This is immoral, illegal, unethical. It's not what I used to think we are about.It seems we have lost our way.My role will be to continue to try to get us back on track.Perhaps idealistic and unrealistic yet I see this struggle as my duty. I took an oath to defend my country vs. enemies foreign and domestic.I now see our problem not as a foreign threat but a threat of ignorance,apathy and stupidity of our government & people.

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My guest today is Jack Gilroy, who recently spent Thanksgiving in Jamesville Correctional Facility. Welcome to OpEdNews, Jack.

JB: What did you do that landed you in all this trouble?

JG: Hi, Joan. My crime was attempting to deliver a message to the 174th Attack Wing of Hancock Killer Drone base to stop the killing. Along with 30 other peacemakers, I walked in a solemn funeral procession in memory of the thousands who have been killed by missiles and bombs from drones. Then, we laid down on the ground in a die-in. That was our crime.

JB: Needless to say, it doesn't sound like much of a crime to me. How did you get involved? Was this your first such action?

JG: I've been an activist since the 1960s. I was the UpState (NY) Director for the COR [Committee of Responsibility], the Quaker organization that was taking war-injured Vietnamese children - mostly napalm wounds - for plastic surgery and other procedures. From there, my activism progressed to anti-nuclear actions, involvement in actions to inform Americans of the US Army School of Americas and their assassination program. That led to my incarceration in Southern jails, Atlanta Penitentiary, Petersburg Prison and a work camp in the mountains of Central Pennsylvania in the fall of 2001.

Drone actions began just five years ago. A couple of arrests and then the conviction for my April 28, 2013 die-in at Hancock.

JB: Wow. You're really a veteran at this! And no spring chicken either. I'd like to know more about what it takes to demonstrate and know that there's a good likelihood that you're going to end up behind bars. How do you prepare for that? And does it get easier the more often it happens? I freely admit that facing arrest and prison time would scare the willies out of me. Especially these days.

JG: Yes, it scares the be-Jesus out of me. But I could not take the plea bargain offer of the DeWitt (Syracuse Town) Court. If I said I was guilty of obstructing government administration and trespass, (we never entered the base--our nonviolent vow and action was outside of the fence) then I would betray the thousands of high school students I taught. I was a teacher of a mandated senior class course called Participation in Government. What was stressed in the class was mainly the First Amendment of the US Constitution. I taught it as the heart of our belief in this great nation. To say I was guilty of assembly, of speech, of religion, of press, by lying down in front of an institution breaking US and international law and defying our basic moral standards would be a gross lie.

Joan, when you say "first such action" I took it to mean peace and justice actions. That is a long and involved story that you may not want to get into. I brought up the SOA Watch because the focus was on torture and assassinations taught at Ft. Benning, the home of the US Army School of the Americas (La Escuela de Americas).

There is obviously a connection between my actions in opposition to the thousands of people we helped 'neutralize' in Latin America and the thousands we are 'neutralizing' in the Middle East. We still like to use the word "insurgents" assuming that we are the people who must decide who the insurgents are. Not us, of course, for we are on the side of peace and justice. As kids say, "yeah, right".

So, a short answer to your "When did you get involved (in drone actions)?" is about five years ago. But I have had only two arrests. Some folks have had four or more. However, I have had the most severe sentence. Three months in Jamesville Penitentiary, $1250 fine, $1300 for a transcript of my trial and - get this!- 1500 hours of community service. The Probation Officer in Binghamton NY (75 miles south of the drone base) said she never in the many years she has been a probation officer saw this kind of community service sentence. "50 or 100 but 1500? Pretty crazy. Are your appeal lawyers up to the force they must face?"

JB: Of course I'm interested in the back story, Jack. That's what brought you to where you are today. Do you want to tell us more about that?

JG: Well, in 1971, as a high school teacher at Maine Endwell Senior High in Endwell, NY, I was constantly removed from college campuses for showing a film that illustrated the crimes of our US government. I went to campus student unions, set up a projector and let the film roll"usually without incident but sometimes removed by campus police. The film was called The Survivors. I wish I had a copy of it but it was gone from my classroom closet after my family and I decided to return from Australia where we emigrated in in 1971 and returned two years later. My job was saved and I was able to shake out some of my anger at my government. Although I got into a lot of hassles in Australia (not with the kids or fellow teachers) with the tight educational system of New South Wales that did not think kindly of taking kids to the French Consulate to protest their explosion of nuclear weapons in the Pacific and making the top of the ABC News [Australian Broadcasting Company]. It was quite a struggle with the administrative part of my teaching in Australia.

