The Spark

the Voice of
The Communist League of Revolutionary Workers–Internationalist

“The emancipation of the working class will only be achieved by the working class itself.”
— Karl Marx

The Army Has a Problem:
Resistance

Aug 17, 2009

On August 14th, Sergeant Travis Bishop was convicted in a court martial and given one year in prison for disobeying a direct order to go to Afghanistan. Bishop was the second soldier from Fort Hood in two weeks to be court martialed. Specialist Victor Agosto had just been sentenced to a month in jail for refusing to deploy. Both soldiers had served a lengthy tour in Iraq.

Today the U.S. military, by its own reports, has a problem. Between 2000 and 2006, more than 40,000 troops from all branches of the military deserted, more than half from the Army. And desertion rates jumped by 42% from 2006 to 2007.

In other words, the “volunteer” army is not a willing army. GI resistance is not just “something archaic from Viet Nam”–as Bishop said he had once believed, but came to know different.