By Debra Sweet, Director of World Can’t Wait

Last week I got to listen in as John Burns spoke via Zoom for the third time that day to college students in North Carolina, presenting for We Are Not Your Soldiers. Speaking to a classroom over Zoom isn’t that easy; the students were spread about a room, backlit, so we couldn’t see many faces. The professor opened with the video Collateral Murder, offering students a warning over the violence and a chance to leave the room. Three did, and the others watched in a hush, after the professor explained how the video had been released only because Chelsea Manning send it to Wikileaks; both she and Julian Assange did harsh prison terms as retribution from the U.S. for exposing war crimes.

John’s soft-spoken delivery is deceptive. He quietly devastates the practices of the U.S. military, speaking about his days of training when a comrade was left to die untreated from dehydration, and the drill sergeant told the recruits to toughen up and get over it. “People die.”  John’s steady recount, based on a scrapbook of his military days, drew them in, and they began to ask questions about what the military promises recruits, about John’s own health and how he processed what he experienced while being deployed in the war of terror.  

We look forward to the written reflections from this professors’ classes and will share on the Excerpts from Student Papers page.

Watch a clip from John’s presentation here.