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Our Gratitude for Dan Ellsberg’s Life of Conscience
Dan Ellsberg was one of the first who broke through the post-World War II cocoon of “national security” and revealed the rot within the U.S. Armed Forces that caused the ravages to Vietnam and Southeast Asia. In the early 1960s, President John F. Kennedy pointed the way forward into the future. “A torch has passed to a new generation..” he said. At the time, it seemed like a ringing defense of freedom against the gulags and 60 million dead in Stalin’s Soviet Union very much in line with President Eisenhower’s claim that “we invade no one and dominate no one but defend freedom around the world.” After the brutal world war to defeat fascism in Germany, Japan and Italy, it was stirring and inspiring.
But over 50 years, this spirit metastasized into this neoliberal Amerikan Empire that has spread chaos and death in a dozen “peripheral” countries: Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Guatemala, El Salvador, Iraq, Afganistan, Yemen.
Mr. Ellsberg was one of the very first who broke entirely with not just the national security system but with the national security mindset, a core set of values and principles that held the U.S. military together. Edward Snowden and others would never had stepped forward if the way wasn’t opened by Mr. Ellsberg.
Our eternal gratitude goes to Dan Ellsberg and his family for all they did and all they endured. Peace be with them all.