A Protest Close to Home : Activism: His son is a Marine. Her husband and son are in the Navy. Together they head a group of military families and others who say they support the troops, but oppose the war.

They say they are not anti-war activists. They are not peace activists. Alex Molnar and Judy Davenport are co-chairmen of the Military Families Support Network. Period.

“It is only this war we’re against,” Davenport says of the war in the Persian Gulf. They oppose what they call an unnecessary military offensive when they believe a diplomatic solution should have--and still can be--found.

Their message is simple: “Support the troops. Stop fighting. Start talking.”

Founded last November, the network says it now has at least 5,000 members with groups in 46 states and Washington. About 30% of the network’s members have relatives stationed in the Persian Gulf, Molnar says, and at least three-quarters of its state and national leaders are military family members, veterans or, in some cases, reserve officers.

They keep themselves narrowly focused--organizing opposition to the war and providing support to military families--and unlike several anti-war organizations, they don’t stress linkage of the war to domestic problems or U.S. foreign intervention.

“We’re a home for people who say, ‘We’re not interested in burning the American flag,’ ” Molnar says. “We have an idea it’s our flag.”

Molnar says the flag can’t be waved enough, buts urges Americans to take their government back “from the infidels” in Washington who he says no longer represent American ideals.

“If they (Congress) don’t oppose Desert Storm, we oppose them,” he says. “The only polls that matter are the ones on Nov. 3, 1992.”

As expected, reaction to the new organization is mixed.

Larry Rivers, executive director of the Veterans of Foreign Wars and a Vietnam veteran, has appeared with Davenport on a Washington talk show. He says, however, that his only direct knowledge of the network is television commercials the group has aired urging that troops not be sent to die for the emir of Kuwait’s oil.

“I suspect they have a political agenda independent of any support of the troops,” Rivers said.

Rivers doubts the network supports U.S. troops, recalling his own feelings about anti-war activists during the Vietnam War. He says he is unimpressed by their distinction that they support the troops, but not the war: “It’s not a distinction I can grasp.”

At the national headquarters of SANE/Freeze in Washington, the peace movement’s largest organization, acting executive director Monica Green said Molnar “touched a nerve.”

“It’s an indication that the political and social climate of the country is quite different than it was during the last big war. The phenomenon of Military Families shows just how different the peace movement is this time around. The coalitions that have formed are very diverse--military families, veterans, activists, religiously motivated people. (The Military Families) are the most visible part of the new movement, but in some ways they’re the tip of the iceberg.”

Rep. James Moody, a Democrat whose district includes Molnar’s hometown of Milwaukee, Wis., voted against authorizing the use of U.S. military force in the Gulf.

Marcus Kunian, Moody’s chief of staff, said Molnar and the network “have had a significant impact on us, and it is related to a broader issue. Bush is right. This is not a rerun of Vietnam, and Molnar’s group is reflective of the dramatic difference. They come from a position of support for the troops and individual life, rather than a blanket ‘we’re against the government’ stance. They are not anti-American.”

A spokeswoman for Rep. Les Aspin (D-Wis.), chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, says that while his staff heard frequently from members of the network before the war, “we’ve heard almost nothing since. I have a feeling their popularity has gone down.”

A professor of education at the University of Wisconsin in Milwaukee, Molnar, 44, has a son Chris, who is serving with the Marines in Saudi Arabia. When Chris, 21, was ordered overseas last August, Molnar wrote a scathing letter to President Bush, saying he doubted Bush “had either the courage or the character to meet the challenge of finding a diplomatic solution to this crisis.”

Molnar sent it to the White House, and to the New York Times, which published it on Aug. 23. No response has come from the White House, but many Americans did respond. Among them was Davenport, the 40-year-old wife of a career Navy man.

While Molnar waves the flag, Davenport ties yellow ribbons--like the one around a tree in her front yard at the Charleston Naval Base in South Carolina.

“My husband and I tied it the day before he left,” she says. Her husband, Larry, is a boiler technician on a destroyer that left for the Persian Gulf last September. Last week he called her from Bahrain to say he was coming home.

