USS Phillip Berrigqn Launched as Counter to Latest Aegis Destroyer
by Jack Bussell
Several hundred peace activists departed Library Park, Bath, Maine, at 9:30
AM, August 9th, for the front gates of Bath Iron Works to present an
alternative to another weapon of mass destruction. It was a peace procession
quite unlike any other seen in this area. Led off by a "Swords into
Plowshares" banner, followed by a large native American drum played by six
people, and six giant peace doves floating above the procession, carried by
18 stalwart folks, Washington St became, at least for a short while, the
road to peace.
Hosted by Maine Veterans for Peace, the ceremony began with a speech by
Bruce Gagnon, coordinator of Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear
Power in Space. Then Kathy Kelly, of Voices In The Wilderness spoke,
followed by Liz McAllister, a Plowshares activist from Baltimore's Jonah
House. All urged a halt in production of weapons of war. Maine's Raging
Grannies contributed several songs. We. the Convergence, then "launched" the
peace ship, USS Philip Berrigan. It was decorated by over 200 people, and
loaded with food, medicine, dolls, and flowers. There were statements of
peace and love, poems and prayers for those Iraqis who are dying due to U.S.
aggression, and for our soldiers, our sons and daughters, dying in the
hundreds, who will die in the thousands, when Depleted Uranium poisoning
takes effect. Christine James and Molly Willcox dedicated this new flagship
of Maine's Peace Navy.
Just before 10 AM, Bath police arrested 13 activists, who had positioned
themselves at the front gate of BIW, and charged them with "criminal
trespass."
Baseball Fans For Peace dropped a 60-foot banner, "Why More Weapons," from
the Route 1 bridge over the Kennebec River. At 10:55 AM, to the beat of a
large drum and a countdown from the drummers, the Convergence went silent
and everyone fell to the ground remembering those people who died in
Nagasaki, Japan, on that fiery morning 58 years ago on August 9. A Buddhist
bell was rung in the midst of the silence. At 11:30, we had our closing
circle and dispersed.
Bath Iron Works, a shipyard that has the professional capability and
capacity to produce for peace has chosen to build for war in the form of the
Aegis Weapons System, a $900 million piece of equipment whose only function
is to kill or destroy. This nuclear-capable Arleigh Burke class destroyer,
the USS Momsen, is the 42nd to be built, with 19 more planned. On board are
56 nuclear-capable Tomahawk cruise missiles, each with a 250-kiloton
warhead. This is the equivalent of 933 Hiroshimas or 700 Nagasakis on board
one ship. In contrast, the U.S. Navy has two hospital ships.
Sadly, BIW chose to "christen," in effect, bless, this ship. Blasphemous in
the extreme, it is a message to the world that "God is on our side."
Nagasaki was the center of Japanese Christianity, and ground zero was the
Catholic cathedral. Seventy-five thousand souls died immediately in the
blast and another 75,000 suffered lingering and painful deaths from
radiation, wounds and burns. The second and even more serious message of the
launch was that if the U.S. Navy is willing to insult its ally, Japan, by
"christening" a weapon of mass destruction on the same hour and day that the
United States bombed Nagasaki, just think about what it will do to countries
that are not our allies.
Nine hundred million dollars for one warship while thousands of Maine school
children go to school hungry. Forty-two nuclear-capable warships while
senior citizens have to make choices between food and medicine, and the only
well-paying jobs for organized labor are within the military-industrial
complex, building whatever horrific weapon our Department of War thinks up
next. It is time, past time, to abolish war, to stop the killing, to bring
our sons and daughters home from the killing fields, forever.
Jack and Fay Bussell work with Maine Veterans For Peace.
Back to Peace Talk Index, Fall,
2003