Advertisement

Feature: U.S. blacks conflicted about war

By AL SWANSON, United Press International

CHICAGO, April 7 (UPI) -- Commanding and poised in his desert fatigue uniform at the daily war briefings in Doha, Qatar, U.S. Army Brig. Gen. Vincent Brooks projects a strong, positive black male image to the nation and the world.

Brooks, the Centcom deputy director of operations; Secretary of State Colin Powell, a former Gulf War general; and national security adviser Condoleezza Rice are the most visible blacks in the U.S. war effort against Iraq and African-Americans are both proud and ambivalent about their roles.

Advertisement

Dr. Alvin F. Poussaint, Harvard University Medical School professor of psychiatry, said blacks have mixed feelings when they see Brooks, Powell or Rice on television.

"On one level they're glad and proud that they're in these positions," he told United Press International. "On the other level they're Republicans, and black people in the last election ... 90 percent of the black people voted for Al Gore against Bush. So they see these people in some way as representing the Bush administration, which they have some distrust of. They have a psychological conflict with some of these images. I think they would rather see these people in these prominent positions -- but not waging war against the Iraqi people."

Advertisement

For the majority of African-Americans -- some 68 percent oppose the war according to the latest Gallup Poll -- the image of the clean-cut young black general and elder secretary of state produces as much internal conflict as the U.S. invasion to oust Saddam Hussein, and the likely costly occupation that will follow battlefield success.

American blacks remain highly patriotic, even if they don't like this war. After all, the U.S. military was officially integrated by President Harry S. Truman's executive order 54 years ago and remains one of American society's best examples of a working meritocracy.

African-Americans fought valiantly in every American war from the Revolutionary War to Iraq. Some slaves were promised freedom if they fought for the British, but more fought with the colonists, and more than 180,000 black troops helped turn the tide for Lincoln and the union during the Civil War.

Nearly 40,000 died and there were fewer than 80 black commissioned officers.

There are a lot more black generals and admirals in the military today than there are serving as top Fortune 500 company executives in corporate America.

"Whenever the playing field is even, and the rules are public and the goals are clear (blacks excel)," said Rev. Jesse L. Jackson Sr.

Advertisement

The Iraq war has produced deep divisions in some households.

Mary Mitchell, a Chicago Sun-Times columnist, agonized for months over whether to support the war, which she ultimately did in print. She made up her mind after Powell briefed the U.N. Security Council on Iraq's possible weapons of mass destruction.

"In the end, it boiled down to whether or not I had confidence in the people who are in leadership in Washington ... and I did have that kind of confidence," she told WBBM-TV's "Eye on Chicago."

Mitchell said she can't talk about the war anymore with her significant other, who does not support it.

"We can't talk about it anymore. We can't talk about it. We can't watch it on television. We can't listen to it on the radio," she said. "We have to put the war on the side."

Minorities were more likely to freely express their opinion before March 19 but with U.S. troops in harm's way they shut up when the fighting began. Many blacks and Hispanics have fathers, mothers, uncles, aunts, brothers and sisters who joined the military for educational opportunities -- not to fight a war -- and America has a sordid history of not honoring the contributions of minority soldiers when they return home from battlefield.

Advertisement

Despite the overwhelming opposition to the war in polls, African-Americans for the most part have been missing in action in significant numbers at anti-war demonstrations, marches and rallies.

"I think it is because the peace movement lacks visible black leadership," said Harvard's Poussaint. "Black people may see this more as some kind of liberal white thing, and it's not a civil rights thing and doesn't affect us in the same way."

Black theologians, professionals and organizers met at the Ramada Inn in Hyde Park Sunday evening to plan anti-war actions like "teach-ins" about U.S. foreign policy at forums in the black community.

"That's why we put the black mobilization committee together," said civil rights attorney Lewis Myers. "One of the main reasons historically is that the leadership of anti-war movement is white, basically liberal. They haven't done a good outreach to the black community. You see the (black) leadership (at rallies) but there's been no serious grass roots organizing to get people out."

Latest Headlines