Rallies mark anniversary of Iraq conflict

By Tan Vinh and Nancy Bartley
Seattle Times staff reporters

	GREG GILBERT / THE SEATTLE TIMES An anti-war crowd estimated at 4,000 to 5,000 marches down Madison Street toward the Seattle waterfront yesterday afternoon.
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Monk and DeLurme are mothers of soldiers stationed in Iraq. While both pray for the safe return of their sons, they spent the day participating in different rallies marking the anniversary of the start of the war, one opposed to U.S. policy in Iraq and one in support of those carrying it out.

Monk, of Sammamish, was among an estimated 4,000 to 5,000 who marched in downtown Seattle in a protest organized by the Church Council of Greater Seattle and Sound Nonviolent Opponents of War. The group gathered at Harvard Avenue and Seneca Street and marched to Pier 62/63 to hear actor Ed Asner and other activists criticize President Bush and his foreign policy for nearly an hour.

"We patriots are here to do what is right instead of what is profitable," Asner told a cheering crowd. "Let us have peace. ... Peace is grander than war."

Also speaking was retired Navy Lt. John Oliveira of Darrington, who last May looked into the cameras of several television networks and defended the war, even though he now says he didn't believe in it.

	JOHN LOK / THE SEATTLE TIMES "Operation Support Our Troops" lines the overpass at Interstate 5 near Madigan Army Medical Center in Pierce County yesterday, one day after the one-year anniversary of the start of the U.S. war in Iraq. About 100 people attended the rally.

Oliveira was a Navy spokesman last year on the USS Theodore Roosevelt, an aircraft carrier that launched jets from the Mediterranean Sea to attack western and northern Iraq.

"I had to tell the American people this information that I felt was not true. My conscience was bothering me," Oliveira said.

"I am proud of my military service," but pitching the war to the media and the communities, he said, was "taking a toll."

After a 21-year naval career, Oliveira, 38, resigned in January, he said, to clear his conscience.

In the crowd, Vicky Monk, echoing the fears of countless military parents, said when she drives home each evening, she fears that an Army car will be waiting in her driveway, and a remorseful soldier will step out and tell her that her only son is dead.

It's been almost a year since 20-year-old Spc. Tim Monk of the First Armored Division left for Iraq, and his mother said her anger toward the war hasn't subsided. Neither have the tension-filled reminders that tragedy could unravel her family at any moment.

It's those emotions that drove her to join the Seattle protest.

The event was largely peaceful, according to police, who reported two arrests, one for suspicion of assault (shoving a police officer) and another for obstructing traffic.

Meanwhile, a much smaller but no less spirited group gathered in support of the troops at the Interstate 5 overpass at Exit 122 (Madigan Hospital/Camp Murray) in Pierce County.

	JOHN LOK / THE SEATTLE TIMES Showing support for U.S. troops in Iraq, a man directs his enthusiasm toward the cars on Interstate 5 below an overpass near Madigan Army Medical Center yesterday.

In a demonstration billed as "Operation Support Our Troops," about 100 people carried signs and held photographs of loved ones serving overseas with the military.

Among them was Joyce DeLurme of Snoqualmie, whose son, Army Sgt. Ron DeLurme, 21, is stationed in Iraq.

DeLurme wasn't in favor of her son joining the military. "He was only 17 ... I'm not one of these good patriotic moms who wanted him to go."

Now that he is in Iraq, "I'm proud of him and support what he's doing," she said.

At the rally, someone played "God Bless America" on a trumpet. A few women wore Statue of Liberty crowns. One man dressed as Uncle Sam. And everyone carried flags that billowed in the breeze.

Beneath the overpass, many drivers honked and waved. A truck blasted its horn. A cavalcade of motorcycle riders thundered past, waving. Those in the rally above cheered.

"See how many people wave to us and honk?" said Liz Jackson, an Air Force veteran and one of the rally's organizers. "This is the best poll to tell what America is thinking."

Tan Vinh: 206-515-5656 or tvinh@seattletimes.com

Nancy Bartley: 206-464-8522 or nbartley@seattletimes.com

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