"...any soldier that refuses to fight in this war has my respect."

...quoted from Kyle Snyder who, having participated in war, is now resisting it ... from Canada (read his story: ttp://www.couragetoresist.org/x/content/view/110/27/).

Robin Long, another warrior and war resister seeking refuge in Canada, says, "...a soldier is just a uniform following orders, a warrior is the man or woman that follows their conscience and does the right thing in the face of adversity."

I find this very touching... "a warrior is the man or woman that follows their conscience and does the right thing in the face of adversity." For, yes, Robin is extending the current definition of a warrior and his extension is particularly important in light of the prejudice that exists against the military by the Left and peace activists.

As a “military mom” who has skin in the game (my child is a well trained warrior fighting in the Global War on Terror) as well as a thoroughly anti-war woman derived from generations of men who fought in various wars, I’m in a unique position experiencing the American “left” and “right” ideologies on war.

While I did not live in the U.S. during the Vietnam War era, I was affected by this war even in far away South Africa. Somehow, I was affected viscerally. I "knew" -- albeit I had very little understanding of the politics accompanying war -- the broad expanse of what was happening in Vietnam to the indigenous people and to the invaders. Maybe I knew it because I'd grown up hearing the war stories of my family members in war: my great grandfather engaged in the British war in Afghanistan in the 1830s; my Welsh grandfather was a home guard in England during the WW II Blitz and I heard his stories of death and destruction; my English grandfather went to South Africa as an 18-year-old soldier for the British Empire against the guerilla Boers; my Afrikaner grandmother - yes, she married a British soldier! - was 5th generation resister to British colonialism; my two brothers deployed as conscripts for the Apartheid regime (this was after Vietnam War) on "the border" of Angola.

Essentially, while the venue, the weaponry, the faces change, the essence of war is always the same: it is about destruction and “power over.”

Growing up amongst people who have experienced war and paying attention to the symptoms and detrimental psychological effects of war, I notice the “shorthand” or sound-bite thinking that is common amongst Americans about war: American Left = war and military: BAD; American Right=war and military: GOOD.

Robin Long and others like him - Kyle Snyder, Darrel Anderson, Kevin Benderman, Lt. Watada, Agustin Aguayo – may have entered the military as ideologues and for a variety of reasons (including excellent salesmanship by recruiters) but they’ve come out as empiricists. It is a great thing for this country that they’ve managed to hold onto their humanity, despite military training, and that they now not only refuse to participate in killing but are willing to promote the discussion about war. They’ve engaged the realities of war on the battlefield and now they’re engaging the war of ideologies and communicating their learning to deepen the debate in this country about war.

Robin has learned that a "warrior" is an archetype and not "just" a stereotype of a numbed-out killing machine. It is particularly touching that this young man has come to this understanding through the day-to-day experience of war. It is a triumph of humanity that people like Robin Long, Kyle Snyder, Kevin Benderman, Lt. Watada, Agustin Aguayo and so many others manage to hold onto their humanity... despite the training… and refuse to participate in the killing.

The definition of "warrior" is broad. Let’s introduce the concept of the warrior archetype into the anti-war movement. To be a warrior is not to be "for war." To be a peace activist is also to be a warrior. To be a warrior for truth, and community, and generative ideals such as collaboration, negotiation, multilateralism, and the complexity of diversity is to be a warrior for peace.