By Michele Richinick
Justiniano Rodrigues said he made the wrong choice, and the realization almost came too late.
In August 2003, Rodrigues, then a freshman finance major at Northeastern, enlisted in the US Army Reserves, believing his service would allow him to travel to parts of the world he’d never seen. At the time, the thought that he’d experience real combat hadn’t crossed his mind, he said.
“It wasn’t until I went to training that I realized I couldn’t be there. I started to reflect on the actual experience I would go through during war, and realized killing went against my religion,” said Rodrigues, a Roman Catholic. “When you’re in there and realize you’re not going to be shooting at targets forever you realize what values you have and what you are capable of doing.”
In January 2006, Rodrigues’ reservations came to life when he was called to active duty and sent from Boston to Camp Atterbury in Edinburgh Indiana, for three months of training in the 220th Transportation Company. But before he even left, Rodrigues was convinced that his religion clashed with the objectives of the war he would likely be fighting in.
Hoping to resolve the conflict, Rodrigues consulted one of the sergeants at the base in Massachusetts where he had weekly training. She told Rodrigues that it looked like he could qualify for conscientious objection (CO).
Filing for CO status varies between the different branches of the military. In the Army, the soldier must first provide documentation and submit an administrative action form requesting discharge or non-combat duty. A chaplain then reviews the form to determine whether it is a valid request. If it is, they set up an interview with the individual and have a hearing if the action is not denied, said Captain (CPT) Julie Craig, executive officer and associate professor of military science.
Since the invasion of Iraq in March 2003, about 300 US Army soldiers have applied for CO status, according to the most recent data from the Army. Of those, slightly more than half have been approved.
“The only time I have come close to hearing someone say they were a conscientious objector was when a soldier who had been in the army for two to three weeks wanted to get out and said that his congressman would allow him to leave because his wife will leave him if he didn’t,” said Master Sergeant Jeremy Wentworth, a senior military instructor.
Rodrigues made several attempts to apply for CO status in Massachusetts, but he said he received little guidance. Still unsuccessful when he arrived in Indiana, Rodrigues began to take steps on his own. He met with various people to begin the process, including psychologists.
“[One psychologist] told me, ‘You’re from Africa and there is war there all the time,'” Rodrigues said. “It was an ignorant and frustrating conversation to have. I was offended.” Rodrigues continued training anyway, maintaining the same daily routine as his fellow soldiers, which included firing exercises.
When a soldier applies for CO status, the military is not supposed to force the soldier to participate in activities that involve shooting, Rodrigues said.
“I stood up against my commander, which was difficult because it was the boss,” Rodrigues said. “He said [shooting] was something I was going to have to do and he said I would carry my weapon to Kuwait until my CO passed. It didn’t make sense that I should do something against what I was applying for, so I refused.”
Training in Indiana proved long, and it prepared the soldiers for the mindset needed in Iraq, Rodrigues said.
One day the Iraqis who worked at the base came to training and the soldiers practiced how they would search them if they were in Iraq, Rodrigues said.
“It was intimidating searching someone because they spoke their own language and we had to go up to them and tell them what to take off to search them,” he said. “I realized it wasn’t something I would want to do to another human being. It was a strange feeling.”
At the time when training ended in August 2006 Rodrigues and his fellow soldiers were sent home for two days to say goodbye to their families before deploying.
Rodrigues never returned to Indiana and never shipped to war. “When we were leaving Indiana, one of the soldiers said, ‘F this, no one should live this life,'” Rodrigues said. “I had already made up my mind about not trusting the company by then, but his words affected me.”
When Rodrigues refused to return to Indiana, none of his CO forms had been processed. With no approved reason to leave the Reserves, Rodrigues went Absent Without Official Leave (AWOL). The military defines AWOL status as the abandonment of a soldier’s duty without permission by the government or a commander.
AWOL soldiers are classified as deserters and dropped from their unit’s roster after 30 days of absence. According to US Army statistics, in the 2006 fiscal year Rodrigues was one of 3,196 soldiers who deserted the Army. AWOL soldiers run the risk of arrest or deployment.
“At that point I didn’t trust the war and wasn’t going to leave the country with a company I didn’t trust because of their misguiding,” Rodrigues said. “That’s when I decided to go AWOL.”
After going AWOL in 2006, Rodrigues lived in his hometown of Amherst and stayed in contact with a lawyer. Army captains called Rodrigues’ house and said they were going to send police to track him down, Rodrigues said.
Fearing both arrest and deployment overseas, Rodrigues spoke with American Friends Service Committee Members on the GI Hotline. The hotline assists soldiers in understanding their rights, Rodrigues said.
The phone call proved a valuable one, helping Rodrigues secure a lawyer.
“After speaking with the lawyer I didn’t know what to expect,” Rodrigues said. “So I went to the base in Oklahoma with my lawyer and turned myself in so I wouldn’t be caught by the police for going AWOL. There was no way I was going to go to jail [if caught].”
At that time, there were no military personnel on base in Oklahoma because everyone had been sent to Iraq, Rodrigues said. The only people on base were government workers, he said.
“Nothing bad happened – I got in a military cruiser and then they took me to the office where people who turn themselves in go,” Rodrigues said. “I spent one week at the barracks and then they out-processed and discharged me.”
Rodrigues never finished the CO process before he went AWOL, leaving him with what is called an Other Than Honorable Discharge. But he is looking forward to completing the form and gaining honorable discharge from the Army.
At first, the officials misguided Rodrigues, which led him to complete the form and set-up his own interview with the chaplain during his free time, he said. Rodrigues said he had no assistance with the process whatsoever.
Rodrigues was told that the final step to his process, the hearing, might be in Iraq. The officials were unsure where it was going to be, Rodrigues said.
After three years of attempts to secure his status in the Army, Rodrigues transferred to the University of Massachusetts Amherst where he is now a senior resource economics major. He hopes to complete the CO process in the future so he can upgrade to honorable discharge.
“Soldiers didn’t understand me but treated me like a human being and that made a difference to be in a friendly environment even though they knew I might not have been going to Iraq with them,” he said. “They were like brothers to me.”
