On Feb. 5, more than 55 cities and towns rallied with the message: “Disband NATO! No War on Russia!” The day of action was sponsored by the ANSWER Coalition, Code Pink, Black Alliance for Peace, Peace Action, Maryland Peace Action, Popular Resistance and others.
From Huntsville, Alabama, to Providence, Rhode Island, from Dallas to Milwaukee to Seattle — people nationwide are standing up against war with Russia. Biden has escalated an already tense conflict with Russia, despite Ukrainian President Zelensky telling Biden that Russia is not about to invade and that Biden’s escalations are causing “panic” in Kyiv, Ukraine’s capital.
In Washington, D.C., protesters spoke at the White House and demanded Biden and the U.S. foreign policy elites stop their threats against Russia. While Biden has already sent U.S. troops to countries surrounding Ukraine, people made their demands heard to stop this war in its tracks.
ANSWER Coalition Director Brian Becker was among those who spoke to the crowd. He explained how the United States gets away with their insatiable war drive, saying:
“The only way to get the American people to say ‘yes’ to spending a trillion of their dollars every year is to fear or hate others. So we’re told to fear the Russians. Hate them. Fear the Chinese. Hate them. Fear the Cubans and the Venezuelans. Fear the Palestinians. And as long as you hate and fear them, you can say maybe the government has a point in spending a trillion dollars of our money every year for death and destruction. Because fear and hatred are a form of collective deflection away from what people know to be the real problem.”
People mobilized and came from around the area to protest in front of the White House and show their support for ending this war on Russia before it’s too late.
Other cities with demonstrations that day included New York City, Seattle and Boston.
In Boston, braving the wind and cold, 75 anti-war activists assembled at Park Street Station in Downtown Boston on February 5. The protesters came from local groups including the Green-Rainbow Party, Veterans For Peace, Committee for Peace and Human Rights, the Massachusetts People’s Party, United Against War and Militarism, Boston May Day Coalition, the ANSWER coalition and others.
Jackie King from Massachusetts Peace Action spoke to the heart of the matter: “We are here today to tell our government, both Democrats and Republicans, that the dangerous actions and words must stop. Step back from the brink! Instead of ratcheting up the tension, the U.S. should deescalate and pursue a path of vigorous and sincere diplomacy.”
ANSWER organizer Nino Brown spoke to the clear U.S. aggression: “The United States has installed bases in Romania, in Latvia, in Poland, all pointing to Russia. [Now] you have U.S. troops in over 800 military bases all over the world. There’s not even 800 countries all over the world!”
By coming together, anti-war activists in Boston exposed the cracks in this foundation of U.S. hegemony. Cracks through which flowers of hope bloom, in the form of multinational working-class unity, organized around one simple slogan: “They say more war. We say no war!”
