Redondo Beach Anti-Warrior

From the Easy Reader:

     One day a week since the Iraq war began on March 19, 2003, John Fortier has come to the corner of Pacific Coast Highway and Knob Hill Avenue.

     He usually has a chair, a crossword puzzle, a radio and a bottle of water. He always has a cardboard sign that reads, “War Is Not the Answer.” Affixed to the sign are a variety of medals he was awarded for his military service five decades ago, when he served as an aerial gunner aboard B-29 and B-26 bombers at the end of the Korean War. 

    Fortier, 75, downplays most of the medals, which he said were “not for valor but more for showing up as scheduled, sober and properly dressed The exception is the aerial gunner wings. Those I earned, first in 29s, then in 26s. “Having them on the sign…was inspired by a few pedestrians questioning what right I had to do what I was doing,” he added. “I figured the military 'bling' would be useful for establishing my 'service creds' and it seems to work.” 

    His goal is simple: “Just to get people to think about it.”

    Fortier said only about five drivers out of every hundred respond, most positively, with a honk or a thumbs up (about “99 percent” are on cell phones, he noted). Earlier in the war, people tended to be more abusive toward him, but as his protest has persisted he has seen the tide turn against the war. It still bothers him how little people really pay attention to what is occurring in Iraq.

     One day, Fortier was joined on the corner by a special visitor. A station wagon pulled up and a man in a wheelchair emerged from the vehicle. 

     “What are you doing?” he asked.

     "I’m protesting this war,” Fortier said. “I been to one, and I didn’t like it.”

     “Good for you, man,” the man replied. “Did you happen to see that movie, ‘Born on the Fourth of July’?” 

     “I did,” Fortier said. “Seemed like a good man.”

     “That’s me,” the man said. “I’m Ron Kovic.”

     They chatted for a few minutes, and Kovic eventually wheeled across the street and came back and gave Fortier a “Penguin” frozen yogurt from the store on the other side of PCH. 

     (I met Kovic in the early '90's at the Lighthouse in Hermosa Beach. He was animated, outgoing, and his story brought my friend Margaret to tears.) 

     Fortier has no plans to end his protest.

     “We’ve reduced their whole standard of living in Iraq to bare subsistence,” he said. “We’ve done a lot more harm than good. Why aren’t the people in the streets protesting?”