“No NATO, No War”: U.S. Veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan Return War Medals at NATO Summit

Democracy Now! broadcasts from Chicago, site of the largest NATO summit in the organization’s six-decade history. On Sunday, May 20, 2012, veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, as well as members of Afghans For Peace, led a peace march of thousands of people.

Iraq Veterans Against the War held a ceremony where nearly 50 veterans discarded their war medals by hurling them down the street in the direction of the NATO summit. We hear the soldiers’ voices as they return their medals one by one from the stage. “I am giving back my global war on terror service medal in solidarity with the people of Iraq and Afghanistan,” said Jason Heard, a former combat medic who spent 10 years in the U.S. Army. “I am deeply sorry for the destruction that we have caused in these countries and around the globe.”