The first thing Anne Roesler does every morning is check the Internet for news of the 82nd Airborne.

It's the same anxious routine followed by thousands of American parents with children stationed in Iraq. But with Roesler there's one major difference:

Anne Roesler holds a picture of her son while framed by a sign made for a San Francisco peace rally in February.

She passionately opposes the war fought by her son, an Army staff sergeant with the 82nd Airborne Division.

If most military parents are consoled by "support our troops" patriotism, Roesler and others opposed to the U.S. occupation say theirs is a special isolation. Yes, they support the troops. But when they oppose the war, some people question not just their loyalty to their country, but also to their children.

Roesler was communicating with other Bay Area military parents until the war started. "And then several of them felt that we had to close ranks (and support the Bush administration) because that was what patriotism was all about," Roesler said. "And I said, 'Absolutely not. That's not what patriotism means to me.' "

On Saturday, Roesler will join a small contingent of military parents in an anti-war march in San Francisco. The event begins with a rally at 11 a.m. in Civic Center, followed by a march to Jefferson Square Park. Along with a demonstration Saturday in Washington, D.C., it figures to be one of the largest protests since the war began in March.

Both demonstrations are drawing energy from parents and spouses who go to the mailbox each morning hoping to see a letter from Iraq, and go to bed each night dreading a knock at the door.

In recent months, hundreds have joined organizations like Military Families Speak Out and the newly formed Bring Them Home Now. Several parents have publicly shared the demoralization, fear and concern gleaned from letters and calls from their children in Iraq. A Pennsylvania mother made headlines in September by shopping for body armor for her son after hearing that the Pentagon wouldn't be able to supply every soldier with updated vests until December.

Yet the moral authority that the voice of the military parent lends to the peace movement comes with a price.

"There is a social pressure not to speak out,'' said Judith Ross, a 57- year-old San Franciscan with a son in the Marines. She is organizing a contingent of families for Saturday's demonstration, but like many military parents, she asked that her son's name not be used so backlash about her activism wouldn't touch him.

At one Washington, D.C., demonstration earlier this year, a man approached Military Families Speak Out co-founder Charley Richardson and told him, "You're a disgrace to your son,'' Richardson said. He was carrying a sign reading, "Our son is a Marine. Don't send him to a war for oil."

Asked how his son feels about his activism, Richardson said, "We don't speak for him, but he supports our right to speak out."

In Saratoga, Roesler also asks that her son's name not be used. But otherwise, her heart races and mind wanders just like any other parent with a child in combat.

Anxiety nearly paralyzed her from the moment her 25-year-old landed in the Middle East in February until the first time he called her in June.

Her son is not a letter-writer; the only note he has sent was scribbled on the back of an MRE box shortly before the U.S. invasion in March. Roesler began sobbing as she recalled the few lines on the back of the makeshift postcard.

"He just said, 'I'm OK, I'm going to be OK, I'll be home soon,' " Roesler said. "But I live in fear of getting that knock on the door. I don't know what my life would be like without him, but I refuse to believe that anything bad is going to happen to him."

The 50-year-old Roesler grew up in a military family. Her father was wounded in World War II, and her grandfather fought in World War I. Now, however, her home office is covered with peace banners, bumper stickers and a photo of her son in uniform.

When her son said he wanted to join the military, she wasn't happy and she told him so. He didn't need money for college, but felt he needed to have more structure and discipline in his life.

Eventually, Roesler understood that and respected his reasons for enlisting. Likewise, she said, her son respects her activism; he has since he was in the fifth grade. That's when somebody asked him what his mother did for a living. He responded, "She wants to save the world."

"And it's become a family joke since then,'' Roesler said. "Everybody says I want to save the world."

Lately, she says, she's noticed a change in her son in the phone calls she gets from him every five weeks or so. He's been having tea with Iraqi families, trying to understand their culture and the source of the differences between the United States and Iraq.

He's told his mother that after his hitch is over in 2007, he wants to return to the Middle East as a civilian to help the two cultures understand each other better and "prevent all this miscommunication that leads to war," Roesler said.

Jane Bright's son joined the military three years ago for many of the same reasons as Roesler's son. The discipline. The structure. A natural leader,

Evan Ashcraft was promoted quickly, rising to the rank of sergeant in the 101st Airborne Division.

A year ago, his mother began attending anti-war demonstrations in Los Angeles, where she lives, hoping to keep the war from starting and stop her son from being sent to fight it.

When she failed and Ashcraft was sent overseas, she continued to lobby to bring American soldiers home. Mother and son never discussed her protests; she didn't want her son to feel that she disagreed with what he was doing.

On July 24, the Jeep in which Ashcraft was riding was ambushed by a grenade attack. Ashcraft died instantly, leaving behind his wife of three years. He was supposed to come home this month.

A few weeks after Ashcraft's death, the military sent home the contents of his pockets to his wife. "I don't want to know what was in there,'' Bright said. "I can't. It's too poignant."

Instead, she will honor his memory by continuing to speak out against the war that killed her son. No matter what other people say to her.

"To me," Bright said, "supporting the troops means bringing them home now. ''

©2003 San Francisco Chronicle

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