.Vets returning from Iraq turn to war protesters for help
DAYTONA BEACH -- Three months after his advanced infantry training in the Army Reserves, Mike Gianfriddo was deployed to Iraq.
His military occupational specialty: administrative assistant. His job in Iraq: tower guard.
He served in Iraq from September 2005 for a year, then returned to his Minnesota home. He won't talk about what he saw, except to say that once home, he felt out of place and found ordinary life hard to handle emotionally.
Recently he found help in an unexpected place: the corner of International Speedway Boulevard and Nova Road during a peace demonstration where he met members of Central Florida Veterans for Peace and Military Families Speak Out. Those groups join CodePink of Central Florida, a women's peace movement that organizes daily demonstrations in Volusia and Flagler counties.
While these Iraq war protesters may be very visible to passing motorists, their whole mission may not be apparent. Seeking peace and an end to the war, they also help returning servicemen and women readjust.
Not all who pass by honk in support of the demonstrators or agree with their protest, including Carmine Fragione of New Smyrna Beach, a former Connecticut probation officer. His opinion opposes the protesters' philosophies.
"I see them on the street corners with signs. I trust that the anti-war group is from a wide background, but I think they are misguided," he said. "But I think in the time of war, we support our president and fight to win."
But Gianfriddo saw the protesters in a different light, and that led him to folks who understand his troubling issues.
"I don't like to talk about the war," Gianfriddo said in an interview at a Daytona Beach restaurant. He declined to be photographed. "When I came home, I didn't initially know what to do. I had basically been in the VA (Veterans Administration) in Minnesota since the problems started."
He tried to go to school but didn't do well in that setting. He was hospitalized for a time.
"I ended up coming to Florida, still having service-related health issues," said the 25-year-old. He now is in the reserves based in Daytona Beach. He lives in Port Orange, works at a laundry and struggles to fit in.
"I came down here and started treatment at the VA and have tried to put my life back together," he said.
Among the organizations demonstrating on the busy street corner, some are branches of national groups made up of former military people, relatives of active military personnel and civil activists who oppose the war in Iraq.
They do more than protest, Gianfriddo said. They offered him help.
"It was really inspiring when I drove down the road to see people who cared about us so much that they were out there sticking up for us," he said.
His first encounter with the demonstrators happened on Memorial Day. He got out of the car and talked to former Army Spc. Phil Restino, local contact for Central Florida Veterans for Peace, which covers Jacksonville to Melbourne. Restino introduced him to David Katz of Cocoa, a Vietnam War Marine veteran who lent an ear and helped him maneuver through some military red tape.
Katz said Gianfriddo and other returning military service people face different problems than when he returned from Vietnam.
"We know now that the policy of going to war has nothing to do with the troops, but they didn't know that in the '60s when they protested against all of the establishment including the Navy, Marines, Army," Katz said. "In the '60s the soldiers were persecuted individually.
"What these men and women need, more than anything else, is somebody just to talk to (so) they don't fear any repercussions," he said. "They are still active reservists or inactive still hooked up with the contract. They face constant rotation to the war theater."
Since that first encounter, Gianfriddo continues to meet Restino, Katz and many other area members of Veterans for Peace and Military Families Speak Out one-on-one or at a coffee shop owned by Charlie Williams, a veteran Coast Guardsman.
"I can't speak out against policy when I am in uniform," Gianfriddo said, but admitted he's not afraid to talk to the veterans he's met through the peace group. "I think it's really important for soldiers to engage in dialogue together with divergent viewpoints, so they are not looking at each other like the enemy and turn on each other.
"If you are going to be asked to go and kill people for freedom, then you should be able to ask questions and understand why you are doing it other than you just signed a contract."
One member of Veterans For Peace, Roberto Barragan of Ormond Beach, said he knows of the mental anguish returning soldiers suffer after his experience during the first Gulf War.
"I help with the demonstrations on Thursday and am pretty active in the black community. I help the kids who have come home with resources. They talk to me and I try to help them with housing and getting through red tape," Barragan said. "They have to have somebody to bounce stuff off of, to keep them from doing things that are socially inappropriate."
Like Barragan, Army Sgt. Maj. (Ret.) Charlie Carlson of New Smyrna Beach, a member of Military Families Speak Out, is active in demonstrations but also helps returning veterans. These include his son, who served 14 years, including deployments to Kosovo, Bosnia, Panama, the first Gulf War and the initial march into Baghdad, before he left the military voluntarily after getting into trouble for airing his opinions on blog sites.
