Pentagon calls peace meeting a “threat”

When a group of about 20 activists met in Lake Worth last year to talk about how to keep young men and women from joining the military, their ranks included five Quakers, a disabled Boca Raton man and a 79-year-old grandmother.

Members of that group, which now calls itself The Truth Project, consider themselves a harmless band of idealists and peaceniks.

But the Pentagon considered their inaugural 2004 meeting a “threat,” according to a classified database of information obtained by NBC News that lists information about suspicious people and activity inside the United States.

The Truth Project meeting, held at the Quaker Meetinghouse, was one of nearly four dozen antiwar meetings or protests listed on the 400-page document generated by an obscure Pentagon agency that analyzes intelligence reports on suspicious domestic activity, according to the report aired Tuesday on NBC’s Nightly News.

The database classified the Lake Worth meeting as one of more than 1,500 “suspicious incidents” across the country over a recent 10-month period.

People who attended the meeting were shocked to see their organization’s name on the database, but it got them thinking about a few strange faces at the gathering, people none of them had seen before. Since then, strangers have shown up at various group rallies to snap photos of the activists.

The group now thinks those strangers may have been “spies,” said Rich Hersh, spokesman for The Truth Project.

“When the Pentagon does something like this, they trample my constitutional and my civil rights,” Hersh said. “I’m 59 and disabled, and if I’m being spied on and judged a credible threat to recruiters, then a soccer mom is going to end up being the next person who’s judged a threat.”

The Pentagon released a statement Wednesday that implied — but did not explicitly acknowledge — that some information on the database had been handled improperly.

Members of The Truth Project have visited several area schools including Lake Worth High, working to counter the efforts of military recruiters by lecturing on alternatives to violence.

They provide literature and videos for teens, using only “peaceful, nonviolent means” to get their message across, said Evelyn Grachow, a 79-year-old grandmother who sits on the group’s board.

“When we saw (the database), our eyes fell out of our heads,” said Grachow, of West Palm Beach. “We really couldn’t believe what we were seeing, because all we do is give information to the young people in high schools who have been harassed by recruiters. There is never talk of our doing violence.”

Lisa Stewart, a Quaker who attended the Truth Project meeting, said the Quakers investigated the group before allowing them to use the meetinghouse.

She said she shares the group’s concern that a draft might be instituted during the Iraq war and wanted to find ways to deter students from enlisting.

“I just wanted to make sure this group was on the up and up and they weren’t a bunch of hotheads,” said Stewart, 68, a member of The Truth Project. “They were very much in keeping with (Quaker) principles.”

The Pentagon said Wednesday it was reviewing its use of the database. Pentagon spokesmen declined to discuss the matter on the record.

The Pentagon “views with the greatest concern any potential violation” of its policy governing the collection and handling of unvalidated information on suspected domestic intelligence threats, the statement said.

It added that Stephen Cambone, undersecretary of defense for intelligence, ordered a full review of the system for handling such information to ensure that it complies with Pentagon policies and federal law.

Cambone also ordered a review of whether Pentagon policies were being applied properly with respect to reporting and storing information about “U.S. persons” — people, not necessarily U.S. citizens, inside the United States. He ordered a review “to identify any other information that is improperly in the database,” the Pentagon statement said.

The House and Senate intelligence committees are to receive letters today spelling out these actions, officials said.

“The fact that the Pentagon would do this is absolute nonsense, and everyone in this country needs to be concerned,” Hersh said.

Kevin Deutsch