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DEPT. OF MORAL QUALMS
The Iraq war’s first conscientious objector
BY DEIRDRE FULTON

Iraq-war veteran Camilo Mejia, 29, signed up for military service 10 years ago, hoping the army would offer new experiences and help him pay for college. Instead, after three years as an infantryman, five years in the National Guard, and five months in Iraq, Mejia got eight months and three weeks in an Oklahoma military prison.

Mejia is the first Iraq vet to publicly refuse to continue military service; he did so in October 2003, citing moral and spiritual opposition to war. He spent several months "underground" before surrendering in March 2004 to military police at the Peace Abbey, in Sherborn. When Mejia applied for conscientious-objector status, his request was denied and he was found guilty of desertion in May 2004. Mejia and his Brookline lawyer are appealing the decision.

Mejia was released from military prison last month, and on Tuesday, the Peace Abbey presented him with the Courage of Conscience Award, which honors people and organizations that embrace the principles of peace, justice, and nonviolence. The Phoenix caught up with Mejia the day before he received the award.

Q: What were some of the main points of your 55-page conscientious-objector claim?

A: It explains everything about why I’m a conscientious objector, from even before we went to war. It talks about me being a vegetarian, it talks about my feelings about the military.

They pretty much just cheat soldiers, and cheat people into thinking they have certain benefits, or that they’re well taken care of, when in reality it’s really a mask that serves the purpose of war. For instance, pre-deployment training is supposed to get soldiers ready to go to war, and yet when you go through the training, you realize that it’s nothing but a box that needs to be checked. You know, because units have to be certified. For instance, if you’re supposed to qualify with your weapon, they’ll take you to the range, and you’ll shoot your weapon or whatever, but after a while, if you’re not qualified, they’re not going to keep working with you. They’re just going to pass you. It’s the same thing with first-aid training, it’s the same thing with nuclear-biological training. There’s not a sense that they’re really concerned with your well-being.

And there’s no type of training dealing with human relations. You know, you’re going to supposedly free a people from a dictator, and there is not a sense that you’re there trying to bond with the people, trying to earn their hearts and minds.

Q: When you first decided, in 2003, not to return to your unit and your fellow solders, were you scared?

A: I was terrified.... I didn’t know if they were going to push for the death penalty, I didn’t know if they were going to push for 25 years incarceration, I didn’t know if they were going to send a bunch of military policemen or FBI guys looking for me everywhere. I was terrified.

And it was very painful not to return to those guys. Because when you’re at war, you bond with people in a way that you cannot bond with people anywhere else.

Q: Would you encourage other soldiers to follow the path you’ve blazed?

A: Everyone has a different calling, whether you want to call it faith, or you want to call it conscience, or you want to call it something else. Not everybody is going to disagree with every war, not everyone is going to be a conscientious objector, not everybody is going to disagree with this war. But people can make a difference in their own way. For instance, if you agree with the war, if you’re not a conscientious objector, you’re in Iraq, and you have moral disagreements with the way your unit is treating Iraqis, then perhaps you can make a difference at that level, and treat people with dignity and respect. That’s a great thing, and I encourage that.

Q: What does the word "conscience" mean to you?

A: I always tell about this incident we had.... Basically, there was this demonstration, and the demonstration turned violent, and they started throwing grenades at us, and we were given the order to fire at anyone who threw a grenade — this is considered a very hostile act, and this is considered justification for shooting. You could tell when they were going to throw a grenade because the whole crowd would hush and they would move to one corner. So, you see this guy emerge from the crowd, he appears in one corner, and he has something in his hand. He’s swinging his arms, and he lets go, and it looks like a grenade, so we opened fired on him. And we killed him.

I wonder if I killed him, if I missed him, if I hit in him in the shoulder or the knee. And it’s really hard for me to deal with the fact that I might have shot him in the chest or in the head, or that my bullet might have killed him. And I ask myself why — he threw a grenade at us, and it was a 100 percent justified killing, legally.

He was 100 meters away, maybe, and in every other aspect you’re justified. But there’s something inside of you that tells you this is wrong. The fact that he’s too far, the fact that he has no chance of actually hurting anyone, the fact that if you look at the bigger reasons justifying the war you see that you’re not justified in being there in the first place. It’s that that moves beyond a military order, beyond international law. Something inside of you that tells you, "This is wrong" — that is conscience.


Issue Date: March 18 - 24, 2005
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