Yolanda Huet-Vaughn - Gale

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Yolanda Huet-Vaughn
Excerpt from ‘‘Statement Refusing to Serve in the 1991 Gulf War’’
Issued as a press release on January 9, 1991.
Reprinted from Voices of a People’s History of the United States, 2004.
‘‘Do we as Americans want the responsibility of going ahead
with offensive maneuvers that could easily be the start of World War
III? And I ask you, what is worth all of this death and destruction?
What do we have after Vietnam except the tears and the pain and the
loss?’’
A person
whose personal beliefs keep him or her from participating in
military service or military action is called a conscientious objector.
Historically, conscientious objectors have cited religious, political, or personal
reasons for refusing military action. Some religious groups, such as
the Society of Friends (Quakers) or Jehovah’s Witnesses, are pacifists, or
against violence of any kind. Political convictions among conscientious
objectors are often directed at military conscription, periods of time when
eligible citizens are required by the government to serve in the military.
Many conscientious objectors in the United States took this stance
during World War I (1914–18) and the Vietnam War (1954–75).
Some conscientious objectors refused to participate in the Vietnam
War, the Gulf War (1991), and the war in Iraq that began in 2003 because
they believed those wars were illegal. For example, under the U.S.
Constitution, the president can initiate military action, but it is the role of
the U.S. Congress to declare war. In those wars, Congress voted to authorize
the president to use military force, but did not officially declare war.
The Selective Service Act, passed by Congress in 1948 and amended
in 1951, required that conscientious objection be based on religious
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Yolanda Huet-Vaughn
U.S. soldiers stand near a destroyed SCUD missile, fired by the Iraqi military, during the Gulf War in 1991. More than 650,000
U.S. troops participated in the war, and nearly 150 died in battle. CONSOLIDATED NEWS PICTURES/GETTY IMAGES.
belief. In 1970 the U.S. Supreme Court removed the religious requirement
and allowed objection based on a deeply held and describable set of
moral values or ethics. A 1971 Supreme Court ruling added that one’s
personal ethics must apply to war in general, and not simply to a specific
war or military action.
The lead up to the Gulf War was a tense period. Dr. Yolanda Huet-
Vaughn became a conscientious objector for professional and political
reasons. After having served in the military from 1977 to 1982,
Huet-Vaughn enlisted in the U.S. Army Reserves as a medical reserve
officer in 1989. Those serving in the reserves train in military operations,
but live as civilians, or people outsidethemilitary.Whennecessary,
reserves can be called for service to help supplement the regular
U.S. armed forces.
After Iraq invaded Kuwait in 1990, Saudi Arabia, which borders both
Iraq and the much smaller independent nation of Kuwait, agreed to allow
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a base for troops, equipment, and medical support for nations that
were working together to expel Iraq from Kuwait. The military activity
was called Operation Desert Shield, and Huet-Vaughn was called to
report to Saudi Arabia in December 1990. She officially announced her
refusal to serve on January 9, 1991. Three weeks later, the Gulf War
began.
Things to remember while reading
‘‘Statement Refusing to Serve in the 1991
Gulf War’’:
Huet-Vaughn objects to Operation Desert Shield as ‘‘an immoral,
inhumane, and unconstitutional act.’’ She gives several reasons:
1) She believes the military action violates the Constitution; 2) she
maintains that the medical oath she took when becoming a
physician is to preserve life and prevent disease; and 3) she believes
that as a human she needs to protect the planet. By participating in
Operation Desert Shield, she would be violating both of those
beliefs. She cites potential dangers to civilians and the environment
to back her position.
During the Gulf War, there was great concern around the world
that Iraq possessed and would use chemical, biological, or nuclear
weapons. Huet-Vaughn emphasizes that this would result in a
medical disaster.
