From the Family and Friends of Lt. Watada

Support Lt. Ehren Watada on Oct. 27, Nov. 3, and at Thanksgiving

Dear Friends of Lt. Ehren Watada,

As you may know, the Army command at Fort Lewis, Washington, recently attempted to court-martial Lt. Ehren Watada for a second time. But a Federal judge stepped in at the last minute to put a temporary halt ('stay') to the proceedings. The judge has now extended this stay until Nov. 9, in order to give him more time to consider the arguments of Ehren's attorneys that a second court martial would amount to double jeopardy, and to consider the Army's arguments to the contrary.

So the Family and Friends of Lt. Watada are mobilizing anew.

On Oct. 19, we organized a number of actions around the country in conjunction with the Iraq Moratorium.

We are encouraging groups around the country to show their support for Lt. Watada during the regional marches and rallies this Saturday, Oct. 27.

The national steering committee of the Family and Friends of Lt. Watada is also calling for one-hour vigils in cities around the country on the first and third Saturdays of every month, beginning on Saturday, Nov. 3.

And we will soon begin a letter-writing campaign of thanks to Lt. Ehren Watada, to coincide with the Thanksgiving period.
We encourage everyone, especially veterans and military families, to show their support for the courageous stance of Ehren Watada during the anti-war marches this weekend and beyond. We know that support will be shown for Lt. Watada by speakers, banners, flyers and other efforts taking place at many of these marches. But in some cases, your own initiative could make a big difference.

Our new flyer is attached as a Word document. It contains a good legal summary of the status of Ehren's case as well as our demands that there be no second court martial, that all charges against Lt. Watada be dropped, and that he be released from the Army with an Honorable Discharge.

We encourage you to download this flyer, make copies, and distribute them widely at the Oct. 27 marches and rallies. There is room at the bottom of the flyer to plug in local information for twice monthly vigils in support of Ehren Watada.

Lt. Ehren Watada is the first military officer to publicly refuse to deploy to the U.S. war against the people of Iraq. He needs and deserves all of our support.

Thank you for your extraordinary efforts.

for peace and justice,
Gerry Condon

for the national steering committee
of the Family and Friends of Lt. Watada

For regular action updates, please visit www.thankyoult.org