The Unlikely Activist

TheUNLIKELY ACTIVIST

D a k o t a A c c e s s P i p e l i n e

Bismarck

TRIBAL PROTEST SITE

STANDING ROCK INDIAN RESERVATION

by Margaret Littman ’86

Littman’s curiosity, and love of writing and language were fostered at Fountain Valley School. For more than two decades, she’s been a freelance writer and editor writing magazine articles and guidebooks. Her most recent guidebook on the historic Natchez Trace will be published in fall 2017. Her work has appeared in many publications including Chicago magazine, USA Today and Entrepreneur. She has a B.A. in fine arts from Vanderbilt University and an M.S.J. from the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University. She lives in Nashville and is the owner and founder of Nashville Paddle Co.

Photo by Griffin Norman Clark led more than 2,100 veterans to Standing Rock. Photo by Joseph Zummo

An unexpected phone call and a galvanizing cause moved Wesley Clark Jr. ’88 to action.

While he has long been an environmentalist, having grown up in California and Colorado and gazed upon majestic vistas every morning, Wesley (Wes) Clark Jr. ’88 never considered himself an activist—until recently. A self-described news junkie, Clark, the son and namesake of the retired general and former Supreme Allied Commander Europe of NATO’s military forces, began closely following one particular news story last fall. At a protest camp in North Dakota’s Standing Rock Indian Reservation, Sioux and other Native American tribes and allies had gathered as “water protectors” to halt construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline. Clashes with local police and security forces had begun to escalate.

In September 2016, he got a phone call that changed his life. Phyllis Young, an elder, former Standing Rock councilwoman and organizer of the Oceti Sakowin protest camp, was reaching out for help. She contacted Clark hoping to get in touch with his father about supporting the movement. In a voice “filled with mortal fear,” Clark recalls, she described showdowns between the tribes and police. There were stories of dogs attacking women and children, the elderly getting beaten up, protestors being sprayed with mace.

Clark and a group of veterans apologizing to Native American tribal leaders. Photo by Joseph Zummo

Clark decided that he himself had to take action. An Army veteran with four years of service, he realized his fellow U.S. military vets were uniquely suited to protect the peaceful protestors. Clark believes that veterans are skilled at outreach because the military is one of the few sectors where Americans of different ethnic, socioeconomic and other demographic groups live and work together well. military over hundreds of years. His apology, delivered on one knee to tribal leaders, caught the attention of social media; in some ways, the viral spotlight surprised even Clark.

“It was one of the most deeply moving experiences of my life,” Clark says of the apology, delivered while a blizzard howled outside. “It was like you could feel a physical force out there.”

Enlisting the help of a close friend, he put out a military-style “operations order” on Twitter and Facebook, and started an online donation campaign to cover supplies, which eventually raised more than $1 million and helped the volunteer effort raise its profile. Quite soon, he had managed to mobilize a group of more than 2,100 veterans to travel to Standing Rock to serve as “human shields” for protestors in the face of an impending eviction order by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. For a handful of frigid days following their arrival on Dec. 4, Veterans Stand for Standing Rock garnered headlines and a sizable social media following.

On Dec. 5, as the vets prepared for the worst, the Army Corps announced it would not grant an easement (at least temporarily) for the pipeline to cross under the Missouri River just upstream of the reservation at Lake Oahe. Veterans and protestors both cheered the temporary de-escalation of conflict. That evening, at the reservation’s Four Prairie Knights Casino & Resort, Clark led a group of veterans in a moving ceremony asking for forgiveness from Native peoples for the poor treatment they have received from the U.S. government and

GALVANIZING FORCES

When he got the call from Standing Rock and heard firsthand about distressing acts of violence against peaceful protestors, Clark was deeply affected. “I had never been a religious person, but I grew up Catholic and we were taught, ‘That what you do to the least of my brothers, you do to me’,” he says, quoting Matthew 25:40. “So I told Phyllis I would help her.”

He spoke to his father about the situation, but the senior Clark was cautious. Due to his long, high-level military career, he saw a complicated bigger picture, particularly after the presidential election results.

Clark Jr. says of election night, “For me, it was like watching the most powerful elite people in the country have their spirits broken all at once. Afterward, my dad told me, ‘You have to keep your head down. Don’t go to Standing Rock.’”

But at that point, Clark was already committed to others and more significantly, to himself. “When I took the Army oath to defend the Constitution against enemies foreign and domestic, well, that is how I see this [situation],” he explains. “We are at an incredibly dangerous time in American history. People need to get physically and emotionally involved. If you really

WE ARE AT AN INCREDIBLY DANGEROUS TIME IN AMERICAN HISTORY. PEOPLE NEED TO GET PHYSICALLY AND EMOTIONALLY INVOLVED.” “

understand what is going on with the environment, you’ll be worried your kids will never have a 20th high school reunion.” (Clark is father to two sons, ages 11 and 12.)

THE VIEW FROM HERE

Clark’s experiences in North Dakota were a game changer. “I do not have the time to write anymore. I feel like I have to help to save the environment because the government is not going to do it,” he says. He is now assessing other environmental issues where he believes veteran activism can help.

Tactical and organizational skills gained in the military may help veterans to stay focused when planning and executing actions, Clark says. And veterans are able to participate in protests.

“We don’t want any active duty [personnel] participating and risking damaging their service record; only people who are okay with getting arrested,” Clark told a reporter as he headed to Standing Rock in December. Various groups—Veterans Stand for Standing Rock, Veterans for Peace, Iraq Veterans Against the War—worked together there.

Clark is still evaluating his next move. A separate group of veterans have started a second GoFundMe campaign and had raised more than $167,000 at press time. They plan to return to Standing Rock in the wake of the president’s memo ordering the Army Corps to expedite its environmental review.

Clark says he may work with clean water activists in Flint, Michigan. He plans to meet with Americans of every faith during a seven-day meditation and prayer event in Washington, D.C. The group is to meet at the Washington Monument in March and walk in a labyrinth that circles the city, “meditating on the world as we see it and asking for guidance to show us the way forward,” Clark says.

Clark credits his experiences in the Army, both in family life and as a young serviceman, for imbuing him with courage and a desire to help protect our country, our families, our planet. “My kids were terrified that I was going to Standing Rock,” he says. “I told them, `When I grew up, my dad was in the Army and he did dangerous things to protect me. This is me protecting you.’”

Although the pipeline was not ultimately blocked, and likely won’t be, Clark is convinced that unifying veterans to engage in activism after the end of their service really made a difference. “We met a lot of people up there and had a great experience. We are hoping the veterans go home and spread their experiences and that energy. Even if my actions only mobilized one person, that’s one more than yesterday.”

A military scion follows his own path

Clark enjoyed growing up in the military, which he describes as a family of sorts. He attended FVS as a boarding student his sophomore year, then stayed on as a day student when his parents moved to Fort Carson during his junior and senior years. He credits the School’s stunning natural location with stoking his commitment to protecting the environment. He also taps Dr. Glenn Philipps’ AP history class with helping inform his worldview.

Clark’s 1988 FVS yearbook photo.

After graduating from Georgetown University, Clark joined the Army, serving for four years. He helped on his father’s 2004 campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination, but mostly he has stayed away from politics and government.

For the majority of his career, Clark has worked in Hollywood, assisting producers, and ultimately focusing on screenwriting. He also worked at ad agencies in Manhattan. More recently, he has advocated for wind power initiatives and occasionally guest hosts on “The Young Turks,” a progressive Internet news show.