the Army missed its active-duty recruiting goal in February. The Reserve has missed its monthly quota since October. Army officials said the goals would most likely be missed the next two months as well.

Gen. Richard A. Cody, Army vice chief of staff, told Congress on March 16 that he is concerned about whether the Army can continue to provide the troops the nation needs.

"What keeps me awake at night," he said, "is what will this all-volunteer force look like in 2007?"

The Marines also missed monthly recruiting goals in January, for the first time in a decade. The Navy and Air Force, which provide fewer people for the war, are on track to meet their quotas.

Trying to refill the ranks solely through recruitment in wartime is rare. Historians say the Spanish-American War, Mexican-American War and Gulf war were the only major conflicts since 1775 that did not rely, in part, on conscripts.

Since 1973, the Army has usually maintained an all-volunteer force of a million active-duty, Reserve and National Guard soldiers, primarily through a marketing campaign that promoted opportunities for adventure, new skills, college money and other personal goals - enticements that, in wartime, often do not outweigh fear of combat and death, Army surveys show.

While some in Congress have raised the specter of a draft, the Bush administration has rejected that idea, saying higher skilled soldiers are needed in a high-tech age, and are best found through recruitment.

But several senior officers interviewed, including Col. Greg Parlier, retired, who until 2002 headed the research and strategy arm of the Army Recruiting Command, said the pressure on recruiters shows the policy should be re-examined, and initiatives like national service should be considered.

Courting Mom and Dad

The Army is the nation's largest military branch, comprising 80 percent of the 150,000 troops in Iraq. Its recruiters are among its best soldiers. Most are sergeants with 5 to 15 years of experience, pulled randomly from the top 10 percent of their specialty, as defined by their commanding officers. More than 70 percent did not volunteer for the job.

Some soldiers are better suited to the task than others. Staff Sgt. Jose E. Zayas, 42, is outgoing, bilingual and embraces his mission. Recently, canvassing in the Bronx, he had little trouble persuading a couple from Massachusetts to accept a few pamphlets.

But for every Sergeant Zayas, there is a recruiter like Sgt. Joshua Harris, 29, a former personnel administrator in a New Jersey recruiting station, who struggles when talking to strangers. Seven weeks of instruction in approaching prospects helped him, he said. But many recruiters said few soldiers possess the skills they need.

Recruiters are paid about $30,000 a year, plus housing and other allowances, including $450 a month in special-duty pay for recruiting. They live where they recruit, often hundreds of miles from a base.

These men, and occasionally women, spend several hours a day cold-calling high school students, whose phone numbers are provided by schools under the No Child Left Behind Law. They also must "prospect" at malls, at high schools, colleges and wherever else young people gather.

The follow-up process often takes months. Though parents do not have to sign off on the decision to join, recruiters said it is virtually impossible to enlist a new recruit without their approval. Over dinners and on the phone, they make the Army's case over and over to win parents' support.

If they succeed, they are responsible for bringing the recruit in for 5:30 a.m. processing , organizing physical fitness training or, in the case of one California recruiter, taking 3 a.m. phone calls to comfort a recruit crying over a breakup with her boyfriend.

The whims are many from the young, restless and uncertain, experts said.

Recruiters have "the only military occupation that deals with the civilian world entirely," said Charles Moskos, a military sociologist at Northwestern University.

Even before the war, recruiters contacted on average of 120 people before landing an active-duty recruit, Army data showed. That number is growing, recruiters said.

One recruiter in the New York area said that when he steps outside his office for a cigarette, he often is barraged with epithets from passers-by angry about the war.

In January, the brother-in-law of a prospective recruit lashed into him. "He swore at me," the recruiter said, "and said that he would rather have his brother-in-law in jail for selling crack than in the Army."

The recruiter said, when out of uniform, he often lies about his profession. "I tell them I work in human resources," he said.

Still, they must sign up two recruits a month. Anyone with outstanding criminal cases, health problems or poor test scores is disqualified. Most months, at least one must have a high school diploma and score in the top 50 percent of an aptitude test.

Lt. Col. William F. Adams, a psychologist at the United States Military Academy who has counseled recruiters, empathized with the pressure but said it came with the job. Of the recruiting goal, he said, "It is not a goal or a target; it is a mission. If you don't do it, you're a failure."

A December report from the commanding officers overseeing about 40 recruiters in West Houston reflects the mission-driven culture of recruitment. Sent by e-mail to station commanders, it started by declaring, "We can sum up the month of Dec with one word - Unprofessional!"