Afterwards, back in the US, my students became involved in a long series of in the street issues of environment and nuclear activism. We had the largest nuclear storehouse in the US (the world?) just a bus ride from our school. The school district, of course, did not approve of my request for transport to the nuclear facility because it was "too dangerous." Long story but we got there and I went over the fence as Santa Claus to deliver gifts and offerings to the federal employees of more life-giving work.

I was arrested of course, the first of several at this institution.

JB: So your own integrity condemned you. Hoisted on your own petard, so to speak. Why do you think that you got such a severe sentence, especially when you were probably among the elders of the group? Were you and the others surprised by the stiff sentence you received? And would you have done it if you had known what you faced?

JG: Yes, Joan. I would have done it. Cheney said that about torturing people. I say that in opposition to torture and killing that is not what I believe we're about. If we lose respect for other people in our own country and abroad, then we have become lesser human beings. I don't believe I'm a 'lesser human being'. I'm not naïve, assuming we have never tortured. We have. Our history is a bloody mess. But there has been an American spirit that has said no to violence and torture and killing I associate myself with that wonderful Americanism that I wish I was able to say I always knew. I did not.

I was trained to kill as a US infantryman and was prepared to kill until looking eyeball to eyeball with a young Russian soldier in Schoenbrunn Palace in Vienna in 1955. He was a kid about my age and I was taught that Russians were monsters. He was no monster. He looked sad. Maybe frightened. I knew almost instantly that much of what I was taught was a lie. He was a kid like me, pushed into this mess where we were trained to kill one another. It was just a ceremonial end to the occupation of Austria but for me it was an epiphany. It changed my life.

Yes, I'm an old dude who refuses to think old. I'm 79 and still active. I did push ups in prison 14 years ago and did them this year as well. Mandela was in his 70s and doing push ups. He would not be intimidated by his confinement. He kept his health. I did too. I even played basketball with guys in their 20s.

JB: It's your passion that keeps you young! Speaking of these young guys you played basketball with, what did they think about what landed you behind bars?

JG: They had high respect for me. First, I was just Pop. Then, I was Jack. One of the guys, but with a history and one they could talk to. No surprise. Most young men did not have a father, or had an abusive father or one that was in prison now or when they were younger. They know about injustice and not a lot about foreign policy, I made sure to remind them that one of the great heroes of the Vietnam War (that they only had heard of) was Mohammed Ali. Why? they asked. And, of course, it was a good lead-in to a brief history of not just the courage of Ali who was willing to go to prison for five years rather than go to Vietnam and kill people.

And how the Supreme Court sided with Ali. Yes, there sometimes is justice.

JB: Sometimes.

JG: I should have noted that they had no idea that drones hanging over the Middle East were controlled by 'pilots' just a few miles away from the prison we were in. I explained that the drones were not in Syracuse but doing 24/7 psychological torture duty over places like Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan and only the CIA and NSA and a few high level White House types knew where else. And rockets called Hellfire Missiles (made by Lockheed which has a plant in Syracuse) were guided to human targets by the Reaper and Predator drones via satellites from Hancock Drone Base right up on Mallory Rd. They know Mallory Rd. better than I because I don't live in Syracuse.

JB: All happening right in your collective backyard. That somehow makes it more real. You used your incarceration as an opportunity to connect with the other inmates.

JG: Again, they had respect for me. I felt appreciated by them. I was not happy going there but, within a day or so, I knew I was meant to be there. How often is an old man, a father and grandfather around who could be talked to? I became not just a confidant but a scribe. I wrote letters to lawyers, judges, and even wives for fellows who were usually bright but had little education in academics. The prison M.D., a woman, told me I was the oldest by far of all inmates. I asked: "and the only prisoner of conscience?" She smiled but did not answer.

I should note that one feather in my cap after a whole year of going on this issue pretty much by myself was a Syracuse TV program out of the university called Ivory Tower. I've admired this Friday night panel discussion similar to Washington Week for many years. Well, on Dec 5th just a few days after my release, they gave F's and A's to issues and people on national issues (that's the program..national and international issues) and Jack Gilroy was noted with background photo and script and given an A.

It's been some time since I was in college so it was a nice grade for a 79 year old!

I do have a play called The Predator. Not about a dirty old man but about dirty new tricks of the US Government with a drone called The Predator. You can read it at www.knowdrones.org, or www.paxchristiusa.org. Go to resources on both sites.

People around the country have been reading the play. It played this Sunday at All Saints Church in Syracuse. I would have liked to have gone but I would have needed a pass from my Probation Officer and didn't have one. I'm confined to Broome County NY - dangerous old dude, don't you know?

I protest killing, assassinations; watch out!

If you can give a plug for The Predator, that would help our effort. Those who saw the play Sunday afternoon said about 45 people were there but 15 were Muslims and want to do it again"and two students of theater from Manhattan who hope to find a small place downtown to put it on"poco o poco, say the Latinos.

