How to Start a Revolution Page #2

and were here today to discuss

how to seize political power

and deny it to others.

I say nonviolent struggle is armed struggle,

and we have to take back that term

from those advocates of violence

who try to justify with pretty words

that kind of combat.

Only with this type of struggle,

one fights with psychological weapons,

social weapons, economic weapons,

and political weapons,

and this is ultimately more

powerful against oppression,

injustice, and tyranny than is violence.

That got my attention.

This is the flag of the 5th Battalion,

7th United States Cavalry.

The 7th Cav, as you know,

was the Regiment of General Armstrong Custer,

who fought and died at the

battle of Little Big Horn.

Thats me in my younger days.

A full head of hair.

This is the award for the Distinguished

Service Cross, that I got in Vietnam.

Vietnam, 1968

In 1968, Bob was deployed in Vietnam.

He was decorated for bravery

during a Vietcong ambush.

But his experiences there would change his

views on the way conflicts should be waged.

I think Vietnam influenced my view about

the importance of nonviolent struggle,

and particularly the importance of getting Gene

Sharps ideas out to the rest of the world,

because we must have an alternative.

Vietnam convinced me that we need to

have an alternative to killing people.

Burma, 1992

As a US defense official in Burma,

Bob had seen the military dictatorship there,

persecute the minority Karen people.

After leaving the army,

Bob traveled back to the rebel camps to teach the

Karen Gene's lessons in nonviolent resistance.

I was talking to one of the Karen Commandos

and he says:
Where in the hell

has this information been?

Weve been fighting and killing people for 20 years.

How come we didnt know this?

Some of the Burmese came up to him and asked

if he would write something for the Burmese on

how to move from a dictatorship to a democracy.

Thats the origin of why the book was written:

the Burmese.

I couldnt write about Burma honestly,

because I didnt know Burma well,

and he said not to write about something

you dont know anything about,

so I had to write generically.

If there was a movement that wanted

to bring a dictatorship to an end,

how could they do it?

And so I wrote those theories,

and they were serialized there,

and published in English and in Burmese,

and I thought that was it.

In 1989, Gene traveled to China at the height

of the demonstrations in Tiananmen Square.

Tiananmen Square, 1989

It would shape his views about the

importance of planning and strategy.

Lesson 1:
Plan a Strategy

Id gone to Beijing

after the Tiananmen Square

protests were well underway.

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