The document noted that in a month's-end drive to meet quota, seven recruits had appeared for processing. Of those, two did not meet weight requirements and needed a waiver, while two others lacked paperwork.

"We are processing crap," the report stated, "double and triple waivers, waivers which get approved and the applicant refuses to enlist (two this month), waivers on people with more than 20 charges, etc. We are putting these people in our Army!"

The cause, it said, was a lack of leadership: "I challenged you to fix your stations. No one has stepped forward."

Asked to respond to the document, the Houston recruiting battalion declined.

The report was followed on Jan. 6 by an e-mail message from Command Sgt. Maj. Frank Norris, the second in command of 212 recruiters in and around Houston, threatening to deny all requests for leave.

"There are no excuses and I am tired of entertaining such lack of discipline and focus," he said in the e-mail message forwarded to The Times by a recruiter who received it. "Let this serve notice that any station commander that is holding this great battalion back will not be a station commander in this battalion very much longer."

Neither document contained any mention of the war, nor other possible obstacles. Sergeant Major Norris declined through an Army spokesman to be interviewed. General Rochelle said most battalions do not resort to such tactics.

Brawling Over Prospects

The recruiter in New York who had considered suicide said he has seen at least four marriages break up among the 9 or 10 recruiters in his area since 2002. He said he has been subjected to threats of discharge and "zero-roller training," when superiors comb through recruiters' phone logs and other materials, then lambaste them for failing to enlist anyone.

After more than a decade in the military, he said he still loves the Army. "It's just this detail," he said. "This is hell."

A Texas recruiter - a gruff man whose home is decorated with military commendations - said that he suffers from severe headaches lasting up to six hours. "I never had them until I got out here," he said. "They're from recruiting."

He and other recruiters said they sometimes feel angry enough to hit someone. Two years ago, he said, two recruiters in his office brawled over who should get credit for a new recruit. "We call this the pressure plate, like on a land mine," he said, pointing to the recruiter patch on his uniform. "If you push it too hard, we'll explode."

His wife, like spouses in California and elsewhere, is furious at what she sees as the Army's lack of support. "What we are doing is good; recruiting is good and important work," she said. "But the fact of the matter is that it's killing our soldiers."

Many of the recruiters said they have asked for other assignments. One of them is Sgt. Latrail Hayes. Now 27, Sergeant Hayes enlisted in the Army 10 years ago, out of high school in Virginia Beach, continuing a family tradition of military service. He volunteered to be a recruiter in 2000, after 52 jumps as a paratrooper, and at first his easy charm, appeals to patriotism and offers of Army benefits enticed dozens of recruits.

But Sergeant Hayes said he started rethinking his assignment as the war went on. Mothers required months, not weeks, of persuasion. And stories he heard from some of his recruits who had gone to Iraq and Afghanistan made him reluctant to pursue prospects by emphasizing the Army's benefits. When his cousin, whom he had recruited, returned from Iraq with psychological trauma, he filed for conscientious objector status in June, to get a new assignment.

The application was rejected in November. Now, instead of serving 20 years in the Army, he intends to leave in December, when his tour ends. "There's a deep human connection when you try to persuade someone to do something you've done," he said. "So when it turns into something else - maybe even the opposite - it's difficult."

Some recruiters said they witnessed more "improprieties," which the Army defines as any grossly negligent or intentional act or omission used to enlist unqualified applicants or grant benefits to those who are ineligible. They said recruiters falsified documents and told prospects to lie about medical conditions or police records.

An analysis of Army records shows that the number of impropriety allegations doubled to 1,023 in 2004 from 490 in 2000. Initial investigations substantiated 459 violations of Army enlistment standards in 2004, up from 186 in 2000. In 135 cases, recruiters - often more than one - were judged to have committed improprieties, up from 113 in 2000. The rest were defined as errors.

General Rochelle acknowledged that the impropriety figures "may be a reflection of some of the pressure that is perceived at the lower levels." He also said that the increase could partly be explained by improvements in tracking violations.

"We hold every recruiter responsible for being a living and breathing example of Army values," he said.

The quotas will remain unchanged, General Rochelle said. But the commanders should be held responsible for finding ways to meet their goals. "It does no good to pass the heat, as it were, or the correction down to the individual soldier," he said.

The Army announced in September that it would add about 1,200 active-duty and Reserve recruiters to the field. It has also more than doubled bonuses for three-year enlistments to $15,000 and increased its advertising budget.

