Move America Forward's Takes Action Against 'Counter-Recruitment'
by Catherine Moy (more by this author)
Posted 03/14/2008 ET



A well-organized campaign of anti-war, anarchist groups and homegrown terrorist groups has caused an escalation of violent attacks on military recruiting centers across the nation, according to an in-depth report by Move America Forward, the nation’s largest pro-troop nonprofit organization.

Attackers since Sept. 11, 2001, have used bombs, human blood, feces, chains, guns and other weapons to destroy government property, block individuals trying to enter recruiting centers, close down recruiters, and terrorize the general public, according to the Move America Forward report being released today.

“This report took a lot of work, but it was necessary to show to the public that the attacks are well-planned, well-orchestrated and they are a threat to our society,” said Melanie Morgan, chairman of Move America Forward. “The conspiracy has reached all the way to Berkeley City Hall where the City Council encourages radicals to impede recruiters and even pays their way to harass U.S. Marines.”

Move America Forward (MAF) will release the report and a related TV commercial at a press conference this morning at the Press Club in Washington D.C. The commercial focuses on the growing problem of attacks on recruiters.

The report highlights more than 40 recruiting sites across the nation that protesters have attacked. Some of the sites have had more than one incident, such as Berkeley, Calif., where the left-wing group World Can’t Wait has assaulted and battered people entering a Marine recruiting center and employed juveniles in masks to beat elderly people with skate boards and picket signs, set fires and hit police officers.

Among the 40-plus cities and incidents in the report are:

• Bremerton, Wash.; Jule 29, 2007: A 19-year-old Bremerton man slashed 42 government tires at a recruting center to protest the Iraq. He was charged with a Class B felony in Kitsap County Superior Court.

• Pittsburg, Pennsylvania; Oct. 6, 2006: Jeb Bush, brother of President George W. Bush and governor of Florida at the time, was harassed near a demonstration at a military recruitment station and forced to flee. Police tasered two people. After the march left, the front door of the station was smashed.

• Lufkin, Texas: July 3, 2007: After a spate of attacks at a recruiting center which included vandalizing recruiters cars and breaking windows, somebody shot up recruiters’ cars in an escalation of the attacks.

• Santa Cruz, Calif.: April 2006: Military recruiters were forced off the U.C. Santa Cruz college campus when a mob of attackers surrounded them.

Specifics on attacks in the report also include more on the Times Square bombing last week, a firebomb at a Texas recruitment office, a “Molotov cocktail” bomb at a Buffalo, N.Y.; recruitment office; and gunfire at a Denver, Colo., recruiters’ office.

“Counter-recruitment” is so popular with anti-war activists that entire Web sites have been set up to describe the activity that often turns violent and destructive.

Anarchist groups and anti-war organizations such as the radical Code Pink encourage others to attack and vandalize recruiting centers in action they call “counter-recruitment.” After completing their violent acts, the groups often post about them on web sites.

Very few people are caught and prosecuted for the offenses, the report shows.

“We cannot sit by as this violence continues,” Morgan said. “Law enforcement has an obligation to our society to stop these actions by capturing the suspects and prosecuting them. Lawmakers must ensure laws are in place to properly punish these deviants of society.”

Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.), who has introduced legislation to strip the city of Berkeley, Calif., of its federal earmarks for designer lunches and other pork because the City Council encourages forceful protests of the city’s sole recruiting center -- will speak at MAF’s press conference at 9:30 a.m. at the Press Club in Washington D.C.

DeMint has been an outspoken critic of “counter-recruitment” and especially the ongoing incidents in Berkeley, where the City Council gave free parking and sound permits to Code Pink and enacted a resolution labeling the Marine recruiters there unwelcome intruders.

The anti-war groups continue their siege on recruiters’ centers across the country. The fifth anniversary of the beginning of the Iraq War, March 19, 2008, will mark more attacks, according to Web sites of radical groups. The Pittsburgh Organizing Group (POG) plans to hold a “torch-lit march to a modern day castle of abominations -- our local military recruiting office,” according to its website.

The POG will try to shut down the office and evict “everything inside of it.” The group will bring a “movable cage” to capture recruiters and hold them.

“This violence will not stop until good Americans, lawmakers and law enforcement work together to arrest and prosecute the perpetrators of these attacks,” Morgan said.

MAF is calling on U.S. Attorneys to investigate all of the incidents and prosecute the criminals participating in the violence.

Ellie