George's Dirty Tricks

Thirty-eight years ago I was a 21-year old Marine Corps reservist/antiwar activist. I and two Air Force reservists had formed the G.I. Association, an anti Vietnam War group that organized reservists around the county to oppose that mortal sin of a war.

Needless to say the Nixon administration was not amused by our organizing efforts. They had a draft back then but, so many US kids were dying every week they had to keep stoking that furance with warm bodies, and they did not want us messing with those kid's heads.

While we advocated peace rather than violence and broke no laws, national or international, we suddenly found ourselves ass-deep in FBI agents wherever we went, 24/7. When my mail arrived an FBI would rush to the box and copy down the return addresses off the envelopes before returning them to the box. If he and I reached the box at the same time I had to wait until he was done.

This was hardly a covert operation. They wanted us to know they were there, watching. They amused themselves further by loosening the lug nuts on the wheels of our cars parked on the street overnight. After two of my wheels rolled by me on Golden Gate Bridge, I started checking the wheels instead of my oil every morning.