For the first time since 1998, the Army has lowered its standards, last week increasing its age limit for Reserve and National Guard recruits to 39. Last year, it agreed to accept thousands more recruits without high school diplomas.

In a small concession to recruiters, Army brass announced in February that they can trade the green slacks and shirts that they said made them feel and look like security guards for battle fatigues.

General Rochelle said the uniform swap was part of a new recruiting strategy to stress patriotism over salesmanship and enlist veterans to help make the Army's pitch. "It's less materialistic, in terms of the focus, once we get a recruiter face to face with a young American," he said.

The recruiter in Texas, for one, said the changes are too little too late. He said he would prefer to be in Iraq.

"I'd rather be getting shot at, because at least I'd be with my guys," he said. "I'm infantry. That's what I'm trained to do."

Margot Williams contributed reporting for this article.

From Hero To Homeless

For 25-year-old Herold Noel, this winter, like the war, has not been kind.

When "Iraqi Freedom" began, Private First Class Herold Noel was a soldier in the U.S. Army's 3rd Infantry Division, pounding a path into Baghdad.

"I fought for this country," he said. "I shed blood for this country. I watched friends die."

And like so many, Herold Noel came home a hero, but he wound up homeless.

He started living out of the back of his jeep when most of his clothes and all of his military medals were stolen at a homeless shelter

"If ever I need to go on an interview, I got my tie, my shirt, so I keep it as clean as I can.

"For a job interview?" Pitts asked.

"Yeah."

When the war in Vietnam washed up the first wave of veterans in need of shelter -- the Department of Veteran Affairs had no homeless programs at all. While today, they offer services in every state. Still, as many as 275,000 veterans will likely sleep out in the cold tonight.

"Why weren't all the lessons of Vietnam learned this time? So there wouldn't be any homeless veterans?" Pitts wanted to know.

"Most of the veterans that we're seeing have a mental health and a substance abuse problem," said Peter Dougherty of the Department of Veterans Affairs. "Those problems are the underlying factors."

Herold was diagnosed with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Unemployed, married with three kids, he couldn't get a job.

"The physical war is over. The mental war has just begun," he said.

Pitts asked, "The system is better than it was during Vietnam?"

"The system is a whole lot better than it was before," Dougherty said.

"But there's a 'but' there, sounds like," Pitts noted.

"Well, the 'but' is we have to find them."

Filmmaker Dan Lohaus found them on the street and in shelters across the country. Herold Noel was one of them.

Lohaus and Pitts watched a film clip.

"This is a soldier at his breaking point?" asked Pitts.

"This is a solder at rock bottom," the filmmaker said.

"I put applications in. I did all that. They lost my application three f^&@# times!" Noel said.

This time a city housing agency has given him the runaround yet again.

"What are you telling me man? I have three kids out there man! I fought for my country man. My country shouldn't be doing this to me."

"It's terrible to know that he's not the only one crying in his car," Lohaus said.

"This may sound like an insensitive question, but why should anyone care? About Herold? About the others?" Pitts wanted to know.

"These are the folks who are protecting us and we are treating them this way, who is going to sign up? Who is going to do it next time?"

Still, Herold Noel is one of the luckier ones. Just recently an anonymous donor heard Herold's story and is paying his rent for a year. Tonight, one Iraq War veteran is off the street. But somewhere soon, another could well take his place.

HOMELESS VETERANS For More Information: • National Coalition for Homeless Veterans • Black Veterans for Social Justice • Documentary: When I Came Home

©MMV, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.

SAME SHIT, DIFFERENT HEMISPHERE

Malcom Lagauche
Sunday/Monday, March 27-28, 2005

How can a leader of a country who instituted a program that has taught almost two million former illiterates to read and write within a year be called a tyrant? How can a leader of a country who incorporated land reform that has been a huge success be called evil? How can a leader of a country who has been instrumental in eradicating diseases that once ravaged the nation be called troublesome? By having the name of Hugo Chavez; that’s how.

In past few years, Hugo Chavez has worked wonders with the nation of Venezuela. He has endured assassination attempts; a failed coup; and an illegitimate recall vote; all sponsored by either the U.S. administration or its stooge allies within Venezuela. Today, even former opponents of Chavez begrudgingly admit he has done a wonderful job at the helm of their country. All the horror stories of the rich being raped of their money have proven untrue. The country is now prospering and for the first time, a member of the indigenous population that encompasses 80% of the country is in power. And, his efforts have benefited, for the first time, the majority of the 80%.

