OREPA NEWS MARCH 2020 oak ridge environmental peace alliance • p o box 5743, oak ridge, tn 37831 • www.orepa.org STOP THE NEW NUCLEAR ARMS RACE W hen Beatrice Fihn, director of the Interna- Geneva, Switzerland, will speak about campus tional Campaaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, connections to the bomb and will share a report accepted the 2017 Nobel Peace Prize, she said, on the various universities and colleges in the “Those who say a future without nuclear weap- US who have a hand in weapons production. New Tools ons is impossible need to get out of the way of Jackie Cabasso, Mayors for Peace Coordina- for those who are making it a reality.” tor in the United States, will describe campaigns At Stop the New Nuclear Arms Race, an to get local government and other political Disarmament international conference sponsored by OREPA, powers to support the Ban Treaty; K A Garlick, Activists The Nuclear Resister, and Nukewatch, you can coordinator of an effort in Fremantle, Australia, meet some of those people. Not the ones getting will explain how their campaign got a major city out of the way—the ones making it real. on board. WHEN WORKSHOPS Susan Crane from the Redwood City Catho- May 22-25, 2020 lic Worker in California, and Marion Küpker, Seth Shelden, ICAN’s liaison to the United director of the Büchel ist Uberall campaign in Nations, will be there, explaining the effect the Germany, will lead a workshop on resistance WHERE Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons is efforts. already having, even before it enters into force. The point of the conference is threefold: Maryville College Ardeth Platte and Carol Gilbert will join Seth to • To learn what tools are available and hear Maryville, TN tell how they are using the Ban Treaty to spark how they are being used effectively; conversations with military officers, base com- • To meet colleagues from around the world manders, and public officials around the world. who are working on nuclear disarmament; REGISTER Susi Snyder, director of PAX, The Neth- • To provide opportunities for collaborative erlands, will lead a workshop, complete with work with our global allies. by APRIL 24 remarkable success stories, about the Don’t Bank at orepa.org on the Bomb campaign and its focus on press- THE TIMING ing corporations and financial institutions to Coronavirus fears aside, and we hope they withdraw support for nuclear weapons activities. will be sidelined by the end of May, the timing of Alicia Sanders-Sakre, from ICAN in the conference could not be better. Even as the forces for nuclear disarmament are 122 non-nuclear armed states. rallying around the Ban Treaty and its promise of a The Conference and the virus When the Ban Treaty achieves fifty world free of nuclear weapons, the nuclear powers ratifications (it has 35 to date), it will are doubling down on their bombs and missiles, For now, we are monitoring officially enter into force. At that time, increasing funding for exotic new weapons and despite their disavowal of the Treaty, walking away from arms control treaties. developments with COVID-19. nuclear weapons states will come This year marks 75 years since the Bomb was under increased pressure to hear and first used; the Trinity test in New Mexico and the The outlook for the end of accommodate the consensus of the destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, devastat- May will be clearer by mid- rest of the world. ing as they were, were only harbingers of far greater April. With the luxury of Much of that pressure will come from us, the citizens living in nuclear threats to come. time, we are taking a wait- With the passage of time, fewer and fewer first- weapons states, or countries like hand witnesses to the power of the Bomb survive to and-see attitude. As we reach Germany and The Netherlands that tell us their stories. One of them, Hideko Tamura, a decision point, we will have US nuclear weapons deployed on will join the Stop the New Nuclear Arms Race con- consider travel restrictions, their soil, or countries like Australia that continue to mine uranium, and ference vie Skype to convey the clear and unequivo- the resilience of the virus, the cal message of the hibakusha, “Never again!” countries that are under the “security This simple and powerful demand is at the heart success (or not) of contain- umbrella” of nuclear weapons states. ment efforts, and additional of the new abolition movement growing around COME TO MARYVILLE the world. Efforts to understand the humanitarian information about risks. impacts of nuclear weapons only underscore the The purpose of the conference in compelling nature of the hibakusha’s call. If human- In the end, health and safety this pivotal