Category: Nonviolence

The Nuclear Arms Race Has to Stop!

Leave a comment

by Ann Froines, Back from the Brink

August 6 and August 9 were the anniversaries of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki by the United States Army Air Forces just days before the end of World War II. Our national and local media gave little attention to this anniversary, even as the Hibakusha—Japanese survivors of these bombings—still tell their stories in their international campaign for nuclear disarmament and world peace. NHK World – Japan, the international public television station of Japan, carried the film, The Pursuit of Peace, which describes the decades of worldwide peacemaking by the Hibakusha. Their goal is to make the Nagasaki bombing the last atomic explosion humankind will ever face.

Back from the Brink-CT Hub offers readers this update on media resources in the campaigns to prevent nuclear testing, for nuclear diplomacy (treaties) and the eventual abolition of nuclear weapons.

1. Back from the Brink website (preventnuclearwar.org) now has a series of podcasts from experts and activists discussing nuclear abolition. One podcast features Tina Cordova, a co-founder of the Tularosa Basin Downwinders Consortium (trinitydownwinders.com) which advocates for those affected by radiation as a result of the first atomic explosion at the Trinity Nuclear Weapon Testing Ground in New Mexico, other tests in the Solomon Islands and elsewhere in the Pacific.

After a 20-year campaign directed at the U. S. Congress, $8 billion was appropriated for compensation to the victims who suffered from radiation poisoning, many cancer deaths, and increased infant mortality. See the website for information about the 2023 documentary film, First We Bombed New Mexico.

2. An Ordinary Insanity is a 30-minute film of Daniel Ellsberg’s final plea for nuclear disarmament, made freely available to all by the Ellsberg family as his final legacy before his death. Ellsberg, well before the Pentagon Papers reveal and controversy, started his career at the Rand Corporation developing nuclear weapon strategy. His plea argues that “national security” cannot be obtained by nuclear weapon superiority or an arms race, but instead guarantees just the opposite: the end of civilization in a nuclear Armageddon. Search for “anordinaryinsanity’ to find the film available on YouTube.

Readers, please join this campaign by writing to U.S. Sen. Chris Murphy urging him to support Senate Resolution 323, an act urging the United States to pursue a verifiable agreement among nuclear-armed states to eliminate their nuclear arsenals. These unstable times show the urgency of taking nuclear weapons off hair-trigger alert.

Back from the Brink-CT preventnuclearwar.org
ann.froines@gmail.com

Resisting the War on Gaza: An Appeal from the New Haven Sunday Vigil

Joan Cavanagh, vigil participant

We are witnessing, in real-time, ongoing genocide against the people of Gaza. It could not occur without US military aid and financial support. We urgently appeal to you to join the New Haven Sunday Vigil for Peace and Justice as part of your other efforts to end this atrocity.

The vigil began in May of 1999 as a project of the Connecticut Peace Coalition/ New Haven in response to the US bombing of Kosovo. Similar to the postal service before privatization, defunding, and DeJoy, we’ve vigiled most Sundays since, in sun, rain, snow and sleet, in temperatures ranging from several degrees below zero to 95 degrees above. Our message is simple: Resist this Endless War. By this we mean, resist our permanent state of war and preparations for it, overseas and at home.

Participant numbers have fluctuated from a “high” of 15 to 20 during the initial post-911 invasion of Afghanistan and the 2003 war on Iraq to a “low” of three to four in recent years. Occasionally, we’ve been told by a dismissive passerby that the US is “at peace.” Not exactly. Consider our ongoing nuclear weapons buildup; our drone bombings against many countries of the world; our “covert” operations and global regime change maneuvers; and our funding of wars conducted by client states. Consider our government’s war on poor and vulnerable populations to benefit a smaller and smaller number of global ultra-rich. Remember that these are ongoing, bipartisan issues.

When our regular vigil participants dwindled to a new low at the end of last summer, we figured we’d had a good run and considered ending it. Then came the terrible October 7 attack by Hamas on Israel, followed immediately by an orgy of collective punishment supported by US funds and materiel against civilians in Gaza. It has, as of this writing, taken the lives of over 25,000 people, an estimated two-thirds of whom are children.

We continue with more urgency than ever. We need your help. For more information about the content of the vigil and how to join, please call 203-668-9082 or contact joan.cavanagh@gmail.com or  monicaxavieramcg@gmail.com.

