The Nuclear Resister networks the anti-nuclear and anti-war resistance movement while acting as a clearinghouse for information about contemporary nonviolent resistance to war and the nuclear threat. Our emphasis is on support for the women and men jailed for these actions. This blog is the online companion to the quarterly Nuclear Resister newsletter, a more comprehensive chronicle.
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Stand & Demand: Abolish Nuclear Weapons, Resist Lockheed Martin
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Photo by Leonard Eiger, Ground Zero Center for Nonviolent Action
from Ground Zero Center for Nonviolent Action
Activists blockaded the West Coast nuclear submarine base that would likely carry out a nuclear strike against the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea) should President Donald Trump give the order.
Naval Base Kitsap-Bangor, just 20 miles from Seattle, is home to the largest concentration of deployed nuclear weapons in the U.S. More than 1,300 nuclear warheads are deployed on Trident D-5 missiles on the eight ballistic missile submarines based at Bangor or stored at Strategic Weapons Facility Pacific (SWFPAC) at the Bangor base.
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Hiroshima Day at the White House, Photo by Felton Davis
by Art Laffin
On August 9 from 12:30-1:30 p.m., about 30 people from the faith-based peace community in D.C., Virginia and Maryland, held a witness of repentance at the Pentagon to commemorate the 72nd anniversary of the U.S. nuclear bombing of Nagasaki.
Displaying a lead sign saying “U.S. Nuclear Bombing of Nagasaki, August, 9, 1945 – Repent,” and carrying other disarmament signs and photos of the carnage and victims of the atomic bombings, we processed from Army-Navy Drive to the police designated protest zone, which is located in an enclosed space with a bicycle fence on the southeast corner of the Pentagon near the south parking lot. Once at the site, we encountered numerous Pentagon police and security as well as some Pentagon workers. Bill Frankel-Streit and Eric Martin proceeded past the protest zone and were told by police that they could not continue further or remain on the sidewalk. When they refused to comply with an order to go into the designated protest area after several warnings they were placed under arrest.
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Photo by Leon Vo
from Marylia Kelley
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Los Angeles Catholic Worker Photo
from the Los Angeles Catholic Worker
On Saturday, August 5, the Los Angeles Catholic Worker joined the Guadalupe Catholic Worker and others in a prayerful witness at Vandenberg Air Force Base commemorating the 72nd anniversary of the U.S. atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and calling for the elimination of ICBM missile testing, nuclear weapons, and U.S. imperial war-making.
Three Los Angeles Catholic Workers – Jeff Dietrich, Mike Wisniewski, and Karan Benton – were faced with arrest for “ban and bar” violations if they did not immediately leave the protest area. (They had each received ban and bar letters after previous arrests at the base.) Jeff and Mike chose to leave rather than face arrest, while Karan refused to leave. She was immediately arrested, cited for trespass and later released facing a future court date and certain jail time.
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Jerry Zawada on March 6, 2016 at Pacific Life Community gathering, Photo by Felice Cohen-Joppa
Fr. Jerry Zawada OFM – nuclear resister, peace and justice activist, Franciscan friar – died on the morning of July 25 at the age of 80. Jerry served his early years as a Franciscan priest in the Philippines, and later worked with the homeless, war refugees and survivors of torture in Chicago, Milwaukee, Mexico, Las Vegas, Tucson and elsewhere. Jerry was imprisoned for two years in the late 1980s for repeated trespass at nuclear missile silos in the midwest; served three six-month prison sentences (2001, 2003, 2005) for trespass at the School of the Americas in Fort Benning Georgia, and two months in prison in 2007 after crossing the line to protest torture training at Fort Huachuca, Arizona. A few years ago, his advocacy for and celebration of mass with women priests earned a disciplinary letter from the Vatican.
He never stopped standing up and speaking out for a peaceful, just and nuclear-free world, even when in recent years he slowed down physically and wasn’t quite sure how fast his legs would carry him. His life will remain an example and inspiration to so many – those who knew and loved him, and those he never had an opportunity to meet.
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Activists prepare to enter Büchel Air Base in Büchel, Germany to challenge U.S. nuclear weapons deployment. From left, Bonnie Urfer, Steve Baggarly, Susan Crane, John LaForge and Gerd Buentzly. (photo by Ralph Hutchison)
An international group of five peace activists got far inside the Büchel Air Base in Büchel, Germany, after nightfall on Monday, July 17, 2017, and for the first time in a 21-year-long series of protests against the deployment of U.S. B61 thermonuclear bombs there, climbed on top of one large bunker used for nuclear weapons. After cutting through two exterior fences and two more fences surrounding the large earth-covered bunkers, the five spent more than one hour unnoticed sitting on the bunker. No notice of the group was taken until after two of them climbed down to write “DISARM” on the bunker’s metal front door, setting off an alarm. Surrounded by vehicles and guards searching on foot with flashlights, the five eventually alerted guards to their presence by singing, causing the guards to look up. The internationals were eventually taken into custody more than two hours after entering the base.
Photo by Bonnie Urfer
from Ralph Hutchison
A delegation of eleven U.S. citizens joined with activists from China, Russia, Germany, Mexico, The Netherlands, Belgium and Britain at a peace encampment at the German airbase in Büchel, Germany, where U.S. B61 bombs are deployed.
On Sunday, July 16, following the celebration of a Christian liturgy, Dutch and U.S. citizens removed the fence blocking the main entrance to the airbase and proceeded on site, the Dutch delegation carrying bread for a “Bread Not Bombs” action and the U.S. delegation carrying the text of the Nuclear Ban Treaty passed on July 7 at the United Nations in New York City.
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Photo by Art Laffin
from the National Campaign for Nonviolent Resistance
In Washington, D.C. on July 12 – the 200th anniversary of Henry David Thoreau’s birth – six anti-war activists with the National Campaign for Nonviolent Resistance (NCNR) and several supporters visited both the Senate and House Office Buildings. They first went to Room 317 in the Russell Office Building to deliver a petition to Sen. Mitch McConnell (scroll down to read petition). A staffer graciously accepted the petition, and indicated that it would be delivered to someone in the office who works on military spending.
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Trident Ploughshares photo
from Trident Ploughshares
A group of four protesters blocked the main route to the base by lying in the roadway joined to each other through “lock-on” tubes while a different group, in carnival costume, occupied an alternative access route. Access to the base via these roads was blocked for over two hours. The “lock-on” group was eventually removed by police and the four arrested on a charge of breach of the peace. Those arrested were Esa Noresvuo (26) and Kaj Raninen, both from Helsinki, Peter Anderson (60), from Wales, and Jamie Watson (35), from Glasgow.
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