Michael Sudbury
Michael
Sudbury joined the military right out of high school. He
re-enlisted in the year 2000, with his contracted term of service up in
January of 2003. However he was prevented from leaving the service
at that time, another victim of the "stop-loss" program (the draft by
another name).
After long reflection Sudbury also came to see all war as immoral, and
filed for Conscientious Objector status, based on that conviction.
He had not yet completed the application process for CO status before
his unit was ordered to ship out to Iraq. After conflicting
messages from the military regarding his possible release from service,
Sudbury decided that he would refuse to join his unit in combat, no
matter the consequences. Fortunately, just days before his unit
was to be shipped to Iraq, he was discharged from the military.
If you are ordered to kill someone that you do not think should be
killed, but you pull the trigger because you are afraid of the
punishment for not following orders, you are not free....If you refuse
to do something that you think is wrong, even though you will be fined,
imprisoned, attacked, or even executed, then..then you are free.-
Sudbury
Michael Sudbury was interviewed on Democracy Now.