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The Peace March
Verdict: The honourable day
London - Saturday 15 February 03
Was it all a waste of time?
The invasion of Iraq turned out to be an instant victory. The Americans wiped out every trace of opposition. President Bush and Prime Minister Blair are heroes within their own countries and parties. Iraq is crushed as a unified state. The Arabs are destroyed as a nation. In the Middle East, Israel stands supreme. Every country in the world now knows: be nuclear - or be wiped out by America.
Knowing the end of the story sometimes ruins a play, and in many ways The Peace March was like drama - an epic: a cast of thousands (to millions), spectacle, and people living a life outside their normal 9-5 - not quite themselves. Like a great piece of theatre, it had a stunning backdrop: the streets of London on a fine day. There was a beginning, middle and end. And it was seen by audiences around the world. It wasn't theatre, but there's no trivialisation to make the comparison. Like a great play, the kind of rare play that changes the world, its apparent surface was rooted deep, in a truth - and anger - that endures beyond events.
Miles of words have been written about the march, perhaps most eloquently by the BBC (BBC News 15 Feb 03), in its classically anodyne style. But the feeling of being there was unique.
Three hours after its midday start (from Embankment and Russell Square), viewed at Westminster, it was solid with people forward and back. Every bit of Britain was there, every accent from Scotland, Ireland, Wales and England. There were the fit and strong, the middle-aged, the young. There were people in wheelchairs - including at least two elderly women, in their 80s or 90s, with that flinty determination old women can uniquely possess - one with a baby in her arms. Every age, every social group - they were there.
And eyefuls of Liberal Democrats - identified by their banners, a look of knowing superiority, and trademark health-food-shop skin. One really did carry a sign begining: 'Mr Blair, we don't doubt your sincerity'. But - they were there.
The march passed Whitehall, up Haymarket to Piccadilly. It's not normally evident how enormous these streets are. Filled in their entire width with people, they are magnificent. The imperious buildings, predicated on an Empire that ruled the world, may at first seem the wrong backdrop to a march against a new colonial devastation. But they are part of history, and history was being invoked: a history that includes the Peasants Revolt, the Parliament, and the Civil War.
The Peace March united many types of people, who would often be seen as separate, in a common purpose. And it was the march that was the event. Tired old speeches from tired old (and young - with clichéd patronage from Ms Dynamite) axe-grinders at Hyde Park corner were the nominal end of the march. In reality, they were irrelevant. It was the coming together, the feeling of completeness, the reality of doing something, when nothing seemed possible. The point was - to be there.
At 4.30 pm, near the official end of the day, at its final destination, they were still coming. Standing at Hyde Park Corner, looking back towards Piccadilly as far as the eye could see, there were people marching, solid across the full bore of the street. That's four and a half hours after the start. London's never seen anything like it before.
A couple of months later, the Americans have achieved a crushing victory by the use of overwhelming force.
If the end of the march had been a few hackneyed speeches in Hyde Park, the perspective of 2 months later might make it seem pointless. But two things negate that.
The first is the old principle that two wrongs don't make a right. Wrong people governing Iraq? OK to overthrow a sovereign state because America feels like it and life will be better, in their terms, later? No.
The second is the essence of the event. The Peace March was a march of honour. It was an honour to be there and with each other, and to have been there. In the most literal sense, with the endless debate over numbers - from 750,000 to 2,000,000 - who attended, it was a single opportunity to stand up and be counted. When a state chooses to do evil, it is far worse for it to be a democracy. Because then - whether it is America, Israel or Britain - every citizen who supports the state in its action is guilty.
Waste of time? America's won, hasn't it? In this place, at this moment, it looks that way. But the world's beginning to remember America now. And that is something America may come to regret.
END
John Park
reviewed 1 May 03
Fringe Report (c) Fringe Report 2002-2010
