[March 19, 2011] Vietnam vet visits Frederick to speak on ending all wars Tweet Mar 19, 2011 (The Frederick News-Post - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) -- Prior to coming to Frederick on Tuesday evening, Elliott Adams will join fellow veterans in front of the White House on March 27 to advocate for the United States' withdrawal in Iraq and Afghanistan. On Sunday he will travel to Quantico Marine Corps Base to protest the mistreatment of Bradley Manning, who is suspected of providing Wikileaks with classified military documents. Adams said these demonstrations sometimes end with him being arrested, but that's not his goal, nor does it bother him. "There was a time in my life when I was willing to risk my life for the principles I believed in. Since then I have found out I was risking my life, but it was not for those principles," he said. "To risk merely being arrested, jailed and fined for those principles seems like a small price to pay." Adams is the president of the board of directors of Veterans For Peace, a nonprofit organization that advocates for the end of war as a tool of national policy. "We're vets who have served in uniform for this country and have come to believe that we have a more important role in serving world peace," he said. "Quite simply, war doesn't work." VFP has about 7,000 members including associate members who didn't serve in the military, Adams said. Members have served in wars all the way back to World War II. Adams has served as VFP's board president since January, but served two one year terms prior to that as well. He will speak to the Religious Society of Friends in Frederick at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday and plans to discuss how to abolish war. The first step is to get around the myths of how war works, Adams said. "There is no such thing as bayonet point democracy," he said. Adams points to the Iraq War as an example of how war doesn't work. Besides the absence of any weapons of mass destruction, he said the goals of creating a nonsectarian government and increasing the roles of women have both fallen flat. "All the things we've tried to accomplish, we've accomplished the exact opposite," he said. He cites involvement with Panama, Grenada, Afghanistan and Pakistan as other examples. "None of them are about making us more secure," he said. "We're just making more enemies, we deplete our national resources, and we destroy our children." Daniel Frasier spearheaded the organizing of the event through Creating a Culture of Peace, a nonprofit organization that emphasizes active nonviolence. Frasier, along with Adams, is a member of the organization's board of directors. "I think he will bring a perspective that at least people would be open to hear," Frasier said. "It's not just somebody that represents the peace community, although he does that now, he's been on the other side." In the late 1960s, Adams volunteered to enter the military and became a paratrooper in Vietnam. He also served in Japan, Korea and Alaska. He enlisted because he thought war was a way of making the nation safer and defending the constitution. Under fire, his opinion changed. "When you're in there destroying villages, destroying lives, destroying people, it can only create animosity, anger and frustration, which cannot give birth to peace," he said. Adams left the military after serving his three-year term. He became involved with VFP soon after it was founded in 1985, but admitted he was a "closet vet" and wasn't as active in the organization as he is now. Adams said he couldn't deal with what came from being a veteran. That changed when the U.S. invaded Iraq in 2003. Adams described that transition as an old saying that goes "new wars scratch open the old wounds of old vets." "Like so many veterans, when we invaded Iraq the first time, it just tore open the old memories and forced me to come out as a veteran for peace," he said. To see more of the Frederick News-Post or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.fredericknewspost.com. Copyright (c) 2011, The Frederick News-Post, Md. Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services. For more information about the content services offered by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services (MCT), visit www.mctinfoservices.com. [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ]