"Also testifying were two law school professors, a retired Army colonel [ANN WRIGHT] who resigned from the State Department in protest of the war, and a former senior U.N. official [DENIS HALLIDAY] in charge of humanitarian aid to Iraq who quit in protest of the effects of economic sanctions on the Iraqi people.
"But the star witness Saturday was one who has little personal connection to Iraq. However, Daniel Ellsberg has experience in acting against a war that he came to believe was wrong.
"The former Defense Department analyst leaked the top-secret Pentagon Papers to a New York Times reporter in 1971, exposing Johnson and Nixon administration lies about the war in Vietnam. He was put on trial for espionage, but the charges were eventually dropped.
"Ellsberg, 75, said Iraq, far more than Vietnam, “is clear-cut aggression, a crime against the peace.”
“'This war is almost unique among all wars,” he said. “We haven’t really had such a clear-cut challenge to us as democratic citizens and what to do when our country is engaging in such clear-cut aggression.”
"He praised Watada for figuring out his own course, even if it means prison.
“'The majority of the country is against this war. To oppose it incurs no risk,” Ellsberg said. “The only risk is in taking steps to stop it.”
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