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It is always been suspected that antiwar groups are targeted by domestic intelligence organizations. Every important American activist has an FBI file. On October 18th, sparked by a National Lawyers Guild suit under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), AP reported that antiwar and Pro-Palestine groups had been infiltrated and spied upon by the federal agencies. The litigious back fire from The Lawyers Guild comes at the information that had been stored, more so, than the information that had been collected (even after investigating antiwar protesters had proved fruitless). At 4:15 in the embedded video Pat Scanlon, Coordinator of Veterans For Peace (Chapter 9), expresses his lack of surprise.
“While in the Army,” says Scanlon, “I was in Military Intelligence. I saw and handled numerous files of investigations conducted by the U.S. Army on U.S. citizens and students participating in local peace activities in their communities and on college campuses. This recent revelation of the Boston Police monitoring peace activists in Boston is proof of what I believe is a continuation of forty years of this kind of surveillance and monitoring of peace groups and individuals around the country by police and other government agencies.”
Scanlon objects to being labeled an “extremist” for opposing war. “Who are the real extremists here, let me get this straight. Members of Veterans For Peace, veterans who have dutifully served our country, many in the line of fire, many with military decorations, who have personally experienced the horrors of war and now stand for peace are labeled as extremists and monitored by local police departments as a threat. While those who illegally took this country to war in Iraq resulting in over 4,700 deaths of our young men and women, 30,000 wounded, 30% suffering from PTSD, suicide rates increasing 15% each year, 1,000,000 Iraqis killed, 3,000,000 Iraqi refugees now scattered in countries around the world: These folks are not considered extremists, yet members of Veterans For Peace are? What is wrong with that picture?”
http://antiwar.com/blog/2012/10/18/fusion-center-boston-police-spied-on-peace-activists/
