Free The Burglary by Betty Medsger

Davidon as leader and as friend. He still marvels at the simplicity of the idea: get files that document what the FBI is doing, give those files to the public. Only an impressive mind, braced with great courage, could envision carrying out that obvious but frightening and challenging plan to get evidence. Durst thought the idea should be tested as soon as possible. He told Davidon he wanted to be part of the group.
    Smith and Durst agreed to be interviewed for this book but not to be named. They and Janet Fessenden, the only member of the group who has not been found, will be referred to by fictitious names. The other five burglars have agreed to be identified.
    DAVIDON FINISHED his recruitment shortly before the December holidays. He rarely shows pride, but he did years later when he thought about the people who had said yes to his invitation. He smiled as he remembered their good qualities. From the beginning, he was sure he had assembled a fine team. Together they deepened their skills as amateur burglars and after research decided the break-in should be attempted.
    They were in many ways ordinary but at the same time extraordinary. They were part of that group of acutely aware people who during the Vietnam War took to heart and mind their belief that war was the most powerful act their government carried out on behalf of the public using citizens’ money and lives. Therefore, they thought they had a responsibility to study and understand the war and to engage with fellow citizens and government officials regarding this monumentally important thing, war. In recent years, after many years of participating in rallies, demonstrations, and letter writing, they had engaged in acts of resistance, not with enthusiasm, but because to them doing so was a necessity in the face of government officials’ continued refusal to consider arguments that the war was an unjust one and should stop.
    The war was on their minds daily. They did not know how to be indifferent. They had a keen sense of empathy that led them to identify with the agony of American troops and the agony of the Vietnamese people. The numbers alone were enough to propel such people to think, in frustration, “How long can this go on? What else can we do?” For nearly a decade, Americans woke up hearing daily news reports about “yesterday in Vietnam,” followed by the number of American troops, the number of South Vietnamese, and the number of North Vietnamese and Viet Cong who had been killed. This regular roll call of the dead was an ongoing marker of the dimensions of the war and, in the minds of many activists, a depressing reminder of their failure to stop it.
    The downward spiral toward hopelessness in 1970 that Davidon wanted to stem was a reflection, in part, of those growing numbers. In some months, more than five hundred American soldiers were killed. In the end, the totals were: 58,152 Americans killed; 2 million Vietnamese civilians and 1.1 millionVietnamese military killed. For Americans, the losses were enormous. For the Vietnamese, they were simply staggering. Vietnam lost 12 to 13 percent of its population in the war. To put that loss in perspective, if the United States had lost the same portion of its 1970 population, 28 million people would have died—a number that would have represented the killing of every man, woman, and child who lived in California, Arizona, and Michigan at the time.
    Other statistics reflect the amount of dissent that took place. Between 1965 and 1970, more than 170,000 young men were officially recognized asconscientious objectors who refused to fight for religious or moral reasons. Later in the war, others refused to serve because of their opposition to this particular war and sought recognition as selective conscientious objectors, a category of refusal to serve that was recognized as valid late in the war by the U.S. Supreme Court. Formal charges were brought against 209,517 young men for violating