Those who supported Huet-Vaughn’s refusal to serve in the Gulf
War argued that the Nuremberg Charter (1950) applied to her
case. The Nuremberg Charter is an international agreement that
defines the principles under which an individual can be tried for
war crimes, or crimes against humanity. The charter stemmed from
the Nuremberg Trials following World War II (1939–45) in which
Nazis accused of committing atrocities such as genocide—the
intentional harming and killing of a particular group of people—
were put on trial. Under Principle IV of the Nuremberg Charter, a
military person has an obligation to not obey illegal orders.
Similarly, American military manuals state that U.S. soldiers are
under no obligation to involve themselves in criminal activities. As
Huet-Vaughn notes, war plans against Iraq were likely to include
the bombing of Iraqi cities. The bombing raids would likely result
in civilian deaths (she notes that 57 percent of people in Iraq and
Yolanda Huet-Vaughn
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Yolanda Huet-Vaughn
Questioning the War in Iraq
Tim Predmore was on active duty with the 101st
Airborne Division near Mosul, Iraq, during the war
in Iraq that began in March 2003. In May of that
year, President George W. Bush announced that
major combat operations had ended. The speech
was delivered beneath a sign that read ‘‘Mission
Accomplished.’’
In August of 2003, American troops continued to
face hostile fire. Predmore felt compelled to write a
letter to his hometown newspaper, the Peoria
Journal Star, to question the ongoing war and why
it was started. On August 24, 2003, the newspaper
printed Predmore’s piece under the title ‘‘Death
Here without Reason or Justification.’’ The essay
was reprinted in the Los Angeles Times on
September 17, 2003, and on many Web sites.
The letter inspired many activists’ antiwar
sentiments and protests. Predmore soon received an
honorable discharge from the military and returned
home. In his letter, Predmore observed: ‘‘This looks
like a modern-day crusade not to free an oppressed
people or to rid the world of a demonic dictator
relentless in his pursuit of conquest and domination
but a crusade to control another nation’s natural
resources. At least for us here, oil seems to be the
reason for our presence.’’ He added: ‘‘There is only
onetruth,anditisthatAmericansaredying....
How many more must die?’’
Kuwait live in cities). Planned bombing raids that kill civilians are a
crime under the Nuremberg Charter. Therefore, argued Huet-
Vaughn’s supporters, her refusal to serve was covered by Principle
IV, which reads: ‘‘The fact that a person acted pursuant to order
[under orders] of his Government or of a superior does not relieve
him from responsibility under international law, provided a moral
choice was in fact possible to him.’’
‘‘Statement Refusing to Serve in the 1991 Gulf
War’’
I, Yolanda Huet-Vaughn, M.D., am a board-certified family physician, a wife,
a mother of three children ages two, five, and eight. I am also a member since
1980 of Physicians for Social Responsibility, the U.S. affiliate of the
International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War. In 1982 I
cofounded the Greater Kansas City Chapter of Physicians for Social
Responsibility. I am from Kansas City, Kansas. I am a captain in the U.S.
Army Reserve Medical Corps. In connection with the Gulf crisis I was called to
active duty service in December 1990.
228 American Social Reform Movements: Primary Sources

I am refusing orders to be an accomplice in what I consider an
immoral, inhumane, and unconstitutional act, namely an offensive
military mobilization in the Middle East. My oath as a citizen-soldier to
defend the Constitution, my oath as a physician to preserve life and
prevent disease, and my responsibility as a human being to the
preservation of this planet, would be violated if I cooperate with
Operation Desert Shield.
I had hoped that we as a people had learned the lessons of Vietnam
[1954–75]—50,000 Americans dead—hundreds of thousands of civilian
dead—and environmental disaster. What we face in the Middle East is
death and destruction on a grander scale. Whereas in Vietnam we had 200
Yolanda Huet-Vaughn
An antiwar protester dresses up
like Uncle Sam during a
demonstration in Washington,
D.C., in 1991. The activists are
urging the government to end
what they consider to be an
unjust war. AP IMAGES.
Accomplice: An active participant
in illegal activity.
Military mobilization:
Gathering of troops and
military equipment.
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