Ban Russian Uranium, But Work with Russia against Nuclear War

by Stanley Heller, Administrator, Promoting Enduring Peace

Every year hundreds of millions of dollars are spent by U.S. companies to buy raw and enriched uranium from Russia. Profits from these sales are helping fund Russia’s war against Ukraine. It’s hypocritical for the U.S. government to demand European countries stop importing Russian natural gas while we import uranium from the very same country.

The U.S. has allowed itself to depend on major uranium imports from Russia and Russian-allied Kazakhstan, but we are not simply calling for increases in domestic uranium production. Uranium mining usually comes at a steep price in pollution of Native American land. There’s also the fact that the uranium is being used chiefly by the nuclear power industry.

Besides the usual worries about the safety of nuclear power plants and lack of a long-term plan for disposal of nuclear waste, this year we’ve learned of a grave new concern, that parties at war will not automatically give a wide berth to nuclear power plants. Russia shelled and took over the Zaporizhya nuclear power complex and its attacks on Ukraine’s electric power grid in November have cut normal and vital electric power to all four Ukraine’s nuclear power complexes.
The U.S. should stop importing Russian uranium and start a crash program to transition away from costly and environmentally damaging uranium and fossil fuel dependence.

The above is the text of a petition we are sponsoring along with the Ukrainian Socialist Solidarity Campaign. It’s a one-two punch, one punch against Russian aggression and another against the costly and dangerous nuclear power industry. We hope you’ll consider signing. We link it at our site: PEPeace.org.

Another and even bigger nuclear issue is the possibility that the war over Ukraine could become a nuclear war. Putin has made several scarcely veiled threats to that effect. As Daniel Ellsberg has said, Putin is acting like the U.S. has done on many occasions. What can be done? While we want nuclear weapons to be abolished entirely, we see that we have to do things in the short run to dampen down the possibility that wars go nuclear. The Defuse Nuclear War campaign has many good ideas: 1) Abolish the ICBMs, the land-based nuclear-armed missiles; 2) make a no-first-use pledge and structure nuclear weapons policy around it; 3) Take nuclear weapons off hair-trigger alert; 4) rejoin nuclear treaties that Trump renounced.

Read more about this at our site: PEPeace.org.

Coming up in late February:

Promoting Enduring Peace and Workers Voice US will support a fund-raiser for the independent miners union in Ukraine, NGPU (Independent Mineworkers Union of Ukraine). The union faces enormous challenges, first from an invader who frequently cuts electricity even while miners are below the earth and second from a government that pushes anti-labor measures in its Rada (parliament). For an interview with a miner leader see the Ukraine/Russia links in the Resources section of PEPeace.org.

NO New Tridents: The Campaign Against the Columbia Ballistic Missile Submarine

by Stephen Kobasa, NO New Tridents Campaign

Seventy-seven years after the horrors visited upon Hiroshima and Nagasaki by the first use of nuclear weapons, the United States continues to construct new threats to all creation.

Machines age, and grow useless. The Trident ballistic missile submarines are no exception. First put into service in 1981, they are approaching the end of their expected operational life. But instead of allowing them to simply pass into obsolescence and remove the threat which they pose to all creation, our government is undertaking to replace them with a new weapon to assure that the threat continues without intermission.

The Columbia class of submarines has been described as the Navy’s top priority program, which will be funded even if that comes at the expense of other Navy programs. Each sub will carry sixteen missile tubes, eight fewer than the current Ohio-class Tridents, but will also have updated propulsion and stealth capabilities which will magnify their threat. They will initially carry the existing Trident II D-5 missile, but designs for both a new missile and warhead are now underway.

Plans are for the production of twelve boats at a projected cost that is presently estimated at $103 to $109 billion. Initial construction has already begun at Newport News Shipbuilding in Virginia, with final assembly to take place at Electric Boat in Groton, CT, beginning this year, ahead of schedule. A new facility for that exclusive purpose is now being built in the Groton shipyard.

At a time when the consequences of global warming and pandemic are being experienced in the lives of all humanity on a daily basis, we condemn the reckless and immoral commitment of human creativity and treasure to these weapons which threaten to erase all creation, and by their mere existence deny fundamental rights to human freedom and community. It is obviously clear that they would constitute a crime against both humanity and the environment.

The NO New Tridents campaign proposes to undertake programs of public education, lobbying and nonviolent civil disobedience calling for the immediate abandonment of the Columbia submarine, and the diversion of funds set aside for its construction to policies that will realize the rights of all the world’s people to healthcare, housing, education, income equity and racial justice.

