Among them in the streets of Philadelphia were at least a dozen currently-serving members of the U.S. military, part of the “Service Members’ Anti-War Contingent” organized by the Center on Conscience and War. Several others signed up to attend, but were not granted adequate leave to travel from their units.
Most of them are in the process of filing as conscientious objectors. They marched behind banners reading “Service Members Say No To War” and “Conscience Takes Courage.”
Consisting of officers and enlisted from the Air Force, Army, Navy and Marines, they constituted the largest gathering of currently-serving military personnel for an anti-war protest since the Vietnam War.
In the Mirror of History
During Vietnam, many thousands of service members became active participants in the anti-war struggle. What started as a tiny handful of dissenters in 1966, by summer of 1971 had grown to what the Pentagon estimated as half of all enlisted soldiers defecting to the anti-war movement.
The Ft. Hood Three in 1966: “We will not be part of this unjust, immoral, and illegal war.”
This historic rebellion compelled the US government to abandon the draft and avoid using it again. But the draft was not the sole reason service members refused to kill.
Throughout the so-called Global War On Terror (GWOT), thousands of service members, who had willingly volunteered for the military, filed as conscientious objectors; many after seeing the reality of war first hand. Others came home to join anti-war protests. Over 1,000 who had fought in Iraq joined Iraq Veterans Against the War under George W. Bush.
The author being arrested for protesting the Iraq War.
Many heroic soldiers in uniform publicly refused to deploy, electrifying the anti-war movement.
But even with those examples, and so many other veterans entering the fight to end the war, it was predominantly recently-discharged service members who joined the demonstrations. While opposition to the war was growing within the armed forces, open participation in protests by active-duty troops was more isolated. While this can partially be explained by fear of reprisal in a more hostile post-9/11 environment, perhaps a bigger factor was that the war still retained majority support up until the election of Barack Obama (who diffused the protest movement by vowing to withdraw).
Trump’s Operation Epic Fury did not enjoy majority support for a single day—and military-age Americans were substantially more likely to oppose the war than the general population. Only 24% of Gen Z supported it; the average enlistee and newly-commissioned officer today is of that generation.
A New Generation of Soldiers of Conscience
A notable feature of the July 4 protest is most of the active-duty participants were commissioned officers. Throughout Vietnam and the GWOT, the ranks of resistance were predominantly made up of lower enlisted troops.
Of the more than 50 Iraq war veterans who testified against the war at the 2008 Winter Soldier hearings, only one had been an officer. Most were E-4s.
Similarly during the Iraq war, those who became war resisters were almost all from the Army or Marines—the ones on the ground killing and dying. Today they seem to come equally from all branches.
Today’s military is not simply a post-9/11 generation, but a post-GWOT generation. Most of the July 4 protest participants currently serving in the military were born after the 2003 invasion of Iraq.
They have grown up with those wars and their lessons: total disasters that turned out to be for nothing, with a devastating humanitarian toll, kept alive endlessly by the lies of those in charge.
They became adults as the Afghanistan war, which spanned their entire lives, ended in defeat. What was all that death and destruction for?
Many began their military training during Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza. For the first time, the impact of American weapons on civilian populations was in front of their faces day and night. On average, young Americans spend over three hours per day on social media. For 734 days, their feeds contained the most harrowing images to ever cross their phone screen. And they were not separate from it—the institution they served was facilitating the whole thing.
So many soldiers and Marines came home from war to protest against it because of the suffering they saw first hand. Today’s troops can see the same from their barracks room.
Unfavorable views of Israel surged from 41% to 60% between 2022 and 2026, driven in large part by attitudes of young (enlistment-age) Americans. Service members were part of that demographic.
Then Donald Trump started a new war with a single ally: Israel. They began that war with two clear US war crimes: the bombing of the Minab girls school, and the sinking of the defenseless IRIS Dena.
This killing took place amidst troops patrolling our streets, partially to support ICE as they violated the Constitutional rights of citizens across the country (including killing two Americans, Renée Good and Alex Pretti in Minneapolis), as well as threats to deploy troops to polling places in November. It took place as totally unaccountable strikes in the Caribbean began killing fishermen, farmers and even human trafficking victims.
A flurry of immoral actions shouldered on a generation of service members with distinctly different attitudes than the one sent to Iraq and Afghanistan.
Compared with previous generations, those age 17-29 are markedly more skeptical of military intervention, less committed to maintaining U.S. military dominance, less willing to serve in the armed forces, and more likely to question traditional foreign policy assumptions.
In 2021, 55% of young Americans said they felt hopeful about the country’s future. Today, only 13% think the country is headed int he right direction. Only 15% of Americans under 30 trust the federal government to “do the right thing.” Only 18% of them trust Congress. Only 1 in 6 report high trust in the Executive branch. As of 2025, 50% support “socialism” or “democratic socialism” while only 39% say they support capitalism (a six point drop in just five years).
These feelings, coupled with a punishingly horrifying foreign policy over the last four years, has set a new stage. More service members called us for help filing as COs in March 2026 than ever before. But that may just be the beginning.
The entrance of more troops into an anti-war protest since Vietnam, at a time when there is no major active conflict nor a major anti-war movement—spanning all branches and prevalent among commissioned officers—is a great sign of hope. When the next conflict breaks out, we will see how deep it goes.
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For media inquiries, contact mike@centeronconscience.org.