year, when media will be ity is to survive, more inclined to examine nuclear will be our primary guiding we must listen to weapons issues, is to focus on the factors. We will post further The Oak Ridge Environmental them and respond future and to redouble our efforts to Peace Alliance is a 501(c)(3) with urgency. updates on the conference create the world we want to raise our grassroots nonprofit organiza- This year web page and facebook. children and grandchildren in—a tion working to educate and also marks fifty world free of nuclear weapons. organize people about nuclear years since the Information about Stop the New weapons production in Oak Treaty on the Nuclear Arms Race is available on Ridge, Tennessee. We advocate Nonproliferation of Nuclear OREPA’s web site; you can also register for the conference there. an end to weapons production Weapons (NPT) entered into Space is limited, and registration closes on April 24, so don’t delay. and we work to create and force. Unless postponed due to OREPA, Nukewatch and The Nuclear Resister have worked hard nurture nonviolent community in East Tennessee. coronavirus fears, in April, na- to keep costs at a bare minimum, and some scholarships are avail- OREPA News is printed four tions of the world will convene able for Next Generation (under 30) activists. times a year in Knoxville, TN and at the United Nations to review In addition to the workshops described above, we will published on-line at orepa.org. that Treaty and to confront celebrate forty years of Nukewatch, the Nuclear Resister, and the Contributions to OREPA’s the reality that fifty years have Plowshares movement. John Schuchardt, participant in the first work may be sent to P O Box passed since the nuclear weap- Plowshares action at King of Prussia, PA, will help us celebrate. 5743, Oak Ridge, TN 37831 or ons states promised to pursue And on Monday morning, May 25, we will go to Oak Ridge may be made securely on-line at in good faith complete nuclear for a march and a nonviolent demonstration at the gates of the OREPA’s web site. disarmament at an early date. Y-12 Nuclear Weapons Complex, where the US currently pro- You can draw a direct line duces thermonuclear cores for nuclear warheads—and where from the failure of those states the $6.5 billion Uranium Processing Facility bomb plant that will to keep their promise to the manufacture nuclear weapons components for decades to come is passage of the Ban Treaty by being built. We can’t spell OREPA without U Okay, technically, we can. Let that be the newsletter, fund the UPF lawsuit, or a lesson about borrowing someone else’s help underwrite the International Confer- fundraising slogan. ence—we can’t do it without resources. What we can’t do, though, is continue Gifts to OREPA are tax deductible. our work without your help. We depend on Please use the envelope included with the donations from our supporters to do this newsletter—or, if you prefer, you can give work—whether it’s paying to print and mail on-line at orepa.org. OREPA News • 2 • March 2020 Trump budget includes 25% increase for nuclear weapons • $53 million for new trident nuclear warhead concept • $750 million for UPF bomb plant construction • $1.4 billion for 2 plutonium pit bomb plants • money for dismantlement, cleanup slashed sometimes, when it comes to nuclear head of the US Strategic Command, would not weapons, talk really is cheap. For instance, in give the committee a straight answer. How could the budget request submitted to Congress in he? Since 2003, Congress has prohibited the February, the National Nuclear Security Ad- production of new nuclear weapons without a ministration says “Weapons dismantlement specific request from the Secretary of Energy and Disposition is a critical element of NNSA’s and an authorization by Congress. integrated effort to transform the enterprise and Budgets reveal priorities. The budget the the stockpile.” President has sent to Congress makes clear that Dig into the budget numbers, and you’ll cleaning up the legacy of contamination spread see just how critical dismantling old nuclear across the nuclear weapons complex, seeping warheads is. Here’s what you’ll find: the NNSA is into groundwater at multiple sites, in abandoned proposing an 11% cut in dismantlement activi- buildings that pose “an ever-increasing risk to ties for next year, to a total of $50 million. That workers and the public” according to a DOE is three tenths of one percent Inspector General’s report, is not a priority. of the entire NNSA bud- Money for cleaning up contamination and get—and one tenth of one protecting the public will be slashed by 20% percent of the Department of ($1.3 billion less than last year) if the President’s Energy’s budget.