The Norfolk Catholic Worker will be the primary organizer around the Newport News Shipyard, while the Hartford Catholic Worker will coordinate the witness at Electric Boat.

Contacts: Jackie Allen-Doucot, purplehousecw@gmail.com, Stephen Kobasa, stephen.kobasa@gmail.com.

We Are in a Climate Emergency

Melinda Tuhus, CT Climate Crisis Mobilization (C3M)

In light of the release of the latest – and grimmest – report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, two dozen New Haveners gathered on the Green on Friday, Aug. 13, to raise the alarm locally.

The report says humans have definitively caused the warming of the planet, that it is accelerating, but that there is still a small window of opportunity to avoid the worst impacts, like global drowning from sea level rise. One banner pointed to the rise in sea level, which could be as much as 30 feet by 2100 without drastic action, putting New Haven and the entire Connecticut shoreline underwater.

Joe Foran came with his eldest son, Joseph, who is 7. Foran said that after listening to dire climate news on the radio every morning, “My two sons were upset and asked me to not play the radio before school.” Later he added, “We are not just avoiding the news altogether. We are struggling as a family with how we tell them the truth in a way that is not overly burdensome to their young minds and young souls. I think the real thing that makes a difference for the kids are actions like today, where they gain their agency and they aren’t just passive victims of the climate madness.”

The other focus of the rally was to point out that Chase Bank is the biggest funder, by far, of the fossil fuel industry and to call on Chase to specifically stop funding Enbridge’s construction of the Line 3 tar sands pipeline across Anishinaabe treaty territory in northern Minnesota.

As an organizer with CT Climate Crisis Mobilization (C3M) I went to Minnesota and was one of 700 people – and counting – to be arrested along the pipeline route.

Eluned Li, a member of Sunrise New Haven, went to Minnesota in June, where she observed peaceful water protectors being abused by the police departments that are paid by Enbridge.

Members of ULA (Unidad Latina en Acción) came, holding a banner featuring Berta Cáceres, an indigenous land defender in Honduras who was murdered for her courageous opposition to a dam project. The climate crisis and the migration crisis are linked, with many ULA members fleeing their homes in Central America due to the ravages of stronger hurricanes and devastating drought.

After the rally, participants carried banners down the block to stand in front of Chase Bank, chanting, “Hey, JP Morgan Chase: bad investment, big disgrace!” and, “If you want it drier, hotter, fund Line 3: wipe out more water!” The company is taking five billion gallons of water for construction in the middle of a drought. Participants passed out flyers asking New Haveners to contact CEO Jamie Dimon.

To get involved, contact Melinda Tuhus at melinda.tuhus@gmail.com or go to the website www.CTClimateCrisisMobilization.org or Facebook page CTClimateCrisis Mobilization.

[A version of this article with the above (donated) photo was published in the New Haven Independent Aug. 15. https://www.newhavenindependent.org/index.php/archives/entry/climate_rally]

Israel’s Actions Long Past Self-Defense

by Shelly Altman, Chairperson of Jewish Voice for Peace New Haven

The threatened eviction of Palestinian families in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood of East Jerusalem. The invasion of the Al Aqsa mosque by Israeli troops, firing rubber-coated steel bullets, tear gas and stun grenades. The bombing of the building in Gaza which housed the Associated Press and Al Jazeera press organization. All during the pandemic raging in Gaza. It’s all a pattern of erasure that is part and parcel of Israel circa 2021. Erasure of any trace of Palestinian presence between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River. Erasure of Jerusalem’s status as a holy city for three faiths. Erasure of news reporting of what’s going on in Gaza.

At the same time, Israel attempts to use its self-description as a Jewish state to erase any criticism of its crimes by labeling such criticism as anti-Semitic. But it is this state that is corrupting the meaning of Judaism and is dangerously fanning the flames of anti-Semitism worldwide.

President Biden and Secretary of State Antony Blinken, nearly silent for so long on war crimes visited upon the civilian Palestinian population in the Occupied Territories, suddenly become vocal when Hamas fires rockets into Israel. Israel “has a right to defend itself,” they say. Dozens of American politicians deceitfully follow suit. But courageous voices in the Congress are now exposing this “right to defend” messaging for its utter failure to acknowledge reality. Reps. Rashida Tlaib, Cori Bush, Mark Pocan, Betty McCollum, Sen. Bernie Sanders and others have pulled open the blinds to expose to the American public the brutality of Israel’s rule. They speak to empty chambers, but their voices echo loud and clear.