"I went to Washington in the peace marches, stood on the street corners, wrote commentary and contributed to what I could," Carlson said of his activities. "Nobody is listening."
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His military occupational specialty: administrative assistant. His job in Iraq: tower guard.
He served in Iraq from September 2005 for a year, then returned to his Minnesota home. He won't talk about what he saw, except to say that once home, he felt out of place and found ordinary life hard to handle emotionally.
Recently he found help in an unexpected place: the corner of International Speedway Boulevard and Nova Road during a peace demonstration where he met members of Central Florida Veterans for Peace and Military Families Speak Out. Those groups join CodePink of Central Florida, a women's peace movement that organizes daily demonstrations in Volusia and Flagler counties.
While these Iraq war protesters may be very visible to passing motorists, their whole mission may not be apparent. Seeking peace and an end to the war, they also help returning servicemen and women readjust.
Not all who pass by honk in support of the demonstrators or agree with their protest, including Carmine Fragione of New Smyrna Beach, a former Connecticut probation officer. His opinion opposes the protesters' philosophies.
"I see them on the street corners with signs. I trust that the anti-war group is from a wide background, but I think they are misguided," he said. "But I think in the time of war, we support our president and fight to win."
But Gianfriddo saw the protesters in a different light, and that led him to folks who understand his troubling issues.
"I don't like to talk about the war," Gianfriddo said in an interview at a Daytona Beach restaurant. He declined to be photographed. "When I came home, I didn't initially know what to do. I had basically been in the VA (Veterans Administration) in Minnesota since the problems started."
He tried to go to school but didn't do well in that setting. He was hospitalized for a time.
"I ended up coming to Florida, still having service-related health issues," said the 25-year-old. He now is in the reserves based in Daytona Beach. He lives in Port Orange, works at a laundry and struggles to fit in.
"I came down here and started treatment at the VA and have tried to put my life back together," he said.
Among the organizations demonstrating on the busy street corner, some are branches of national groups made up of former military people, relatives of active military personnel and civil activists who oppose the war in Iraq.
They do more than protest, Gianfriddo said. They offered him help.
"It was really inspiring when I drove down the road to see people who cared about us so much that they were out there sticking up for us," he said.
His first encounter with the demonstrators happened on Memorial Day. He got out of the car and talked to former Army Spc. Phil Restino, local contact for Central Florida Veterans for Peace, which covers Jacksonville to Melbourne. Restino introduced him to David Katz of Cocoa, a Vietnam War Marine veteran who lent an ear and helped him maneuver through some military red tape.
Katz said Gianfriddo and other returning military service people face different problems than when he returned from Vietnam.
"We know now that the policy of going to war has nothing to do with the troops, but they didn't know that in the '60s when they protested against all of the establishment including the Navy, Marines, Army," Katz said. "In the '60s the soldiers were persecuted individually.
"What these men and women need, more than anything else, is somebody just to talk to (so) they don't fear any repercussions," he said. "They are still active reservists or inactive still hooked up with the contract. They face constant rotation to the war theater."
Since that first encounter, Gianfriddo continues to meet Restino, Katz and many other area members of Veterans for Peace and Military Families Speak Out one-on-one or at a coffee shop owned by Charlie Williams, a veteran Coast Guardsman.
"I can't speak out against policy when I am in uniform," Gianfriddo said, but admitted he's not afraid to talk to the veterans he's met through the peace group. "I think it's really important for soldiers to engage in dialogue together with divergent viewpoints, so they are not looking at each other like the enemy and turn on each other.
"If you are going to be asked to go and kill people for freedom, then you should be able to ask questions and understand why you are doing it other than you just signed a contract."
One member of Veterans For Peace, Roberto Barragan of Ormond Beach, said he knows of the mental anguish returning soldiers suffer after his experience during the first Gulf War.
"I help with the demonstrations on Thursday and am pretty active in the black community. I help the kids who have come home with resources. They talk to me and I try to help them with housing and getting through red tape," Barragan said. "They have to have somebody to bounce stuff off of, to keep them from doing things that are socially inappropriate."
Like Barragan, Army Sgt. Maj. (Ret.) Charlie Carlson of New Smyrna Beach, a member of Military Families Speak Out, is active in demonstrations but also helps returning veterans. These include his son, who served 14 years, including deployments to Kosovo, Bosnia, Panama, the first Gulf War and the initial march into Baghdad, before he left the military voluntarily after getting into trouble for airing his opinions on blog sites.
"I went to Washington in the peace marches, stood on the street corners, wrote commentary and contributed to what I could," Carlson said of his activities. "Nobody is listening."
News Journal Online
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