This success is becoming too much for the U.S. Chavez has run afoul of all that the U.S. looks for in an allied leader. He is friends with and has collaborated with President Fidel Castro of Cuba. In the past couple of years, his influence has been profound in other Latin American countries. His message is that the should be independent of the yoke of Washington. And, this thought process is being welcomed all over the southern portion of the Western Hemisphere.

While most of the eyes of the world are on the Middle East, Washington is already drawing plans to combat Chavez. Recently, the magazine National Review published a commentary by Otto Reich, Bush’s top Latin American aide during his first term. According to Reich:

With the combination of Castro’s evil genius, experience in political warfare, and economic desperation, and Chavez’ unlimited money and recklessness, the peace of this region is in peril.

The emerging axis of subversion forming between Cuba and Venezuela must be confronted before it can undermine democracy in Colombia, Nicaragua, Bolivia, or other vulnerable neighbors.

The new plan of the administration is similar to the "dual-containment" program the U.S. used in the 1990s against Iraq and Iran. First, the U.S. will try to isolate Venezuela’s new allies and have them turn against Chavez. This will be done economically and with military threats.

Once Chavez is neutralized, the U.S. then will go after its almost five-decade thorn-in-the-side, Fidel Castro. Divide and conquer has worked in the past and the U.S. has no plans to change the strategy.

While the former peace protestors have now gone home and put their signs away, no movement is visible that will mention a future conflict against Venezuela and/or Cuba. A few days before the bombs fall, they will again take to the streets and give the U.S. administration a chance to say, "See. We have a democracy where anyone can be heard." They can be heard, but their message is never taken into account. And, the warmongers work 24 hours a day to hone their plans; not just a few days before imminent action. The protesters should be on the streets now. Once they finally do hit the pavement, the plans will already have been made and set in concrete.

I find it sad that many people in the Arab world, as well as many non-Arabs who are aware of the plight of Iraq, know little or nothing about the politics of Latin America in general, or those of Hugo Chavez in particular. Techniques the U.S. used in Latin America to prop up violent regimes and deny the people any form of humanity were the same being used today in Iraq: torture, deceit, stooge government appointees, etc. Now, the U.S. will thrust on Latin America the same techniques used against Iraq: techniques taken from the U.S. 1970s and 1980s Latin America playbook.

Who is this guy Chavez? Maybe a lot of people who follow the Middle East do not realize that he upset the U.S. administration of Clinton in 2000 by visiting Saddam Hussein. Wow, the Clintonites bristled.

On August 9, 2000, Chavez and Saddam held talks in Baghdad. The primary subject was the price of oil. Chvez’ predecessors could always be counted on by Washington to lower prices below the OPEC rate when ordered to do so. In their meeting, Chavez told his Iraqi counterpart that those days were gone.

In addition to oil prices, Chavez gave the Iraqi president his support in attempting to end the embargo against Iraq. The Venezuelan Deputy Foreign Minister, Jorge Valero, told CBS News, "President Chavez affirmed the Venezuelan position supporting any accord against any kind of boycott or sanctions that are applied against Iraq or any other country in the world."

This meeting did not go unnoticed by U.S. pundits. Patrick Clawson, research director of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy stated, "There is no agenda between Venezuela and Iraq, except their OPEC ties."

There may have been no official agenda, but look at Chavez’ accomplishments and they mirror those of the Ba’athists of Iraq: land given to people to produce crops, similar to the program in Iraq from which two million Egyptians benefited; upgrading the health care system; programs to include women in the public and private sectors; making literacy programs available to anyone in the country; etc. The progressions of the Ba’ath revolution and the "Bolivarian" revolution of Chavez ran on parallel tracks.

After leaving Iraq, Chavez called Saddam Hussein his "brother." Those in the Arab world who support justice and oppose the imperialistic actions of the U.S. that have destroyed Iraq must now become aware of the future plight of President Hugo Chavez. He is on the same track as the one Saddam Hussein pursued years ago. This time, with enough awareness and vocal opposition, Chavez may not derail before he reaches his destination.

During his stay in Baghdad, Chavez was impressed with Saddam’s hospitality. He was openly thankful that the Iraqi president drove him around Baghdad in his own car. No chauffeur, just the two presidents. Imagine Allawi driving anyone by himself on the open streets of Baghdad outside the "green zone." I would not want to be his life insurance agent.