Israel is not “defending itself.” It is a heavily militarized occupying force that is using that military strength to oppress and kill those whom it is occupying. That is not defense.

In January, the B’Tselem report “This is Apartheid” documented in detail that “the entire area is organized under one principle: advancing and perpetuating the supremacy of one group — Jews — over another — Palestinians.” In April, the Human Rights Watch report “A Threshold Crossed” added further documentation: separate legal systems, separate road systems, illegal transfer of populations, no freedom of movement, residency rights, or building rights, and an intent by the state of Israel to maintain this in perpetuity. In Sheikh Jarrah and throughout East Jerusalem, we are witnessing 1948 Naqba in real-time 2021: people driven from their homes, the very essence of the Zionist project.

The highly respected Jewish journalist Peter Beinart recently wrote: “The crimes of the past, when left unaddressed, do not remain in the past.” It is well past time to address those crimes.

Shelly Altman is chairperson of Jewish Voice for Peace New Haven.

This opinion piece was published in the New Haven Register on May 19, 2021.

Notes to PAR Readers

We urge you to check the internet for the many demonstrations protesting the bombing of Gaza. As of this printing, there were rallies and marches in Hartford, New London, New Haven, and Manchester, as well as in cities throughout the US and around the world. The New Haven rally and march on May 22 was in solidarity with the people of Palestine and Colombia, fighting for their right to life and self-determination. Video footage is available at thestruggle.org.

A reminder that PAR does not publish in the summer. The next issue you receive will be the September issue. If your subscription has expired with this issue, you will have a renewal form inserted in this issue. Please look for it and renew your subscription. We ask for $13, or whatever you can afford.

Please let us know if you find out that regularly-occurring meetings or events have resumed so we can list them in our calendar pages. E-mail us at parnewhaven@hotmail.com. Many of the previously regularly scheduled programs have changed frequency, gone on hiatus, or switched to Zoom. We want to keep our readers in the know so they have options for activism.

Are you computer-proficient? We’d like help on the Production Team. We currently use a combination of Word and Open Office for this newsletter, and are open to suggestions for other programs for layout. E-mail parnewhaven@hotmail.com and put “computer-proficient help” in the subject line. A stipend may be available.

Letter to Judge Requesting Leniency in Sentencing of Mark Colville

by Promoting Enduring Peace

Mark Colville is scheduled to be sentenced April 9 for his participation in the Kings Bay Plowshares anti-nuclear action. The following letter was sent to the judge who will sentence him. For information: kingsbayplowshares7.org.

February 12, 2021

The Honorable Lisa Godbey Wood
U.S. District Court, Southern District of Georgia
801 Gloucester Street, Brunswick, GA 31520

Dear Justice Wood:

I write to you on behalf of the members of Promoting Enduring Peace, an organization founded in Connecticut in 1952. Our mission is to bring together the movements for international peace, planetary harmony, and social justice. We are best known for the American equivalent of the Nobel Peace Prize, known as the Gandhi Peace Award, bestowed first on Eleanor Roosevelt in 1960, and since then presented annually to leaders of peace and progress such as Martin Luther King, Jr., Daniel Ellsberg, César Chávez, and Ralph Nader.

Since 1952 we have supported nonviolent ways to highlight the need to put aside weapons of mass destruction that threaten civilization. We are especially moved by peace advocates willing to pay a price to carry out their religious commitment to peace via nonviolent action.

In that regard, we implore you to show leniency in the sentencing of Mark Colville, regarded in our community as a great moral leader. We ask specifically that his sentence be time served.

We ask you to consider the nature of the time when Mark Colville and the other members of the Kings Bay Plowshares entered the Naval facility. They were responding in a noble and completely nonviolent way to the announcement of a $10 trillion “modernization” campaign of U.S. nuclear weapons, and when the President renounced virtually all U.S. weapons control treaties and threatened to “totally destroy” North Korea. These few explained that they were desperate to warn the world that we were on a path towards nuclear war. We believe that all of us should follow their example in taking a stand against these supremely destructive weapons systems. But at the time of the Plow-shares action, no one else was listening.

Many of us in Promoting Enduring Peace personally know Mark Colville and can attest to his outstanding and merciful work for the homeless. His family home has been a soup kitchen for years. He has also made great efforts to stop torture everywhere. He has now served 15 months in prison.
Please understand the sacrifices he has made to help make us all safer. Please let him return to his family and his admirable work.

For peace and progress,

James C. van Pelt, President
Stanley Heller, Administrator

1 2 3 … 10