The ribbon is for Larry and her son, Eric, who serves on a submarine. It is also for all the troops she says she supports the only way possible--by opposing the war.

Davenport’s home answering machine says, “Keep praying for peace, but remember the Lord helps those who help themselves. Write your congressman.”

Last fall, opposed to what she saw as an unnecessary and unjustifiable deployment of troops and a coming war, Davenport said she decided she must protect her husband from his government. She called Molnar and said to him, “Well, heck, we can change the world.”

They, and several military families met in Washington to organize.

The Military Families Support Network now has a storefront office in Milwaukee, a Washington office staffed by two full-time volunteers, and 46 voluntary state coordinators.

What they are doing, besides demanding an end to the fighting, is pressuring elected representatives through phone calls, letters, visits, demonstrations and interviews with media.

They write letters to the editor and appear on or call into talk shows. They promise to hold officials accountable on Election Day. And they demand good medical care, job and educational opportunities for troops after the war has ended.

In addition they serve as a support and referral service for military families. They do anything from intervening to protest for families with several members sent to the Gulf, to giving advice on dealing with creditors. Recently, Davenport said she found child care for the infant of a single mother who was shipped out.

Molnar and Davenport visited Los Angeles last week, speaking to peace groups and members of the entertainment community. Their trip was sponsored by the Hollywood Policy Center, the educational, nonpartisan arm of the Hollywood Women’s Political Caucus.

They are an unlikely pair who share one thing in common besides their opposition to the war: This is their first time out; neither has ever been an activist. They say many in the network were also apolitical and never had seen themselves as activists.

Molnar is an academic, on leave this semester, with a background in history and political science. He says he opposed the Vietnam War, but not actively.

Davenport frequently refers to herself as a housewife and mother from Goose Creek who does not travel much and is unaccustomed to public speaking and fancy places. Born in Visalia and married at 17, Davenport says that during the Vietnam War era, “I was having babies. I’m ashamed to say I have not been involved. Those days are over.”

As a Navy wife, she served on the ombudsman council, speaking out for family issues, and recently was chairwoman of the ship’s support group.

She is well-known on the base, and says her new activism is accepted and respected by many. Wives call her late at night and support her, she says. But when she says, “Join me,” they demur, fearing for their husbands’ careers.

She says she’s been told by the public affairs officer at the base that she is naive to think her activities won’t hurt her husband’s career.

“The best thing my husband said to me is, ‘If anyone tells you to stop, then I’m in the Navy for the wrong reasons,’ ” she says.

Lt. Cmdr. Drew Malcolm, public affairs specialist at Charleston Naval Base, denies telling Davenport that her activities would affect her husband’s career.

“Judy and I talk probably once a week or more,” Malcolm said. “The only time we talked of his career was when she brought it up, telling me to pass it on that if his career was affected, she’d sue.”

Davenport defers to the articulate Molnar for most public presentations, seemingly using her remarks as a postscript.

But she has a gift for reaching a crowd, a way of convincing them of her sincerity. At times Davenport seems to sense that; something clicks, and her animation grows. Such as when she tells the story of her visit in Washington with her congressman, Arthur Ravenel Jr., a South Carolina Republican.

Ravenel, who confirmed their exchange, says Davenport is “kind of pathetic.” He acknowledges telling her that if he were her husband or son, he would be “so ashamed” of her, he’d resign from the military.

“I told him, ‘What shames me is that you represent me in Washington?’ ” Davenport says.

The story was met with a burst of applause at a gathering of peace activists last week in Bel-Air.

She is fully aware “every day of my life,” Davenport tells people, that her husband could be sent to war. That is not the issue, she says. Rather, “my husband and son took an oath to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States. The only person I see jeopardizing the Constitution of the United States at this time is George Bush.”

Molnar is no less passionate.

Of the congressional authorization, he says, “If 100 members of Congress had someone they loved in the Gulf, that vote would have gone differently. There are no Bushes, no Aspins, no Solarz’, no Mitchells, no Foleys over there. My point is, the recruitment stations are open. I’d have a lot more confidence (in the war) if members of congressional families started turning up at the recruiting stations.”