Jenny MarderWhat began three weeks ago as...

Jenny Marder

What began three weeks ago as an international candlelight vigil has

become a weekly ritual and antiwar protest in Huntington Beach.

Demonstrators gathered peacefully by the soft glow of candlelight

at the Huntington Beach Pier on Sunday to express their desire to

bring the troops home safe by putting an end to what they feel is an

unjust war.

“I really feel like supporting our troops is getting them out of

harm’s way,” protester Carol Zwaans said as she wrote “Support our

troops, bring them home now” on a sign in black magic marker.

Her previous sign was simple. It read “No war.”

Other signs read “Love the soldiers, hate the war” and “Support

our troops, pray for peace.”

“Some people say that we’re not supporting the troops, but I want

the troops to come home alive and unscarred,” said Huntington Beach

resident Fred Galluccio, a physician with a family practice. “I’m

here to say that we want peace, that we want the war not to be

happening.” Galluccio attended the vigil with his wife, Monika, and

their two daughters.

Three days before war was declared, about 100 protesters assembled

at the foot of the pier. This Sunday marked the third week in a row

that a group of men, women and children held a vigil Downtown to

express not only their opposition to the war, but their support for

the men and women fighting.

“I am against this war, and I feel it is my duty to come out and

speak,” Fred Galluccio said, with both an American flag and a peace

flag in hand. “We have to speak up when we think something is not

right.”

One of Fred Calluccio’s daughters, 7-year-old Christina, designed

her own sign, which read, “Stop bombing in Iraq.” Under the word

“stop,” a scratched-out mistake was covered up with a drawing of a

cow.

“Next time, I’m gonna to draw a gun and then X it out, so it says

‘no killing,’” the little girl said. Her 5-year-old sister, Sophia,

also designed a sign of her own. It read “Stop the war” in wobbly

letters.

Passersby honked and flashed peace signs. But not everyone

supported the protesters.

“I hate war and I hate having to see families lose their loved

ones, but I think that Saddam is a wicked, evil man,” said Julie

Beutler, 22, of Huntington Beach as she passed by the protest with

her husband, John.

Bill Klausen, an assault boat coxswain in the Navy from 1980 to

1986, was also opposed to the protest.

“They don’t know why they are against the war,” Klausen said.

“I’ll bet 80% of these people are Democrats. It’s a political thing.”

He added that he was disappointed at what he considered a lack of

patriotism.

“Do you think any of these people have kids over there?” he asked,

shaking his head.

Huntington Beach resident Marc Bossu was fuming as he stood by

looking on.

“I actually have hatred against these protesters,” he said. “I

say, nuke those bastards.”

Passionate sentiments directed against antiwar demonstrators in

Orange County are making it more dangerous to speak out against the

war, Monika Galluccio fears.

“With emotions boiling high, it’s getting more dangerous to speak

out,” she said. “One thing that comes to me when we go out and

protest is that I feel scared.”

But the Galluccios said they will not be deterred by fear.

“People can find many excuses not to go to a peace vigil,” Monika

Galluccio said. “But if we have to face the consequences, we have to

face them.”

The Galluccios feel that the U.S. government should not be forging

ahead alone in this war, without the support of the United Nations.

“This will be seen as an imperialistic war,” she said.

They are also worried that heavy military spending will result in

cutbacks on domestic programs.

“We are spending over a billion dollars a day on this massacre and

cutting back on health care and programs for our own poor,” Fred

Galluccio said. “We are killing our own people, as well, by doing

this.”

Also on Sunday, across town, tensions mounted and passion swelled

at another weekly antiwar demonstration at the corner of Springdale

Street and Edinger Avenue.

Crowds have doubled at the corner protest, which meets every

Sunday from 12:30 to 2 p.m., Antiwar protesters are increasingly

confronted by pro-war demonstrators.

Last week, about 25 people faced off against the antiwar

protesters in a rally to support the troops.

Flags and yellow ribbons were posted on the fence, and people

driving by were waving their flags and honking their horns, said

Huntington Beach resident Robert Foutz, who said he has been flying

an American flag in his front yard since the war was declared.

“I support our troops and I do support the effort to remove Saddam

Hussein,” Foutz said, adding “both sides have a right to speak.”

Another antiwar rally, featuring three speakers and about 200

people with signs, occurred at Golden West College last Wednesday.

The campus rally was described by organizer Scott Mollett as

sedate, with only minor dissent.

“The majority of the people were with us,” Mollett said. “A few

military personnel came up and said they were against the war. But if

there was a draft, I think all these guys who were gung-ho for the

war would be singing a different song.”

The candlelight vigil will continue to meet at the base of the

pier in Downtown Huntington Beach every Sunday from 7 to 8 p.m.

As the evening at the pier came to a close last weekend, the crowd

joined hands to say a prayer for the soldiers, concluding the vigil

with a song, “Peace Is Flowing Like a River.”

“It has to flow out of us,” Monika Galluccio said. “It has to flow

into society also, so that we become a more just and more peaceful

society.”

* JENNY MARDER covers City Hall. She can be reached at (714)

965-7173 or by e-mail at [email protected].