JB: I don't have to plug the play, Jack. You just did! Speaking of your literary efforts, The Predator is only one of them. I understand you've written several books that also combine your literary talent with your political beliefs. Can you tell us about them, please?

JG: Sure. I have two published novels and another to be ready by late spring of 2015. Absolute Flanigan and The Wisdom Box are coming of age novels written with young men in mind. The protagonist in each novel struggles with issues of patriotism and values. In Absolute Flanigan, Peter Flanigan is a tough young Irish-American but his conscience cannot accept training to kill human beings. He has few supporters among family, friends or clergy The period of time is WWII, the war some will call the 'Good War'. Patriotism is at a fever pitch. To oppose training to kill is considered not just unpatriotic but cowardly. Peter loves his country and is no coward. He refuses to even register for the draft on his 18th birthday. Peter's adventure is just beginning.

In The Wisdom Box, a Cornell entomology professor adopts a five year old boy. The professor, an agnostic with little time for organized religion, wants her child to have strong basic values of love, compassion and respect. She works hard to do that and is favorably assisted by her secret husband, a Catholic priest with a parish in Ithaca, NY.

In her house high about Ithaca Falls, her son, Frank, is fascinated with a strange box, a family heirloom that has gold plates with questions inscribed in Spanish - questions of values and morality. Frank, deeply influenced by the wisdom box questions, is led into dangerous confrontations with powerful forces of injustice. The Civil Rights movement and the Vietnam War are contemporary to The Wisdom Box.

JB: You're a busy guy! How much do you think your Quaker upbringing has contributed to your political views?

JG: I'm flattered that you thought I was a Quaker. I've gone to Quaker meetings and so respect the Quakers and other Peace Church members such as the Brethren, Mennonites, and Amish. I'm a Quaker in spirit but still on the books as a Catholic. I believe the greatest challenge in Christianity is to move Christians back to their essential beliefs prior to Constantine. That means that the Vatican has to support nonviolence. Keep in mind that the Vatican, the holder of the Just War Theory from the post Constantine period almost 1800 years ago to now, agreed to sidestep the teachings of Jesus Christ and accept the teachings of Church Fathers such as Ambrose, Augustine and Aquinas. In doing so, they overrode the nonviolent message of Jesus Christ. Christians have become the greatest killers of all religions. The Muslims don't come close.

So, yes, my upbringing as a Catholic has contributed to my political views. I refuse to accept the hypocrisy of either Church or State. The Church betrays the teaching of Christ. The United States betrays the Constitution and a system of values that the Founding Fathers emphasized, even if some of those 'men' were also hypocrites.

So, yes. Until Christian sects move away from support and involvement in killing I can't be a firm member of any of these sects. My upbringing may have been Catholic and I still believe in the essential teachings of Catholic Social Teaching that has as its first principle the respect and dignity of the individual person.

Did you ever see the photo of the Catholic Cardinal of Vienna saluting Hitler as the Fuhrer rode into Vienna during the Austrian takeover (Anschluss) in 1938? Or how about Catholic Cardinal Spellman of NY visiting American-devastated Viet Nam in 1968 and blessing our troops, tanks, planes, etc.?

I don't want to be a part of that thinking. I want to be a part of the movement to turn back the lies to the central belief of loving one's neighbors, not killing them.

But hey, our WWII national religious song wasn't Onward Christian Soldiers, it was Praise the Lord and Pass the Ammunition.

JB: You're married and have eight grandchildren. What does your family think of your activism?

JG: My answer may not be the same as those who are my family. You may want to ask my wife, Helene, or Maureen, Dan, MaryEllen or Terry. Maureen and MaryEllen drove through a snowstorm to meet me at the door of Jamesville Penitentiary the day after Thanksgiving. Maureen greeting me as I came out the door with "Thank you for your service."

JB: Jack forwarded my question to his son, Terry, who responded below.

Terry: Joan, yes, I am Jack's son. The youngest (though at 45, not so young anymore) of the four kids. We all love and support our Dad, but I'm sure we'd all answer this question differently.

I'm proud of my Dad. He has strength, passion, kindness and conviction like no one else I know. He is a tireless worker. Regardless of age, very few people have his energy, enthusiasm or level of commitment. I don't always understand or agree with what he is doing or why he is doing it, but something tells me he's probably right. He's usually ahead of the curve with his line of thinking. Years from now, I think we'll realize how right he was (and how wrong "We the people" were) about so many things. CNN was on at the gym today and it said 51% of Americans think torture is ok if it keeps us safe. 51% of Americans are in favor of torture! Since 9/11, we have become a scared and paranoid country. We absolutely need people like Jack to question our government and military and to make people think. 51% of Americans think torture is ok! How many think drones are the answer? Probably a higher percentage. Someone has to pull the other end of the rope.

