in good company

[pynchonoid]

Millions worldwide rally for peace 
Huge turnout at 600 marches from Berlin to Baghdad 

Angelique Chrisafis, David Fickling, Jon Henley, John
Hooper, Giles Tremlett, Sophie Arie and Chris McGreal
Monday February 17, 2003
The Guardian 

Huge waves of demonstrations not seen since the
Vietnam war jammed more than 600 towns and cities
around the world over the weekend as protesters from
Tasmania to Iceland marched against war in Iraq. Up to
30 million people demonstrated worldwide, including
around 6 million in Europe, according to figures from
organisers and police, although most conceded there
were too many people in too many places to count. 

Action began on Friday when 150,000 protesters filed
into Melbourne, with thousands more gathering across
the rest of Australia and in New Zealand. Protests
were still swelling yesterday in Sydney, San Francisco
and in Oman - where 200 women filled the streets in
the sultanate's first all-female demonstration.
Smaller demonstrations choked streets from Cape Town,
Dhaka and Havana to Bangkok. 

Tens of thousands filled the streets of Iraq. In
Baghdad, students, housewives and volunteer militia,
many waving Kalashnikovs and giant pictures of Saddam
Hussein, were presided over by leaders of the ruling
Ba'ath party and watched over by heavily armed police.


US

Last night's protest in San Francisco was the last in
a weekend of American mass demonstrations. 

In New York on Saturday organisers counted 400,000
demonstrators who, forbidden by a court order from
marching, rallied within sight of the United Nations
amid heavy security. They were joined by the South
African archbishop Desmond Tutu, and actors Susan
Sarandon and Danny Glover. In Chicago 3,000 gathered
and in Philadelphia 5,000 more carried anti-Bush
banners. Other marchers massed in more than 100 towns
and cities, including Seattle, Miami and Los Angeles. 

Australia

Yesterday's anti-war protest in Sydney was the biggest
demonstration in Australia's history, surpassing even
the record set by Friday's demonstration in Melbourne.
Around 250,000 marchers were addressed by American
singer Jackson Browne, journalist John Pilger and
Green party senator Bob Brown. 

There was a typically Australian strand of irreverence
about parts of the protest, with organisers giving out
prime minister John Howard's office phone number. 

The prime minister was unimpressed by the protests. "I
don't know that you can measure public opinion just by
the number of people that turn up at demonstrations,"
he said. 

Spain

Two marches in Spain - in Madrid and Barcelona - each
brought out around a million people on Saturday
evening, with dozens more gatherings countrywide,
taking the total number of protesters towards the 3
million mark. 

It was the biggest outpouring of popular political
sentiment - with the possible exception of some
anti-Eta marches - since Spaniards took to the streets
to protect their fragile young democracy after a coup
attempt in 1981. 

The protest was not directed so much at George Bush as
at his faithful ally, the conservative Spanish prime
minister, Jose Maria Aznar. "The Pope says no to war,
the People's party says yes", "Aznar, Bush's doormat"
and "USA global coup" were among the slogans on
display. 

"We don't understand the concept of a preventive war.
The only preventive war is called peace," film-maker
Pedro Almodovar told the Madrid march. 

France

Between 300,000 and 500,000 anti-war protesters
marched through some 60 towns across France on
Saturday, many carrying banners declaring "Proud to be
French" and waving US flags scrawled with the words:
"Leave us in peace". 

Police said 200,000 people attended a Paris march, the
largest such gathering since the anti-National Front
protests of last spring. Some 15,000 gathered in Lyon,
7,000 in Toulouse, and 5,000 in Strasbourg, Rennes and
Marseille. 

President Jacques Chirac said yesterday that "no
option was excluded" if the UN weapons inspectors
failed or were unable to complete their task, but a
new survey found that 81% of the French wanted him to
use the country's UN security council veto against any
US-led military attack on Iraq. 

Among those marching in the capital to support Mr
Chirac's stance were some of his most bitter political
opponents, including the Communist leader Marie-George
Buffet and the anti-globalisation activist José Bové. 

Germany

Berlin's peace march turned out to be five times
bigger than expected by police and organisers - and
twice as large as the biggest previous demonstration
in post-war Germany. 

By the time Saturday's protest reached its peak, an
estimated 500,000 people were packed into the
Tiergarten, Berlin's central park. Three members of
Chancellor Gerhard Schröder's centre-left cabinet
defied his express wishes and joined the march. 

Italy

Rome's ancient monuments were draped with peace flags
on Saturday and the city swarmed with anti-war
campaigners, producing what organisers said was the
biggest turnout in Italy's long history of mass
popular protest. 

The music of Bruce Springsteen blasted over a crowd of
leftwing opposition politicians, film stars, Catholic
church representatives, human rights groups and Iraqi
exiles. March campaigners claimed three million
pacifists "invaded" Rome. Police said the true figure
was around 650,000, though it was "difficult to
count". 

The centre-right prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi,
who has pledged Italy's support for a US-led war, made
no official comment on the march. His deputy and
leader of the far-right National Alliance, Gianfranco
Fini, said the protests had brought the world no
closer to peace because "ideological anti-Americanism"
and "totalitarian pacifism" would not convince Saddam
Hussein to disarm. 

State television, RAI, did not broadcast the protest
live, saying it would put "undue pressure on
politicians". 

Saddam Hussein's deputy prime minister Tariq Aziz, on
a controversial trip to rally support for Iraq, was in
Assisi to see the tomb of St Francis, the patron saint
of peace. "May God the almighty grant peace to the
people of Iraq and of the whole world," Mr Aziz, a
Chaldean Catholic, wrote in the visitor's book. 

Israel

The small turnout for Saturday's peace march through
Tel Aviv confirmed that nowhere is there more support
for an American attack on Iraq than in Israel. 

About 1,500 people rallied at the Tel Aviv museum of
art. Some were Arabs whose chants were anything but
peaceful, with calls for retaliation against America
and denunciations of George Bush and Ariel Sharon as
terrorists more dangerous than Saddam Hussein. 

Other protesters included Jews who focused their anger
on the policies of their own government. 

<http://www.guardian.co.uk/antiwar/story/0,12809,897098,00.html>


...enjoy!

-Doug, enjoying the thought that these protests plus
UN action have probably spared the lives of the
thousands of innocent Iraqis who will be killed if
Bush the Butcher follows through on his threats and
escalates his ongoing war on Iraq with a full-scale
invasion, and preferring to read Pynchon and the
newspaper than to read Pynchon criticism regurgitated
as Mr T's gibberish ... 


"the chaplain, the doctor, your mother hoping to hang
that Gold Star, the vapid soprano last night on the
Home Service programme, let's not forget Mr. Noel
Coward so stylish and cute about death and the
afterlife, packin them into the Duchess for the fourth
year running, the lads in Hollywood telling us how
grand it all is over here how much fun. Walt Disney
causing Dumbo the elephant to clutch to that feather
like how many carcasses under the snow tonight among
the waite-painted tanks, how many hands each frozen
around a Miraculous Medal, lucky pieceof worn bone,
half-dollar with the grinning sun peering up under
Liberty's wispy gown, clutching, dumb, when the 88
fell--what do you think, it's a children's story? 
There aren't any. The children are away dreaming, but
the Empire has no place for dreams and it's Adults
Only in here tonight"
Gravity's Rainbow, pp. 134-135


"There's something still on, don't call it a 'war' if
it makes you nervous, maybe the death rate's gone down
a point or two [...] but Their enterprise goes on" 
GR 628

"Don't forget the real business of the War is buying
and selling." 
GR 105 






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