A Lifelong Hawk Finds Himself Amid the Doves : Protesters: Ken Blalack--archconservative, Republican, Vietnam booster--sees the Gulf conflict in an entirely different light.

Ken Blalack probably has the worst imaginable political credentials tobe an anti-war crusader.

He passionately supported Richard Nixon in the 1960 presidential election, proudly cast his first vote for Barry Goldwater in 1964, and was a Vietnam War hawk during his six years in the Navy.

But lately, something has come over this 47-year-old, white-haired, archconservative business consultant from La Mesa.

Anger over the Gulf War and fear for his Marine son stationed near the Kuwaiti border have turned Blalack into a committed anti-war demonstrator who attends rallies in the unlikely attire of his business suit and tie.

The onetime Vietnam War booster terms the Jan. 16 outbreak of war against Iraq “the most infamous day in this nation’s history”--a struggle, he says, between the colossal egos and ambitions of George Bush and Saddam Hussein.

As for the war’s chorus of boisterous backers, Blalack scoffs and asks: Why, if everybody is so fired up for the U.S. cause, isn’t there a rush to enlist in the armed forces?

“When I see these flag-waving patriots out there, it makes me mad as hell, the same day there are empty recruiting offices,” said Blalack, who enlisted in the Navy and served stateside from 1967 to 1973.

“I get the feeling everybody is popping popcorn and drinking beer and watching this on a TV,” groused Blalack, who couldn’t be a bystander to the Gulf War even if he wanted to.

Lee Blalack, 26, Blalack’s son by his first marriage, was in his last semester of graduate school, studying economics at Memphis State University, when he was called from the reserves back to active duty as a lance corporal with the 2nd Marine Division based at Camp Lejeune, N. C.

On Christmas Day, the young infantryman was deployed to the Middle East, and when Blalack thinks back to how he raised his son, he says remorsefully, “I taught my son to be patriotic, and I rue the day I did that.”

He’s not alone in his worry and his waiting.

His second wife, Laura, whom he married in 1967, and their 10-year-old son, Ryan, are with him. All three Blalacks are close to Lee, who visits them from Memphis during the summers.

“Your perspective certainly does change when you have somebody involved,” said Laura Blalack.

Blalack finds himself in strange company these days as he protests the war at the downtown Federal Building and on weekends at Balboa Park.

He remembers how he used to feel, back during the Vietnam days, when protesters took to the streets and people disdainfully stared at him and his obviously military haircut.

Even now, as he stands shoulder-to-shoulder with latter-day demonstrators, he isn’t entirely comfortable. “It’s the most awkward thing I’ve ever done in my life,” Blalack said.

Still, he has found a cross-section of society at the anti-war events--housewives, older people and the parents of military personnel--enough variety that any stereotyping of protesters as long-haired throwbacks to the ‘60s angers him.

“I plan to be in a business suit every time I go,” he said. “I just want to show there are normal, middle-American people who disagree with this.”

Still, the anti-war scene is out of character for Blalack, a computer expert and business consultant who said he has been a lifelong member of the Republican Party.

“I was brought up all of my life to believe communism was the evil of the world,” the Memphis native said, adding, “Coming from a Southern background, you were told to take what the President said verbatim.”

That credo served him during many Republican administrations, but a distrust of George Bush caused him to waver from his path of political righteousness.

Sometime during the initially cherished Reagan years, Blalack’s faith in Bush waned over the abortion issue. He believes Bush “vacillated” as the political winds blew, and finally sided with “his fundamentalist cohorts” to favor abortion restrictions.

“I’m not for abortion,” Blalack said. “It’s just not the right of government to step in and tell us how to run our lives. It was a civil libertarian issue.”

By the 1988 presidential election, Blalack had defected and posted one of the more unusual campaign signs in his or anybody else’s neighborhood. Handmade, it read, “Conservative Republican for Dukakis.”

“It got the neighbors’ attention, but that was about it,” he said.

Now, with the war, he is busy protesting, writing letters to members of Congress and commentaries to the newspapers. His exposure in the media has drawn “a ton of hate calls” to his home and business.

Blalack isn’t a pacifist; he’s willing to wage war to defend his country and its interests, he says.

And, although he dislikes Saddam Hussein, he believes Bush should have given sanctions more time to work against Iraq and that the President commenced firing to get the war over with well before the next election.

“I don’t believe George Bush wanted to launch a war at the beginning of the electoral season,” he said.

He fears a wider conflict, perhaps with Arabs unifying against the United States, and thinks Kuwait isn’t worth the price.

“I see these sheiks with 80 wives, and I wonder why my son is going to war for this little sheikdom,” he said.

Blalack doesn’t mind if the Palestinian problem is part of the discussion, and he thinks the allies should call a cease-fire and seek a mediated settlement now.

All the while, the family sorely misses Lee, who has told his father he supports both the war and the President.

Ten-year-old Ryan said he writes to Lee that “I miss him and I really don’t want him to go out and fight, and when he comes home, I hope he’ll tell me everything he’s done.”

The Blalacks know their views are not popular.

Blalack espouses his anti-war sentiments to his business clients, but his wife is reluctant, saying: “I find I don’t discuss it with many people, but it’s obvious that most people don’t agree with our positions. I’m not going to alienate our friends because of it.”

If they’ve gotten any appreciation, it’s been from an unwelcome source, Saddam Hussein, who took the opportunity of a television interview last week to thank American war protesters.

Blalack lets that slide off his back. “It doesn’t bother me; there’s nothing I can do about Saddam Hussein.”

But Laura Blalack is upset, saying: “I was extremely offended by it. I don’t want his gratitude or his thanks, because I’m not doing it for him.”

Aside from their opposition to the war, the Blalacks are much like other parents with sons and daughters in uniform. Each day, they watch and read the news, aching for it all to be over.