For selfish reasons, I want him to stop. Let somebody else do it. I want him to just be Dad, Helene's husband and Papa Jack. He was and is a great Dad. He's a caring and loving husband to a very strong, patient and loving wife. He is an awesome grandfather. Papa takes the kids on elaborate pirate treasure hunts with treasure maps he stumbles upon every so often. All the grandkids adore Papa. They have memories and lessons they will never forget and stories and revelations I can't wait to hear, a few years from now. I love that side of him so much but realize he is so much more.

I don't want to visit him in prison ever again. It crushes my insides thinking about that man being locked up. He has such a love of life and genuinely cares about so many people. People who don't care about him and probably think he's a fool. In a time when so many of us are so nasty and fake, he is so kind and real.

I don't know if I answered the question. I have so many thoughts and emotions about the topic of my Dad. He's an amazing guy. Thanks for getting his story out.

JB: Agreed, Terry. Your dad is one amazing guy. Okay, Jack. Anything you'd like to add before we wrap this up?

JG: Thanks, Joan. I hope you have what you need to write your story. There is always more to do. I'm not finished. I hope I never have to back to jail. I'll work to not have to do that but I won't stop acting for justice. My mind now is awhirl with stories of men I was incarcerated with and are still there"and most likely will be back. Our system of incarceration is so vile, so vicious, so unjust that I cannot and will not be silent on this issue"any more than will I be silenced on speaking out against the criminal acts of our government that includes the new method of warfare, the easy method that allow us to send Hellfire missiles down into far away lands, kill people, and go home for dinner with one's family. Fact is, some 'pilots' have said that is the joy of doing this kind of 'work' vs. being far away from one's one family on flying missions. Drone pilots can go to 'work' at 7am or 7pm and be assured of good family time. And we know how important that is for family stability.

All this is immoral. It's illegal. It's unethical. It's not what I used to think we are about. It seems we have lost our way. My role will be to continue to try to get us back on track. Perhaps idealistic and unrealistic yet I see this struggle as my duty. I took an oath to defend my country against enemies foreign and domestic. I now see our problem not as a foreign threat but a threat of ignorance, apathy and stupidity of our government and people.

There is major work to be done. But today, we turned around 50+ years of arrogance and stupidity and recognized the people and government of Cuba. And here in NY State, a governor who was suspected to be in the pocket of gas and oil interests declared fracking will not occur in New York State for health reasons"foul air and water are not healthy. He vetoed fracking over moneyed interests. A major victory for those who have worked for years for environmental justice.

Things do happen. But action and persistence is required. If we never meet, have a wonderful life, Joan.

JB: Thanks so much, Jack. I feel like I've gotten a chance to know you through our extended conversation. It was a privilege talking with you!

JG: Peace and all good things, Joan. Thanks for doing this work.

JB: Likewise, Jack. Likewise!

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Coverage of Gilroy's crime and punishment

Authors Website: http://www.opednews.com/author/author79.html

Authors Bio:

Joan Brunwasser is a co-founder of Citizens for Election Reform (CER) which since 2005 existed for the sole purpose of raising the public awareness of the critical need for election reform. Our goal: to restore fair, accurate, transparent, secure elections where votes are cast in private and counted in public. Because the problems with electronic (computerized) voting systems include a lack of transparency and the ability to accurately check and authenticate the vote cast, these systems can alter election results and therefore are simply antithetical to democratic principles and functioning.



Since the pivotal 2004 Presidential election, Joan has come to see the connection between a broken election system, a dysfunctional, corporate media and a total lack of campaign finance reform. This has led her to enlarge the parameters of her writing to include interviews with whistle-blowers and articulate others who give a view quite different from that presented by the mainstream media. She also turns the spotlight on activists and ordinary folks who are striving to make a difference, to clean up and improve their corner of the world. By focusing on these intrepid individuals, she gives hope and inspiration to those who might otherwise be turned off and alienated. She also interviews people in the arts in all their variations - authors, journalists, filmmakers, actors, playwrights, and artists. Why? The bottom line: without art and inspiration, we lose one of the best parts of ourselves. And we're all in this together. If Joan can keep even one of her fellow citizens going another day, she considers her job well done.


When Joan hit one million page views, OEN Managing Editor, Meryl Ann Butler interviewed her, turning interviewer briefly into interviewee. Read the interview here.

While the news is often quite depressing, Joan nevertheless strives to maintain her mantra: "Grab life now in an exuberant embrace!"


Joan has been Election Integrity Editor for OpEdNews since December, 2005. Her articles also appear at Huffington Post, RepublicMedia.TV and Scoop.co.nz.